Topic selection
Project
Students will focus on learning about and developing their own online information-based business. Students are not required to bring any products of their own into the business development process. Each student is required to produce information about a particular niche area of interest. This information is posted on a web site and a blog created by the student. All work is done individually. No group work is required or allowed.
These information-based web pages and blog posts form the basis of the online business. Traffic to these businesses is created and monitored using search engine registrations, ezine database article submissions, inbound lines (links to the students webpages from other online sources), niche related outbound links (links from the students web pages to other web pages related to the same area of interest), page counters and analytics.
A student's online business is established on the Internet and accessible using normal search engine procedures. Student then attempt to make their business profitable through a monetization process. This monetization process includes: posting advertisements on their web pages, promoting physical products available through affiliate relationships, asking for donations, promoting physical products created using CafePress, and promoting the sale of ebooks created by the student.
The project is divided into four milestones with measureable deliverables. Comprehensive and clear expectations will be distributed in class as the term progresses.
Assignment 1 - Topic Selection
Most people who are just starting out in creating an online business make the mistake of looking for a product first, and a market second.
To boost your chances of success, start with a market. The trick is to find a group of people who are searching for a solution to a problem but not finding many results. They must be looking for a solution to a problem in a topic area that you know about or you are interested in learning about. The internet makes this kind of market research easy.
1. 1.Visit online forums to see what questions people ask and what problems they are trying to solve.
2. 2.Do keyword research to find keywords that a lot of people are searching, but for which not many sites are competing.
3. 3.Check out your potential competitors by visiting their sites and taking note of what they are doing to fill the demand. Then you can use what you have learned and create a product for a market that already exists - and do it better than the competition!
This deliverable is worth 5% of your overall class mark. The deliverable for this assignment will be 1 - 2 pages long (plus title page and appendices) and will be submitted to ACORN
The main deliverable will be an executive summary of what your research has found. The details of your research will be supplied in the appendices. The rubric provides details on what is expected.
Remember: you are developing an information based business. No product should be required to make your business financially successful.