33 of 34 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
A book clearly written for an audience that is TOTALLY ignorant about doing business online and won't mind reading valuless text, December 20, 2007
This review is from: Open an Online Business in 10 Days (Paperback)
It has finally happened. After writing close to 300 book reviews on Amazon (I have three profiles as of this writing), I have finally come across a book I hate. I never thought it would happen. I've always privately questioned the other reviewers on Amazon who hit a book with a 1-star. Now I think I know the feeling they have. :(
This book was supposed to teach me EVERYTHING I need to know about starting and running my online business. It was supposed to provide recipes for success, hazard roadmaps, and interviews from successful dot com builders (it did provide interviews). Basically, this book was supposed to explain to me what it takes to build an online business that will grow and succeed. The goal supposedly was to give me the tools and knowledge needed to emerge a victor online.
I found some value in the following chapters:
3. Getting funded
5. Web site building 101
6 Host your site
7. Managing your business
8. Knowing your customers
11. Web site traffic builders
12. Cashing in on affiliate programs
14. Secrets of search engines
17. Customer service for success
I found little value in the following chapters:
9. The scoop on B2B e-commerce
16. Tapping international markets
19. ID theft, credit card fraud, and more bad stuff
And I found no value in the following chapters:
1. The Internet gold rush
2. Moving from a brick-and-mortar to an online store
4. Dot com dreams?
20. Time for an upgrade
21. A tour of the Web
10. e-Chat with Dawn Lepore
13. e-Chat with Pete Cobb
15. e-Chat with Howard Tong
18. e-Chat with Reed Hastings
22. e-Chat with Bruce Weinberg
23. e-Chats included in Appendix
This book seems to take the attitude that a Web site is a business. In reality, and the way I view things, a Web site is just a tool for a business to use to make money. The title to this book suggests that it was going to explain how to OPEN an online business in 10 days. I should have known there was something very wrong with this book by just reading its title. I knew and I know that an online business can be opened in less than a few hours. All it takes is to pay a Web site hosting service for a domain name and space on its servers and then upload a few Web pages into that space. Voila! You have opened an online business.
But how do you make the online business successful? Well, you need a business plan. You need some know-how. And you need some resources. When I looked in this book I didn't find much on these subjects. Sure, there was some coverage in the chapters I list above as having some value. But the content included in these chapters was less-than. For example, Chapter 3 mentions business plans. But anybody who knows anything about business plans will say what the heck is the author talking about. Another example, Chapter 6 covers hosting your site. So wouldn't it be logical for the author to explain the offerings most hosting services offer to the entrepreneur wanting to use their services? Obvious, right? Well, no such coverage in this book. Instead, the author talks about signing up with eBay or Yahoo!
And online businesses don't all sell the same thing. Some sell products, and some sell services. This book hardly differentiates the two basic types of businesses. I could go on and on how this book was a waste of paper and ink. Maybe 8 or 9 years ago there was a place for it. But not now. Don't waste your money on it. 1 star!
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24 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Good read, better than the Dummies books, May 7, 2007
This review is from: Open an Online Business in 10 Days (Paperback)
I'd been looking for some good books about online entrepreneurship, and this book was recommended to me by my brother-in-law, who made several million dollars as an early employee of AOL, then started a comparative shopping site that got bought by eBay or somebody. Anyway, I asked him to help me get started online, and he suggested I do some homework before putting together a business plan.
What I like about this book is that it's to-the-point (one problem I have with the "Dummies" series of books is that they contain a lot of fluff and humorous anecdotes, and I want a more straightforward read). It also has interesting interviews with real businesspeople who discuss the challenges of starting a new venture.
While opening an online business in 10 days is a rather ambitious goal (and the author Melissa Campanelli, who writes the "Net Profits" column for Entrepreneur magazine, acknowledges some of the challenges involved in launching a new venture), it is possible to find out-of-the-box technology that used to cost 5 to 10 times as much just a few years ago, including back-end database integration, transaction processing, dynamic Web page generation, user tracking and Web usage statistics, shopping cart creation, cross-selling and up-selling products and services, etc.
The action steps and checklists are also helpful, particularly since I tend to procrastinate. At least this book helped me to understand what kinds of things I need to think about. In other words, I'm not going to quit my day job at the research lab just yet....
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22 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very readable, with good info for entrepreneurs, March 8, 2007
This review is from: Open an Online Business in 10 Days (Paperback)
This book is a great introduction to online entrepreneurship. Having been through the Internet's boom and bust period of 1995-2000, I still think there are plenty of opportunities to start a new business online, as I see all around me. This book has interesting checklists and action steps that guide you through the process of developing a workable business plan. It also has interviews with a variety of Internet entrepreneurs, including the people who built NetFlix into a DVD rental service that took on Blockbuster (of course, it remains to be seen how NetFlix will survive when Verizon and other phone companies start putting a bigger library of on-demand movies on the Web). As this book highlights, the Internet is still rewarding visionaries who harness its power of niche advertising, marketing, and distribution--look at the newly minted billionaires who started the highly addictive YouTube! YouTube caught everyone at the major media companies completely off-guard. It's amazing no one at Time Warner or Viacom had the vision to figure out a business model that primarily features people's videos. I'm very much a techie, and this book helped me to understand the marketing side of an online business. Get this book and get out there running a business! Peace.
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