Away from huge amounts of money, large human efforts, and the exhausting corporate systems that are often employed for investment processes or business establishment, we turn to the gateway of electronic investment and small-scale projects that rely on the internet for their activities and expansion. These projects are characterized by their low capital, ease of establishment, and minimal workforce.
Investment can involve creating an entirely new project, entering into a partnership in an existing one, or even buying a project outright from someone else. There are various concepts of investment, but what we’re focusing on here is investment on the internet and building small projects. I won’t delve into details now; instead, I’ll list some basic ideas that we might explore more deeply later.
So, what do we need to start a new project or invest in an existing one?
First – The Idea:
Try to find a new, unprecedented idea, or take a foreign concept and localize it. This doesn’t mean you can’t invest in or create websites that have been done before, but make sure to offer new features or innovations. If you want to invest in or enter a partnership in an existing project, make sure it’s a unique and exceptional project, at least from your perspective, and don’t be swayed by the marketing jargon used by the project’s original owner.
Second – Study and Documentation:
After you’ve decided on a particular idea and are eager to implement it, make sure to conduct a basic and preliminary study of the project. The length of the study will vary depending on the project; it could take weeks or months, or just a few days. This step is crucial for determining the strength and longevity of your project, as well as its chances of success or failure. Make sure to study the following aspects:
1. Type of project: Is it individual, joint, a team effort, or a corporate system?
2. Cost of the project: Depending on its type, size, shape, and system.
3. Timeline: The time from planning to execution on the ground.
4. Field study: This includes studying the market environment, competitors, and their methods.
5. Task distribution: A crucial coordination point where you determine who will work on the project, their roles, and your own tasks.
Third – Starting the Project:
This step involves turning the project from paper into reality. Ensure you stick to a set work schedule after distributing tasks as we discussed earlier. Try to adhere to a simple and realistic work plan tailored to your project’s needs, rather than relying on generic schedules that might not suit your work. Keep track of the plan regularly, and if you discover any issues with your schedule, adjust it immediately. This will help you in future projects, making them more realistic and precise, based on documented experiences of both mistakes and successes.
Fourth – Don’t Launch or Announce Your Project Immediately:
The problem with some projects is announcing them immediately after completion without entering a trial phase. However, make sure not to prolong the trial period to the point where you become bored with the project and neglect it. This is a key point from personal experience; I worked on the iStock website for a long time and passed it through a prolonged trial period without actual and continuous testing. This led to two main issues: first, boredom with the project before launching, and second, the emergence of unexpected errors on the launch day. These issues can lead to a loss or decline in customer confidence, potentially resulting in partial or complete failure in the project’s most crucial stages.
Fifth – Don’t Allocate a Large Budget for Advertising:
A successful project should go through a phase where it markets itself before you start advertising it on websites, magazines, newspapers, and other media. This doesn’t mean that advertising as soon as the project launches is bad—in fact, it can be one of the pillars of its success. However, the project must go through an advertising phase, but preferably not at the very beginning for several reasons, the most important being:
• Ensuring its effectiveness, reliability, and that it is free of errors.
• Making sure the project is unique and monitoring visitor reactions in the early stages.
• Securing a certain number of volunteer customers who didn’t come to your site through an ad but stumbled upon it or visited it voluntarily. These are what we call volunteer customers.
Even when you decide to advertise, don’t allocate a large budget or advertise on the most expensive websites. Look for sites that match your site’s niche and are reasonably priced. Also, don’t advertise on all sites at once.
In Conclusion:
I’m sure I haven’t covered all the points related to investment or creating small online projects, nor have I delved deeply into them. But I also stress that these are fundamental points for starting your project, and you can’t overlook them when deciding to launch a new project.