An online business is one which you can run online. Think of any business that involves you finding customers online, receiving payments and making delivery of goods and services online. It simply is a business that you could do over an internet platform. Your customers find you online, they make payments to you while you deliver whatever it is you are being paid for.

Opportunity

According to a recent global study of internet penetration Nigeria has roughly 9% of its over 150 million people connected to the internet, that translates to roughly 14 million people. There are 5 million Nigerians on facebook and over 3 million on twitter. More than 900,000 Nigerians are registered users on Nairaland to mention a few online market places where it’s possible to showcase goods and services to an online audience here in Nigeria. The market is enormous but to tap into this opportunity, you’ll have to do what many brick and mortar businesses can’t do or are not offering. For instance price, can you offer a high value product for less than average price? Also consider rare commodities. Products that are hard to find in many shops can also be sold online. Some people are doing good business online in Nigeria selling cakes through their websites, designer shoes, bags and even cars.

Challenges

The major challenges with doing online business in Nigeria are Trust, payment method and shipping/delivery. First how do you win the trust of Nigerians to buy what you are offering? That is the main challenge, if you can overcome the trust issue then you still have to find a convenient and safe method of processing payment. Will people pay you by direct bank deposit or electronically? Also consider how to deliver the goods to the end user. How long will he/she have to wait to receive his/her goods? Which method of delivery will you use to deliver the goods? Then the idea of doing business online in Nigeria is also relatively new as not many Nigerians are keen on patronizing online merchants but that doesn’t mean there are no opportunities.

Startup Requirements

A professionally designed website

A website is your online shop. It’s what you use to display your goods and services to the world to appreciate and patronize. If you really want to make money through your website then it must be professionally designed and made to look like what any serious business will own. A good website starts from N15’000

Online Marketing Tools

In this era of people being active on social media; facebook, twitter, nairaland and so on it would be a sin not to have marketing tools to help you penetrate this market. You need to have a facebook page, a blog and an account on twitter and nairaland if you want to exploit the marketing opportunities. If you don’t have the time or know the turf, you can hire someone to do your online marketing for you, they come with various titles such as; social media manager, web content marketer or Social media consultant and so on.

Learn about more business Ideas in Nigeria here: http://lagosbusinesses..com/2012/08/how-to-start-online-business-in-nigeria.html