PayPal Stories Archive

A new spirit of entrepreneurial-ism is quickly spreading across Southeast Asia. Big strides in e-commerce and technology have changed the game, affording individuals and small businesses the resources and know-how to build a thriving business and turn a profit without significant initial funding.

 

This new breed of self-starters comes in many shapes but are all driven by a strong passion. A tour guide can turn a love of history into a micro business, a person with disabilities can start up a wheel chair business and even a young kid can turn their favorite recipe into their own online cookie shop. The bottom line is if you have a passion, the opportunity is at hand to turn it into a successful business.

 

Back in the day, building a successful business required a lot of people, resources and legwork. No matter how clever your product or service was, you needed the expertise and investment to bring a vision to life.

Nowadays, getting started is a lot easier. A small business can arm itself with powerful, easy-to-use online tools and resources that can effectively communicate its mission, help build its brand, and provide a ready-made platform to sell its products. It's a new DIY culture driven by technological innovation.

With a little creativity, focus and drive, you can turn your passion into big profit.

 

We've gathered some free and low-cost tools and resources that can help you to get started:

 

Even if you start very small, you will need a logo. It helps communicate your company's unique identity and gives the business credibility. Try out some of these inexpensive options for creating your logo: 99Design, Fiverr or Designcrowd.

 

A homepage is your company's online storefront. A website is an inexpensive way to self-market and communicate your product or service. Setting up a website does not have to be a big project. No need to hire designers or coders. With tools like Squarespace,Wix or Weebly, you can create websites in minutes and do not even have to host them yourself.

 

Online stores do not need to be complex solutions that require heavy tech support and teams of programmers. If you plan to sell your products online, try Shopify, Prestashop or the WordPress eStore PlugIn. With these shopping cart systems you can easily showcase your products and offer customers an easy purchase experience.

 

On the one hand, you should offer your customers an easy payment process that is secure and trustworthy. On the other hand, you have to find a payment provider that makes it easy to get started. A simple, easily accessible payment service provider is the right choice when you start out. Of course, we recommend PayPal.

 

You do not have to be an expert when it comes to accounting. Tools such as Wave, Freshbooks or Kashoo can help you organize your financials and keep an overview of invoices, expenses and payrolls.

 

Once you're all set up, you'll need to get the word out about your business. A good starting place could be setting up a page on Facebook with some information about your business and your products. You can easily run some Facebook ads to build a community and generate traffic to your site. Email is a powerful medium to keep in touch with your customers and prospects. We recommend creating a simple email program to keep people updated on your products and promotions. MailChimp is an excellent email tool, and it's totally free for up to 2000 subscribers.

 

The technical barriers to set up a business have become much more manageable. Using the right technology will help save you money and time - so you can fully focus on the vision for your small business.