Course Description

Do you fear being left behind the Internet explosion? Don?t know how or where to start? How much richer would your life be if you operated your own business? Take the online step-by-step class that includes how-to mentoring. Topics include: Identifying web businesses that do well - How to conduct market research on your idea - Adding shopping carts and secure shopping for free - Get your Web site online - Strategies on getting others to pay you for advertising - How to bring traffic to your site - Winning the search engine game. No additional fee or purchases will be necessary to complete your project. Read lessons, participate in exercises, and hold live interactive discussions with instructor Gary Fugere and fellow students in your on-line classroom. Runs for 6 weeks and is self-paced. Complete the lessons on your own timetable. Course requirements include intermediate PC skills. For more information visit www.gsinet.org. Don?t forget to include your email with registration.

Course Outline

Friday, Lesson 2
Myth vs. Reality ~ If you believe what you see and hear about the Internet you are going to be very misinformed. We are going to look at the pluses and minuses of the Internet. We'll also explore tools to get you to start thinking "out of the box".

Week Two
Tuesday, Lesson 3
Supply and Demand ~ In this lesson we'll look at the history of e-commerce and see if we can identify the successes and failures among the various Internet strategies. 

Friday, Lesson 4
HTML De-mystified ~ In this lesson we'll eliminate the urban myth surrounding Web site development. By the end of this lesson your first Web site will be up and live on the Internet.

Week Three
Tuesday, Lesson 5
Effective Web Design-Everything you ever wanted to know about Web design, but were afraid to ask. Content, navigation, graphics, typefaces.

Friday, Lesson 6
Selling Advertising, Affiliates and Hyperlinks-A web site can make a living for you without ever selling a product or service. Here is where we are going to examine how.

Week Four  
Tuesday, Lesson 7
Conducting Market Research-In this lesson we are going to focus on making a good decision about which product or service is right for you.

Friday, Lesson 8
Winning The Search Engine Game-We can do everything right and still lose if we don't understand how search engines can make or break your site.

Week Five  
Tuesday, Lesson 9
Show Me The Money-In this lesson we'll examine all of the financial issues, including: shopping cart systems, and obtaining credit card merchant accounts.

Friday, Lesson 10
The Back Room-This lesson we'll cover all of the nitty gritty stuff of managing an Internet business, storefronts, order handling, shipping, third-party distribution, product pricing, etc. etc.

Week Six  
Tuesday, Lesson 11
Getting your business set up-Here we will look into all of the red tape of getting into business. Things like organizational structure, taxes, business names, domain names and a whole host of stuff that is important to understand.

Friday, Lesson 12
Promoting Your Site To The World-There are literally hundreds of free ways to get your web site noticed. In this final lesson we are going to explore some of them.