Few months back, there was a guest article by best-selling author Scott Fox[of Internet Riches fame] on Internet Riches for Indian Entrepreneurs[articles here & here]. This time we review Scott’s new book e-Riches 2.0

A short review
Let me start off with one of the best reasons to read the book – “Today your customers are online, even if your business has nothing to do with the Net, computers or Technology. To keep up with the competition, you need to promote what you sell by using the latest online marketing techniques to interact with your customers”. This is where e-Riches can help you to use the medium of the internet to establish your brand, make money and outsmart your competitors.

In depth review
It does not matter whether you are a web startup since this book covers a broad range of topics which might be helpful to four kinds of people

1. A corporate marketer or agency employee
2. A small business owner or partner
3. E-business curious and
4. Worried about your financial future.

In the current economic situation, most of the people can be put under the category[4] and internet can definitely be an alternative source of generating some income. This is where e-Riches 2.0 comes in very handy since it covers the various aspects of Web 2.0 and beyond. Also, even if you are not able to earn online, the book would definitely help you/your business to create an effective brand.

It touches upon the various aspects of the Web namely -

1. Email marketing
2. Social Media Marketing
3. Importance and usage of mediums like Blogs and Microblogs
4. New online Public Relations[PR] and Promotion tools
5. Online broadcasting [How to use Video Marketing]
6. What makes a winning online marketing strategy

Most interesting chapters
Although the entire book was quite interesting to read, few of chapters entered in my favorites category. They are -

Social network marketing
Whether you are Web startup or not, Social Networks have become very important since, all the conversation about your brand is happening there. Many times, I hear that we are not internet-savvy & hence you become unaware about what is being told about you as a person/your company. This is where this chapter comes in handy since it touches upon all the aspects of SN Marketing namely -

• Why should you/your startup use Social Networking.
• Which Social Networking medium is best for your business.
• Strategies for success in Social Networking.
• Quick start guide for guys who are new to this medium.

Era of Blogging and Micro-Blogging
Everyone [or should I say most of us] know what is a Blog, but how many of us use the medium effectively.This is where this can be an excellent starting point if you want to use Blogging to reach the right set of people and to promote your business. It explains the Do(s) and Don’t(s) of blogging and touches upon each & every corner of the medium.

Microblogging especially Twitter has now proved an effective medium for marketing and the chapter talks on Twitter for Personal use as well as for business use.This complete chapter was a delight to read !!!

Who should read e-Riches 2.0?
If you are already quite acquainted with the Web and the various aspects of Marketing, this book would help you with some important pointers which can be used in your daily routine. However, if you are new to this entire Web arena, e-Riches could turn out to be an excellent starting point of your journey.

What else could it have?
1. The chapter on Twitter could have been a bit more exhaustive and should have included some interesting tweets on how businesses are using that medium. A small Q&A with few business owners could have made a huge difference giving it a more dialogue oriented approach.

2. Though Facebook had a huge mention in the book, Orkut was left far behind. Some more detailed analysis on how Orkut could be used a marketing machine would have been insightful [Note-Orkut is hugely popular in India though Facebook is catching up ...]

My personal learning
It has been long[4.5 years] since I am blogging. I have been thinking of booking my own domain[which would stand as my own brand] but had been delaying for a quite a long time.

After reading Scott’s book, I understood personal branding in a much better way & have now registered ThoughtsPrevail

Final Words on e-Riches 2.0
As stated before, it could be an excellent starting point or an excellent resource for detailed reference on some of the activities that you perform on the Web.

My personal thanks to Scott Fox for including my Facebook profile[as his Fan] in his book.Scott, if blogging wouldn’t have been there, we wouldn’t have connected with each other !!!

In continuation to the previous article by Scott Fox , author of the best selling book Internet Riches[who is the Guest Writer on this blog]; let us now look at the remaining two factors that would help to create more online opportunities for Entrepreneurs in India.

Note:

“I” in the article refers to Scott Fox.

4. India’s English Triple Advantage: 

With their greater literacy in English, Indian entrepreneurs can continue to capture a greater share of English-speaking customer dollars than entrepreneurs from other countries like China.

This linguistic advantage is important because it allows Indian startups to:

• Compete on a global basis by more easily marketing their e-commerce products and services outside of India into affluent English-speaking markets worldwide.
• Take advantage of proven e-commerce platforms from the U.S. for use in India. Services like Google’s Adsense, Paypal, eBay, Elance, and many others are all available to English-speaking Indian entrepreneurs today, at least for imitation and research if not outright deployment in Indian markets.
• Access the huge amount of technical and strategy information available in English online. Many of the most important lessons learned by American entrepreneurs are well documented online and often available for free. This expertise includes technical documents, the U.S. Patent Office libraries, community forums of all sorts, and even thousands of free email newsletters and e-courses [like those I offer at ScottFox.com] that teach many of the e-business revolution’s tactical innovations for free.

5. Anyone Can Play Online: 

Perhaps most exciting about the E-Business Revolution is the liberation of the creativity of non-traditional entrepreneurs. With little capital required, low risk, and worldwide reach, the World Wide Web offers economic opportunity to a wider class of people, including the disenfranchised, the physically disabled or house-bound, and lower socio-economic classes, than ever before in history. Particular opportunities are emerging to serve youth markets [with more than half of the Indian population under the age of 25], and women [only 23% of Internet users in India are female], for example.

As previous online innovations like eBay, YouTube, Facebook, and CraigsList have demonstrated in the U.S. , it’s difficult to predict how new platforms for commerce and communication can empower people. Today e-commerce’s egalitarian approach to allowing participation and making money is increasingly available to inspire bursts of creativity from Indian entrepreneurs. Additionally, it’s easy to foresee dramatic advances, including the establishment of new billion-dollar companies dedicated to serving the unique needs of previously underserved sectors of Indian society.

Increasingly, the only entry requirements into the race for internet riches are a broadband connection, creativity, and some hard work. As discussed in my book, Internet Riches, and with free updates by email from my blogs at ScottFox.com , I look forward to helping nurture this coming tidal wave of achievement too. I am excited to see the innovative, profitable, and inspiring ways that Indian entrepreneurs of all kinds will find to respond to the opportunities offered by the e-business revolution.

With this closing remark from Scott, I would like to thank Scott for being a guest author on ThoughtsPrevail and hope to see him back in the near future !!!

With Internet growing leaps and bounds in India, the number of online opportunities for entrepreneurs have also grown as well.The growth of internet penetration in India has opened up new doors for Part-preneurs [My terminology for a person who is yet to completely take the entrepreneurial plunge but works on his venture part-time so that one day he can pursue his dreams full-time].

To tell us more about these opportunities, there would have been no better person than Scott Fox, more about him below.

About Scott Fox:

Scott Fox is the Author of Internet Riches, the worldwide best-selling guide to how anyone can use the Internet to start their own business, even without much money or technology. He blogs and offers free email newsletters about e-business success, entrepreneurship, and online marketing advice on his website.
This article is divided into two parts so, without much wait, let us see what Scott has to say about India and opportunities for Indian entrepreneurs online.

Note:
“I” in the article refers to Scott Fox.Before we start, my heartful thanks to Scott for being a guest writer on ThoughtsPrevail.

Internet riches for Indian Entrepreneurs – I
Today the Internet offers to Indian entrepreneurs even more potential for e-commerce success than was available in the U.S. in the 1990′s.

The waves of broadband penetration and low cost e-commerce tools that led to mass adoption of the Internet in the United States are now reaching Indian shores. Although millions of Indians have been online for years, millions more are just beginning to gain access to the global digital marketplace. Most are still connecting at dial-up modem speeds but broadband penetration in India doubled again in 2007. And while the early adopters of e-business in India mirror those of the U.S., these waves have also broadened their reach during the time and distance they have traveled from the U.S. to India to include more people, more kinds of people, and new platforms like mobile phones.

Its huge population alone suggests that India should be an economic superpower. Usually this massive population is viewed as a potentially profitable consumer market to be exploited. I would prefer to see India’s people as a massive natural resource that smart entrepreneurs can leverage to achieve huge financial success. Current challenges in providing basic services like electricity and water will be overcome, and India’s astounding continued economic growth rate offers major opportunities to a new wave of Indian e-commerce start-ups today.

At least 5 factors[with two mentioned in the next article] will combine in India to create exciting new markets and unprecedented millionaire-making opportunities for a new generation of Indian entrepreneurs.

1. Capitalism without Capital:
The low cost of entry for starting a business online is unprecedented. The costs of a PC, broadband connection, and especially the education to put them to work remain significant obstacles. But these foundations of e-commerce success are still so much less expensive than erecting a bricks-and-mortar business that small business ownership is increasingly within the reach of millions who have not fully participated in the economy previously.

2. Low Risk:
Because the e-business revolution so reduces the need for start-up capital, it is much less risky. By starting small online, millions of new Indian entrepreneurs will find that they can build their own businesses without leaving their current jobs, mortgaging their personal assets, or otherwise unduly risking their futures. This ease of market entry introduces increased potential competition but also allows rapid product development iteration, customer feedback, and online market testing to accelerate the success of winning ventures.

3. New Local Market Innovations:
Internet-delivered local services and advertising are sure to spread in India even faster than they emerged in the U.S. Years of U.S. and EU innovation in web site and mobile phone-based services will benefit localization business efforts by Indian entrepreneurs, helping them speedily deploy new tools [whether invented in India or imported] to profitably serve their vast domestic market.

I hope that you found insights from Scott useful as well as interesting.You would find the continuing part in the next article.

Reader Contribution:
Get updated Motivation Quotes by Scott Fox using this Google Gadget by Manish Panchmatia