Stumbling blocks on the road to internet business success

One of the most common questions to be raised on forums and message boards around the Internet is about how to succeed online working from home.

Those people who have built successful online businesses will not hesitate to tell you that the Internet is a good thing and the majority of what they say will be positive, even when pointing out the stumbling blocks on the path to success. The reason for this is that many of the most successful Internet marketers sell products specifically for people who want to know how to make money online. Obviously, those entrepreneurs will write with a degree of bias in the positive direction when it comes to describing the potential for success of an online business. So you should be aware of the bias when searching online for information about setting up an Internet business because there can often be an inherent conflict of interest in the things that Internet entrepreneurs tell you.

Have you noticed how you seldom read about how it might be disadvantageous to get involved in an online business? Yet, there are definite disadvantages to starting an online business that anybody who is thinking about working from home on the Internet should take into account. Some of these "stumbling blocks to Internet business success" are discussed below.

First and foremost, there is the distraction factor. More often than not people who set up their own online businesses do so from home. But when you work from home you can find any number of distractions that will take you away from developing your online business. Television is a major culprit here. Next, the kitchen offers many temptations, whether it is taking a coffee break or making a snack instead of keeping your nose to the Internet grindstone. When you work from home, your bed is close to hand and so you may be tempted to lie in of a morning or to take a "quick nap" in the afternoon - you know, one of those "naps" that turns into a four hour sleep-fest! The backyard on a sunny day will also tempt you away from your computer.

All these distractions can cause people to stop concentrating on the many individual jobs that need to be done in order to make progress with an online business. Self-discipline and concentration are the keys to online business success because they are the motors that will drive you on to achieving your immediate and long term Internet business goals.

Offline distractions can be stumbling blocks to success, but actually they are just the tip of the iceberg. Let's be honest about it, a lot of online business work is tedious and repetitive, so it is easy to tire and get distracted. You know how some company employees escape from the tedium of their desk work by taking time out to play computer games? Well, just imagine how much easier it is for you if you are working at home on an online business with no boss breathing down your neck. Without self-discipline and focus, you'd be sunk before you even got started and that is not going to do anyone any good; least of all you.

As well as the distractions I have mentioned, there is also the competitive nature of online business to take into account. If you intend to establish yourself in a particular niche market, it is very likely that are there are already a large bunch of people who got there before you. When it comes to online business, the big guys can crush the small fry a lot easier than traditional offline big businesses can crush small ones. Competitors don't hesitate to discredit each other and in the end everyone is primarily interested in selling their products to make a profit. The Internet is a cut-throat arena in which to operate and those who aren't aware of this factor get flattened the fastest.

So, clearly, there are several disadvantages to setting up an online business. But that is not to say that working online cannot be profitable; far from it. The Internet is a great enabler. With self-discipline and focus you will be able to reach people via the Internet that it would have been impossible to reach via traditional marketing methods. Suddenly, much of the world's population is just a mouse-click away and it is especially for that reason that you need to keep in mind the downside to online business as well as the huge upside potential that is there for those who keep their eyes on the ball and know how to negotiate those stumbling blocks to success.