The Filipino Entrepreneur

One of the most effective and convenient way to handle cash is in the Philippines nowadays is through Globe G-Cash. It’s the closest thing to paypal, credit cards and EPS of BPI express. If you have an online business that caters local customers, I think this is the best option. Compared to all credit card processing companies, paypal is the easiest way and cheapest way to set up your payment processing but if your customers are mostly local, it will eat away a lot of your overhead cost. Because if you are using paypal, it will charge 3.4%+US$0.30 (this is the highest rate) of the amount transferred to your paypal account using credit cards. But even if the transaction is paypal to paypal and if you will transfer your paypal fund to your local bank account, paypal will charge php50 and the local bank will charge php150 for every transaction. This will not be a problem if the amount of your transactions are tens of thousands of pesos because it will compensate the cost. The only problem here is if your customer is using other network like Smart or Sun for example but buying an extra Globe sim won’t hurt your pocket if you are not a Globe user.

If the money involved is very modest, lets say hundreds or a few thousand pesos then the transaction charges is too much. G-Cash can be considered as an electronic wallet and a poor man’s payment processor to accept payments. For example, if you are selling stuffs on ebay, you can accept payment by G-Cash and you can deposit it to your BPI savings or current account using your cellphone. You can also convert GCash to cash or vice versa by going to Globe Business Center or to an accredited GCASH Partner.

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I’m writing this post not because I totally disagree that blogging is the easiest way to have an online presence. Yes it’s true that it’s the easiest way because there are blog site that will host your blog for free like Blogger.com and Wordpress.com. And if you want to be serious on blogging, you can register a domain name and install a wordpress software to build your blog site. Just beware from folks out there that will tell you that it’s “Blogs are officially the easiest, fastest and most pain-less way to start your online business…”

Building business online needs traffic or visitors. But if someone on the net will tell you if you will just buy their book or register on their online classes and promises something like “I will teach you to have tons of traffic on your website or blog site in 3 days etc. etc.” then you should think twice. You know, in my experience, having traffic on your website is the hardest part of building an online presence. Some were very lucky because they chose a niche that they really love to do and many people have interest in that niche. But some did the opposite, they chose a niche which they are not sure they like and thought many people will like that niche, so in turn very few people visit their blog site.

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Media have it’s magic, it will make something awful really nice because of good publicity. It’s really hard to become popular in the internet but in television you can attract a lot of visitors. Maybe that is a quick way for a blogger to become famous by exposing themselves thru those kinds of media and also by using magazines telling all those things that they are so and so famous about their craft.

I didn’t mean all of them are fake but there are some who are really famous like for example Abe Olandes of Yugatech. But there are some who like to show themselves as a hot shot or something which makes people curios and creates some kind of doubt to other bloggers in the blog sphere if those really are famous and if their websites receives lots of traffic and earns a lot of money.

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Thinking of making your website or blog WAP compliant? It looks like it is easier said than done. Imagine, how will you fit the PC monitor screen to a cell phone screen? Those tiny LCD cellphone screen can’t possibly fit in it, that is, if you will put everything in it. If you are using your cell phone to browse non WAP blogs and websites, you can still view the whole page but you have to zoom-in and zoom-out in order for you to read the contents. It’s not possible to load the whole page in a cell phone’s browser because the letters are too tiny and will not show properly. A WAP compliant or mobile website have slim lined(eliminated the non necessary contents) the webpage and just put the important contents in a small mobile website.

If you own a website (a non blog site) with thousands of pages, for example: static html pages, it will take a long time for you to convert all those pages. But if you own a hosted blog, then lucky for you because it will only take you a few minutes just installing a plug-in. This will only work in a hosted Wordpress blog. I don’t know if the free wordpress blog can use plugins because I haven’t tried it. If you like to make your blog WAP compliant, you can download the plugin here. The plugin is created by Alex King and if you are willing to donate, it’s better so we can help our fellow entrepreneur create more wonderful plugins.

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News about the acquisition of Yahoo! by Microsoft is all over the internet and they say that this is due to Bill Gates wanting to compete with Google in online domination. And it will be purchased for US$44 billion dollars approximately. But just looking at the situation, the reason why Yahoo! is shrinking is due to the fact that more than 3/4 of search engine market was already dominated by Google (see Fig 1 below). And even if they merge it will have not much impact on Google. Yes Microsoft dominates the software industry but internet is a different thing. Although Internet explorer is the most popular browser in the world, still, it’s really the people themselves who will decide which search engine to use unless IE browsers have a built in blocking plug-in that will block anything that comes from Google. But that idea will tarnish Microsoft’s reputation and Google will be in a win-win situation.

Fig 1. Read the rest of this entry »

Good news to all Paypal and eBay members in the Philippines. Today I when opened my mailbox I got an email from Paypal that I can now add my local bank account to my Paypal account. Yes it’s true! and only Philippines and Indonesian Paypal members were granted permission to include a local peso or rupiah bank account. Maybe other countries in South East Asia not yet given this privilege will follow later. Another thing, withdrawing your funds to your local bank account is cheaper compared to credit cards. Remember last year Paypal announced that credit cards holders outside the USA can withdraw funds using their credit cards? But it cost US$5 per withdrawal. In transferring your funds from Paypal to your local bank account it only cost 50 pesos if the amount you will withdraw is below 7,000 pesos. Above or equal that amount, it cost nothing! as in FREE!

I think will help many internet entrepreneurs in the Philippines like online store owners, eBay sellers, affiliate marketers or those OFW which can transfer their remittances with very little cost and might revolutionize e-commerce in the Philippines.

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Many of our fellow Filipinos has already entered the world of e-commerce and we see such successful ventures as Pinoy Delikasi, Divisoria.com, Kabayan Central, K9 Couture and others I seem to forgot already. Those online businesses have passed through the seemingly impossible business on the web selling goods via the internet. Why impossible? First, when you observe online businesses in the U.S., most of them target their customers within the country because that is convenient to them. The standard of living compared to the Philippines is miles apart. So many people there have a better purchasing power and with that, you can assume that many people are credit card holders. Why credit cards are important? In online business, that’s the easiest mode of payment to hasten the transactions. Also, Paypal have contributed much in the development of eCommerce. By using only your email address, you can send or receive money online.

But still, the availability is primarily in the U.S. and if you don’t have a credit card, you still need a U.S. bank account to fund your account for your purchase or shop online. So in the U.S. or maybe in other industrialized countries like Europe, it’s not impossible to establish an online business. In fact, most brick and mortar (Physical business) businesses there are curling up due to the booming of e-commerce. It is cheaper than renting a space, hiring a salesman and paying for utilities which will balloon your overhead expenses and you can also sell your products cheaper. The buyer is also the one who pays for the shipping cost. And not to mention, some shrewd customers just go to the physical store to see the actual item and use the salesman’s time for inquiries then go home and buy on the internet.

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There is one important ingredient of a successful blogger and that is a trait of being “Yourself”. In my observation, famous bloggers like Darren Rowse (Problogger), Shoemoney, John Chow and Steve Pavlina all have this trait in common which makes them very successful. Their writing styles have a personal touch on the audience and it’s like they are casually conversing with an individual that is why visitors are quickly attracted to them. So what does it really mean? Those two words look very simple but for me it’s hard to comprehend and to do.

Like for example, when I was still employed, I remember the day when I was having a conversation with my co-worker/friend in our department, he is telling me out loud to “Be Yourself!” No, he is not angry with me or anyone. He was just joking and teasing our jerk boss. I know the message is not for me but to our idiot boss because he is a great pretender, so to speak. He always acts that he is the smartest person in this office and always showing off to the management that he can do everything even though all of us know how incompetent he is. But little that I know that I’m also not being myself and pointing the finger to the other person. Why? Because the mere fact that I’m employed and working for somebody else means I’m not myself anymore. I’m doing a job that someone is telling me to do and acting on a position that was given to me.

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To those who were not familiar with this feature, this is a special link on the bottom of Google adsense advertisements posted to websites. On the Inside Adsense blog: Farewell Onsite Advertiser Sign-up , it was announced that they already removed this feature. Although this is a great idea to gather and invite advertisers to sign-up, placing it on the ads itself is obviously not effecitive. Why? simple. It is not themed to the majority of the ads shown. Adsense promotes the relevancy of the ads to the theme or content of the site so visitors will be enticed to click on the ads. That’s the primary purpose of online advertising.

To the vast majority of websites, I think not every website is relevant to advestising on a PPC (pay per click) and if a visitor is willing to advertise on the site visited, his or her first thought is direct advertising. But when the visitor clicks on it he is redirected to Adwords to sign-up and have to learn the complexities of contextual advertising. So the visitor backs out. Unlike the simple transaction of placing a banner or a text link on the site itself. ( To see the clearer picture, read the discussion on Webmaster World ) But on the contrary, still contextual advertising like Adwords is the best way in online advertising.

I want to share with you a newsletter from Mike Litman. An inspiring letter about his failure to success story and his discovery of the power of the internet. Many of us have dreams and there is no easy way to achieve success. Yes I admit that there are people who were lucky enough that they chose the right direction from the very start and many took a long route to success. Maybe that is what we call destiny. Anyway here is Mike Litman’s newsletter titles “How I Raised Myself From Failure To Financial Success”:

Lito,

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