Home topics start-up-entrepreneur eCommerce Startup eCommerce The top 4 questions you must ask before you build your online business Bernadette Schwerdtis May 16, 2018 For the last two years I have had the pleasure of being on the judging panel for the ORIAs, the Online Retailers Industry Awards. They’re like the Oscars, but for online business. Being a judge, I get to read all the award applications and see what’s ‘under the hood’, so to speak, of how these entrepreneurs took their start-ups from zero to hero. Let me tell you, reading those applications was like getting a PhD in entrepreneurship, digital marketing and web development, all at once. I learnt so much I wrote a book about it but the key lesson I took from that experience is that great entrepreneurs ask great questions, especially at the start of their entrepreneurial journey. Get these right and the journey will not only be smoother and more enjoyable, it’ll be more profitable more quickly. Here are the top four questions every start-up entrepreneur must ask before they spend a cent: What do you want? Getting clear about what you want the business to do for you is key and will determine every decision you make thereafter. First up, do you want a lifestyle business that enables you to be a digital nomad, work when and where you like and earn enough to fund your tuk-tuk travels and addiction to Matcha? Or do you want to build a global empire, grace the