One of the top reasons people decide against starting, building, and running their own online business is out of fear of not having the computer “techie” knowledge they need.

Fair enough really, I mean without the understanding of what it really takes in this “digital day and age” to get an online business up and running, the thought of things such as website design, linking products to your pages, and using social media to promote yourself can be very overwhelming.

The reason I emphasized, “digital day and age” is due to the fact we now live in an age where technology has advanced so much that even a person with very basic computer skills can get a basic website up and running in no time at all.

 

So if your fear is not being able to do the “tech” stuff, then it’s time to smash it.

Learning online marketing with SFM means you only need to be able to do 3 things on your computer to get started:

 

• Copy and Paste
• Use search engines (Google and YouTube)
• Type and send an email

 

Yep, that’s it

 

Sure, later down the track you will need to learn a few other skills, but that is then. All we need to do is focus on the now so you can get started on your journey to online marketing success. When the time comes, SFM will teach you further computer skills, or direct you to where you will learn them. When all else fails, you can learn anything on YouTube (hence the reason being able to use search engines becomes so valuable).

 

Let’s Start With My Best Friend, Copy and Paste.

Why is Cut and Paste my best friend? Because out of all the 3 “techie” things we need to know to set up and run our online businesses, this is the one I use most. I’m sure when you get started with your online business, it will be your best friend too.

1. Firstly, using your mouse or touchpad, highlight the word, code, paragraph, or page you’d like to copy.
2. Next, hold down either the Ctrl key (on a Microsoft PC) or the command key(On a Mac) and press the letter C. This tells your computer to copy whatever you have highlighted.
3. Place your cursor wherever it is you’d like to paste what you have copied.
4. Hold down either the ctrl key or the command key and press the letter V. You should see your “copy” appear.

 

Ctrl C is Copy and Ctrl V is Paste on a Microsoft computer

Command C is Copy and Command V is Paste on a Mac computer

 

 

My Next Favourite “Tech” Skill Is Using Search Engines

It’s inevitable. You will run into times where you’ll just get stuck on how to do the “stuff” you need to do to make progress with your online business. When you want immediate answers, it’s easier to look for them on a search engine. Knowing how to look for answers to your questions on Google or Youtube will be your savior during those sticky moments of your online journey.

Before using search engines to find information, I recommend downloading Google Chrome as your web browser ( you might wait until you read about using Youtube a little bit further down the page)

Why? ‘Cos it’s fast, really fast. SFM also recommends Google Chrome for watching their webinars, live broadcasts, and live training sessions.

Once you have Google Chrome installed it’s time to learn how to search for the information you need on Google.

I highly recommend entering the things you want to search for using Google Chrome in the top toolbar (as shown in the image below). It’s a lot more efficient 😉

 

Just type what you are interested in finding out information about into the top search bar. When using the top toolbar you’ll see suggestions begin to appear. You can ignore them, but, if you think they will be useful, click on the one you like to save some typing.

 

Youtube.com

Using YouTube as a search engine is great when you need to learn how to do something because you are actually shown how to do things via video footage.

To use YouTube simply type youtube.com into your Google browser and hit your Enter button.

 

This will open YouTube.

You can then type what you are searching for in the search box at the top of the screen (situated beside the YouTube logo), hit your enter button, and wallah – you will be presented with an assortment of video choices to choose from. Pretty cool huh.

 

 

I was never a huge Youtube user before starting my online business, but now I swear by it when I need to learn something fast.

Now that you know how to use Google and Youtube, why not practice using them by delving deeper into how to cut and paste, use search engines efficiently, and you could even get ahead of me by searching for information on how to type and send emails specific to your email service.

 

 

And Last, But Certainly Not Least, Is Typing And Sending Emails

There are so many email services out there these days so I am going to show you the email service SFM recommends, that being Gmail.

Now that you have Google Chrome downloaded and set as your default browser, you will notice the word Gmail towards the top right-hand side of the Google Chrome screen.

 

Click on this “Gmail” icon.

You may be directed to open a Gmail account if you do not already have one, so go ahead and follow the prompts.

 

Once you’ve created your account, it’s time to type and send your emails.

Click on the COMPOSE button at the top left-hand side of the screen. Once you click on the button a box will appear on your screen where you can construct your email. You will see the following (with the exception of my name – your name will be there instead).

 

The section next to “To” at the top of the box is where you put the person’s email address you wish to send an email to.

There is also a space to type the subject of your email.

Under the section for your subject is a large area where you can type your email message.

To send your email, click on the blue “Send” button at the bottom left-hand side of the box..

The other icons are for various other tasks – why not use Youtube to learn more.

 

Final Words

If a lack of knowledge of computer skills is your main concern about starting your own online marketing business, this blog should now have you feeling confident enough to take the plunge. I’m certainly no pro when it comes to tech skills. Ideally, I would have loved to have inserted some of my own educational videos within this blog (I haven’t mastered videoing my computer screen as yet). And that’s my whole point, you do not need to know how to do everything when you learn how to start your own online business, especially if you choose the right online marketing education provider – hint, hint 🙂