Entrepreneurship in the Downstream Petroleum Industries By Labi Francis Onuformi Department of Gas Engineering University of Portharcourt,PMB 5323 Portharcourt- Nigeria

INTRODUCTION FOCUS BUSINESS PLAN CONCLUSION

Entrepreneurship in the downstream petroleum industries has to do with the refining, marketing and distribution of petroleum products to satisfy customer needs. Every enterprise seeks to make profit by the exchange of value which in the case of the downstream sector of the petroleum industries are oils and lubricants such as compressor oils, industrial oils, Grease, Hydraulic fluids, power engine oils, turbine oils and hydraulic fluids which add value to customers.

Our focus is going to be on the marketing and distribution of these products to customers through the use of the internet. In 2004 the number of internet users was 910,060,180 and in 2014 the number increased to 2,925,249, 355 and at least 35% use petroleum products from live stats. This shows that petroleum products can be marketed with ease to these users.

The first step is to have an online oil store e.g. (examples of online stores are jumia and konga but deal in electronics, clothing’s and other accessories) and put all our oil products (e.g. oando oil) online.. The online store will have a payment gateway such as paypal, mastercard and others for customers to pay online to get their products delivered to their door post by delivery and shipping companies. These oil store will be serving the whole world since live stats shows that 48.4% of Asians use the internet, 21.8% Americans, 19% Europeans and 9.6% Africans use the internet.

COST OF SET UP FOR START UP 1.THE WEBSITE 20,000 2.PRODUCT 100,000 3.PAYMENT GATE WAY 150,000 4.STAFF SALARY (4 PERSONS) 100,000 5.DISTRIBUTION COST 100,000 TOTAL 470,000 OUR TARGET MARKET WILL BE FOR THOSE WHO STAY IN PORTHARCOURT GRA FOR EASE OF DELIVERY OF THESE PRODUCTS AND WE BELIEVE WE WOULD GROW TO SERVICE THE WHOLE WORLD BY HOME DELIVERY.

QUESTIONS AN ENTREPRENEUR ASK HIMSELF. WHERE IS THE MONEY WHO IS WITH THE MONEY HOW DO WE REACH HIM WHAT DO WE SAY WHEN WE REACH HIM The Internet answers the 3 rd Question

The site will also attract, convert visitors to customers and also retain and grow them by having a membership portal for all the customers’.These customers will be given a monthly newsletter of our products. The site will also be promoted by using the giant social network Facebook since 1,320 billion persons use Facebook.

CONCLUSION Bill Gates said “ Any Business that does not have an online presence will not thrive in this Generation, that is why the online oil store will be an opportunity for graduates to start up since it has a very cost of starting up. It took radio broadcasters 38 years to reach an audience of 50 million, television 13 years, and the Internet just four

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