EVE Online at Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMOG Gamers to the Next Level!

Tonight is the final phase of the Tyrannis Expansion. In it, planetary Command Centers are finally going to be available for purchase and use. With them, vast portions of EVE Online's player base will begin their own planet-side production businesses. In order to facilitate this, we have listed four basic ways to improve a business model in EVE Online. Read on, and learn how you can optimize your business to produce more ISK.

1. Network With Other Industrialists

Networking with other traders is a critical skill for any industrialist in EVE Online.

The more you work with other industrialists and businessmen, the more your businesses will succeed. There are basically endless ways to profit from interfacing with other businessmen. Some ideas:

Form a local cartel to lock out other producers. Raise your prices en masse to squeeze every last ISK from your target market.

Procure large amounts of minerals or other materials in order to get a bulk discount. Most people are happy to shave a bit off the price in exchange for flipping all of their stock at once.

If a producer of a major commodity like minerals or advanced tech two materials can't keep his goods priced competitively on the market, he will have to sell to buy orders, taking a price hit in the process. Plenty of producers will be happy to sell to their friends somewhere between sell and buy orders.

Cartels, bulk order discounts, outsource aspects of your business plan to other groups, connect with a hauling corporation. I use Red Frog Industries, who are kind of a hauling institution in EVE Online, but there is plenty of competition and also the open courier contract market.

2. Join A Corporation

This ties in with the networking described above, and is essentially its ultimate form. A corporation can share resources, like blueprints and blueprint copies, certain re-usable invention parts, exploration sites that are not needed, and so forth.

A corporation is also a trusty personnel pool. If you need two people for a project, it is much better to grab somebody that you know, trust, and have associated with at length, than to grab some random schmooze out of local.

Corporations are also good ways to learn more about EVE Online, including trade secrets. Many market tricks can be profitably exploited by more than one person, and who better to share the wealth with, than corp-mates? Many of the most profitable projects that I have tried were tips from friends in my corporation.

Shared labor is also a perk. If both you and a fellow in your corporation are making a freighter run to and from Jita every day, it may be more effective to have one of you move goods for the both of you.