10 Creative Online Business Opportunities

Maintaining a steady flow of revenues as a web worker is a major challenge. Whether you’re freelancing for an ever-changing group of clients or selling products to consumers, it can be tough to know whether you’re going to make ends meet month to month. Business comes in waves, so anything you can do to make your earnings more dependable will help you sleep better at night.

We’ve already shared lists of ways you can grow your income with creative online business opportunity ideas (check our posts from April and last January), and we’re happy to present a new list of ideas to help you on your journey for scoring more online gigs.

So much of what’s touted around the web as opportunities to make money online ends up with the opposite effect. We’ve done the hard part for you and checked out the reputations of these sites and business models for you. (We still recommend keeping your guard up and watching out for scammers interacting with users on these platforms, though.) Whether you want to offer your services using a niche online marketplace or monetize your existing assets, there’s plenty you can try!

1. Sell Your Own Swag

Are you an artist, designer, illustrator or doodler? Are you working with a brand that has a strong visual identity? Got ideas for clever imagery or witty words?

All you need is an image file with decent resolution, and you can easily make it available for purchase on the internet as a tee shirt, tote bag, mug, iPhone case or whatever else you can think of. CafePress is the most famous of the sites that’ll handle the printing, processing and shipping on your behalf, but there are plenty of others that have good reputations too, including MySoti, Printfection and Zazzle.

You don’t need to pay any fees at all to the platform you choose, since they only print when there’s an order – and you’ll earn commissions on every sale. So you can get creative and promote your products on your website, with a dedicated microsite, with ads on other sites, on social media, or wherever else you think you can generate sales.

2. Menial Clicks During Spare Time

Do you enjoy mindlessly scrolling, finding images, clicking, evaluating data, dragging, writing five-word descriptions or copy-pasting in your spare time? Businesses often need help with these types of tasks, and sometimes it’s cheaper or easier to crowdsource than to write bits of code to do the work.

That’s where marketplaces like Amazon’s Mechanical Turk and ShortTask come into play. Here you can take on nano-jobs that pay out a few cents each but are highly scalable and generally don’t require too much attention. Each marketplace has its own stipulations, culture and lingo, though, so be prepared for a bit of a learning curve.

3. Virtual Tutelage

Are you an expert in a niche area of knowledge? Can you teach someone to play baroque concertos on the ukulele? If someone has questions about how to store their power tools, can you give good advice on the fly?

There are dedicated web platforms where you can offer your services as an authoritative coach or tutor in exchange for money. Google’s relatively new Helpoutsis a full-on marketplace with video conferencing with customers, while Ether allows you to book paid appointments for phone consultations, with marketing handled by you offsite.

4. Drop Shipping for Risk-Free eCommerce

Drop shipping is a much-praised hybrid business model somewhere between eCommerce and affiliate marketing. Essentially, it allows you to sell other people’s products on websites that you manage, but with none of the risk. The vendor handles the billing, service and order fulfillment – all you need to do is drive the orders and you make commissions.

If you’ve built your website with Wix, you can easily add the 365 DropShip Product Catalog app to your website. There are zero costs involved, and you can earn commissions by hosting a full-on eCommerce-style shop on your site with products from several manufacturers and categories.

5. Leverage Your Social Influence

If you’ve got lots of Twitter followers who click on links you post, you can leverage this asset to make money by sending out sponsored tweets.

There are now several marketplaces where advertisers can post offers, includingTweetPeddler, ChurpChurp and SponsoredTweets. There’s a lot of volume in these directories, so you should be able to find offers to promote products that are relevant to your community of followers and won’t kill your social media credibility.

6. Niche Tourist Services

If you live somewhere that tourists flock to, you might be able to profit from the greater economic ecosystem that comes along with a robust tourism industry. While most travelers purchase solutions for lodging, transportation, eats and guided tours from mainstream, big companies, there are growing numbers of them who prefer to do business with independent locals – it’s often cheaper and more authentic.

If you don’t need your car every day you can rent it out with RelayRides. If you do regularly use your car, then you can offer people rides for money using Sidecar. You can also rent out your home, or part of it, using Airbnb, or offer quirky special interest tours of your locale on Vayable.

7. Cook and Host Dinners

Along similar lines, there are plenty of people who are interested in eating out but have grown tired with the anonymous, polished corporate flavors of restaurants. If you can cook up delicious and friendly dining experiences in your own home, it’s easier than ever to reach customers interested in joining you.

Marketplaces for home-hosted meals include EatWith, Cookening and HomeDine.

8. Sell Your Collectibles

Are your baseball cards from the 80′s collecting dust in your attic in a box next to your childhood Star Wars action figures? Are you unlikely to ever play that Santana album you have on vinyl ever again? You may have a hard time letting go of this stuff, but your life will feel lighter once you do. You can make decent money selling it, too.

Just take some photos, determine fair asking prices, post on Craigslist or eBay, and the inquiries from interested shoppers ought to come pouring in.

9. Offline Tasks via Online Marketplaces

People are posting one-off jobs in droves on platforms like Redbeacon andTaskRabbit, which means you can make extra money by running errands or performing handyman tasks for people in your spare time.

To pick up these gigs, you’ll need to pass a background check, so get started with building your profile with plenty of notice.

10. Review People’s Apps

If you’re a gadget junkie, gamer, tech tool lover or an early adopter, you’re likely to get a kick out of SoftwareJudge. Here you can get paid to try out recently launched apps and write what you think of them.

Social proof is a powerful force when it comes to app marketing, so publishers are willing to pay top dollar for your opinions – a quality review can earn you up to $50.

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How To Make Money On Youtube - Videos You MUST Make To Profit Massively ...

8 Home-Based Business Ideas That Pay

When starting your first business, it’s not always the smartest idea to dive in head first, especially if you don’t have the money or expertise (yet) to dominate a brand-new industry. Luckily, there are great home-based businesses not many people take advantage of early on in their careers that can provide the perfect launch pad. Why not start out small to make it big?

To learn more, we asked eight successful entrepreneurs from the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC):

Q. What’s one home-based business idea that aspiring entrepreneurs can use as a jumping-off point for something bigger?

Their best answers are below:

1. Start a Service-Based Business

Service-based businesses are a great jumping-off point for newer entrepreneurs. In college, I began a digital marketing company out of my apartment. It was a great business to start with because there was minimal overhead, and I used my network of independent contractors to expand my bandwidth and service offerings as needed. Use your business to generate revenue and build your network.
- Kevin Tighe II, WeBRAND

2. Sell Products on Etsy

If you’re crafty, make things at home and sell your handmade goods on Etsy. It’s free to set up an account and only costs $0.20 to list an item. If what you make is interesting, it can fetch a good price. It’s a great way to test the market for an item you make and want to turn into a real business. Clothes, jewelry, gifts and decorative items do particularly well.
- Matt Ehrlichman, Porch

MORE ALLBUSINESS: 

• The  Top 25 Home-Based Business Ideas
• 10 Web Sites Where You Should Have Your Company Profile Listed
• 25 Frequently Asked Questions on Starting a Business
• The 10 Most Creative New Business Ideas Out There

3. Build a Following

Start blogging, and build a following with your blog and social media networks. Having a blog not only makes you more influential as an entrepreneur, but it also makes it easier for you to establish yourself as a thought leader in the industry. Where is your passion: education, technology, startups, payments? Learn about that industry and write about it. Your idea might just come naturally!
- Sarah Ware, Markerly

4. Clean Homes With Green Techniques

If aspiring entrepreneurs want to target a more specific niche, they should try green home cleaning. This is a business that can literally be launched out of the trunk of a car without a huge amount of startup capital.
- Andrew Schrage, Money Crashers Personal Finance

5. Produce an E-book

Tim Ferris’ “The 4-Hour Workweek” was the first to showcase information products to the mass market as a viable way to generate cash. Today, there are innumerable success stories (e.g., Nathan Barry and Sacha Greif, Pat Flynn’s blog and Chris Guillebeau’s “The $100 Startup”). It can be a very fruitful path, but for some reason remains unknown to many.
- Michael Simpson, DJZ.

6. Start an eBay Store

One home-based business idea that I think is great for aspiring entrepreneurs to use as a jumping-off point is starting an eBay store. The site is extremely intuitive, and the cost of entry is cheap. Start in an area you feel knowledgeable, and start looking for deals. For instance, if you know about boats, you should start buying and selling small accessories that you would buy for yourself.
- Jay Wu, A Forever Recovery

7. Help Friends Sell Their Products

I’ve seen this model work particularly well on Etsy, but it also works on most e-commerce platforms. Everyone has friends with cool projects that they aren’t prepared to monetize themselves. You can quickly learn how to set up an online store and manage it for your friends, acting as their representative for a percentage of the store’s income. You can run several stores easily.
- Thursday Bram, Hyper Modern Consulting

8. Find Niche Online Communities

It’s easy to say Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn can help you find like-minded individuals and connect with your friends and acquaintances. But don’t you wish there was one place you could congregate with those same like-minded people who could get to know each other and have constructive conversations and build, share or do great stuff? That’s a killer idea worth pursuing.
- Danny Wong, Blank Label

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What is an Effective Internet Marketing Strategy?

If you’re still struggling to finally reach your financial independence & make a nice living from your home, then listen... The only reason why you’re failing is because you don’t have a good website marketing strategy.

If you ask any successful offline world entrepreneur how it’s possible to build a great business without a proper strategy, he’ll start laughing. But many internet marketing experts are trying to make money without even realizing what on earth they’re doing online…

If you believe that you can jump in, create a website, submit it to a few directories or blogs, sit down, relax & watch those thousands of dollars (that you’ve seen in many marketers’ checks) to come, then you need to stop right there. It ain’t gonna happen. You need to think: who you are and where do you want to be in the future. Whether offline or online, there are only two things that matter: “Buying” and “Selling”. Basically, to simplify, it all comes down to this:

• Who is your customer?
  What is he or she specifically looking for? You must know their problems or desires. You must be in their shoes and find out what is that would make them feel better (an offer).
  
• What is your offer?
  Why should they buy from you? How come you’re better than the rest? Why should they trust you? Are you offering your own or someone else’s product? How will you create an irresistible offer so they beg you to sell it to them?

Think about it… There are millions of people buying online every single day. If they’re not buying from you then whose fault is that - theirs or yours?

Before you even start creating internet marketing strategy for your website(s), you need to do a research. That’s where it all begins actually. Just like in any business, you have to understand where you are and what can you do.

#1 Phase - Online Research

In this phase, you must research your market. Who are your main competitors? What are they doing online? PPC, SEO, press releases, develop their own products, do affiliate marketing or Adsense? What are their weaknesses? Do they offer a guarantee? Is their product really good? Do they build links constantly or not?

Who is your favourite customer? Where do they hangout: MySpace or YouTube? Are they freebie seekers or desperate buyers? What forces them to buy one or another product? Read reviews, forums, testimonials to find out as much as you can about your target market.

#2 Phase – Data Analysis

If you’ve performed a thorough online market research, it’s time to systematize the data you have. Write down what are the main strengths and weaknesses of your competitors. Maybe you have more time than your competitors? Or maybe you know some targeted traffic source that others don’t. How might this affect your business?

Which are the places your target market usually visits? What are their main concerns? Maybe they’re not satisfied with the products in the market. Can offer something better, maybe in a form of a bonus? After that, you come to the next step, which is developing your internet marketing strategy.

#3 Phase – Strategy Development

When you already know your target market and your competitors, you are able to start creating your internet marketing strategy (or strategies). Just sit down and think about: who you are and what you can offer to the target market.

It involves a little bit of planning. What marketing methods you’ll use and which ones you can afford? PPC, SEO, email, blogging, podcasting, video blogging, webinars, viral traffic generation, link building, banner exchange or others…? You must prioritize your web marketing tactics. Find out what’s going to bring you positive ROI in the shortest time possible.

Do you have enough time to perform search engine optimization? If so, then sit and do everything you can, day in day out, to rank at the top in search engines. Don’t have time? Then buy PPC traffic and start testing your landing pages effectively. Or buy resell rights to products and sell them on ClickBank with the help of JV partners.

Don’t have time AND money? Then you better get one or another, otherwise you’re dead.

Seriously, you must find ways to get time or money. You need to think about how you can exploit other people’s time and money to build your own web business. That’s what rich people do and that’s what you must do if you want to survive in this competitive world.

#4 Phase – Monitoring Performance

When you have an internet marketing plan, you can start implementing it right away. The last step is to start monitoring your internet marketing campaigns. Which keywords people typed into search engines to find your site? Which keywords brought you the most money in PPC marketing? Are you satisfied with your SEO rankings or not? Do majority of your visitors leave your site without even spending 30 seconds? And so on…

Only with the help of close monitoring you can discover what works and what doesn’t. Testing landing pages, testing Adwords ads against each other (A/B split testing) can show you some amazing results. And remember – you never know for sure until you TEST it!

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Things you need to know about marketing (before starting a marketing campaign)

One of the core values I have is that I give the same advice to my clients as I would my best friend. So, here is some of my best advice.

1. You should only allocate a small amount of your budget on a web designer.

Let’s say you have allocated £2,500 for a new website build. You go to a web designer and tell them your budget and they build you a website for £2,500. What now? You expect orders to come in but that won’t happen. I have seen it hundreds of times.

A better option would be. Spend £1000 on getting your sales copy, web structure and architecture right first by a marketing specialist. Then, get the website built by a web designer for £300 (you can even get this bit outsourced offshore). Then spend the remaining £1200 on marketing and getting traffic to your website.

Once you start getting the traffic to your website you can gain traction and increase your revenue. You can start to split test your website to find out what appeals to your market best (all the most sophisticated companies test – you should be no different as I almost guarantee your competitors won’t be testing).

2. Concentrate on your point of difference

What is it the Dragons always ask on Dragons Den? Why are you different? Why should I invest in you? Why you?

What happens on X-factor when a woman dressed like Amy Winehouse comes onto the stage and sings Back to Black just as Amy would have done? She gets voted off even if she had an equal voice to Amy Winehouse.

One of the golden rules of business is that you need to be different. You don’t always need to be better – you just need a point of difference. This gives people the option of choosing (or not choosing) your services easier.

The worst mistake I see businesses make is getting a generic looking website with bland, uninspiring copy. Unfortunately, this is the case with most web design companies. Go to a web designer and they will try to please you with a design. They will ask you want you want and what you like. They will give you what you want NOT what you need.

Firstly, work on your point of difference and why people should use you. Then build your website built around that message. What you say is much more important than how you say it. What you say is much more important than how you say it (I said it twice because this is really, really important).

3. Your copy is king

A big mistake I see people make with their website is that they create their own content. This has become more of a problem now it is very easy to update your own website.

If your web designer gave you the job of ‘creating the copy’ then it can be a danger sign. After all, I wouldn’t feel confident in a car mechanic fixing my car and then telling me to perform the MOT test myself.

Copywriting will make or break your website. Your website should be a reflection of your best salesperson. Don’t do this yourself as you are too close to your services to be purely objective and copy writing is a skill. It is a very, very under valued skill and something most web designers leave out (getting you to do the copy increases profit margins).

4. If you want cheap – you will get cheap.

If you want a cheap website then go here (http://99designs.co.uk/web-design). It won’t generate you a return on investment and it will look like every other website out there but it will be cheap.

Don’t get me wrong. If you are a ‘run of the mill’ company then there are hundreds of ‘run of the mill’ web designers in every town in the UK. They will produce you a website you are happy with so you can tick the ‘get a website built’ box off your list. That is fine if that is what you are looking for.

If you are looking to grow your business then you need a more professional approach to your website. A better option is to get the experts in first to craft your sales message, website structure and point of difference and then use out sourced web designers (who are often better qualified but half the price of a UK designer).

5. Grab your visitors attention.

Do you remember the first time you saw a Volkswagen Beetle? How about a Concorde? How about an Ipad? All these things have one thing in common. They stood out and you remember them.

You need to stand out. You engage people through a website with copy, headlines and an easy to use website. These things don’t come about by accident. They are well thought and well crafted.

A well known marketing principle is the AIDA principle. This goes along the lines (in an over simplified way) of grabbing your visitors Attention, then engage their Interest and  buildingDesire through to finally asking them to take an Action (AIDA). This simple marketing principle can be applied with devastating effect on your website.

Use a marketing expert to consult and guide your web designer. Just like you would use an architect to consult builders on a building project.

Key takeaway point

Your prospective clients will judge you on your website whether you like it or not. They will determine what type of business you are, where you are positioned in the market and whether you are worth considering or not before they actually speak to you. Scary that isn’t it? But let’s be honest, we have all done it. You go to a website and you make a judgement call before you have even spoken to anybody in the company from the website.

Do not underestimate the power your website can have and chose your web team carefully.

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20 ideas to make money online

A cash cow for the enterprising, the Internet is littered with opportunities to make a fast buck. While it rarely qualifies as a solitary source of income, the Net can easily help you supplement it. However, the amount you earn depends on the time and effort invested. Go through these 20 options and find out which ones work for you.

Blogging
If you're a passionate closet writer who wants to be published but can't find a way to do so, make each keystroke your way to wealth by penning your own blog. Starting a blog doesn't require extensive technical skills but it's important that you have expertise in the field you are writing on. This will attract visitors to your site. Building a large following will enable you to earn profit by luring advertisers, writing paid reviews or getting commissions for promoting other people's products.

Paid Writing
If maintaining a blog is difficult for you but you still want to indulge your passion for writing, you can jot down articles for other blogs or sites such as Weblogs, Helium or PayPerPost. Writing an e-book can also be a good option. E-books are investment free, with no cost for printing and shipping. If you have a strong command over languages, you can become a copy editor, where Webmasters will pay you to read articles and correct grammatical errors, sentence fragments, etc.

e-tuitions/Webinars
The demand for tutors is high and growing. So, if you like helping others learn, e-teaching could be the earning ticket for you. All you need to become an online tutor is expertise in your subject and a few spare hours per week. TutorVista, e-tutor, SmartThinking and Tutor.com are some of the sites you can enroll with. If you gain a good reputation as a coach, you could even conduct Webinars-lectures or seminars transmitted over the Net. College and university students are willing to pay to gain entry to a well-respected Webinar.

Affilliate/Reseller
For those who have the knack of selling, one of the best ways to make money online is to become an affiliate/reseller. An affiliate is a person who gets a commission for selling every product that he promotes, whether on his Website or through any other avenue such as eBay. You don't have to own the product. You only need to sign up for an affiliate program with a company and start selling its products under your referral link. Firms such as Commission Junction or Click Bank have a large pool of products.

Buying/Selling domains
Buying and selling domain names is another way to make money from home and requires very little investment or time. You can buy domains at their registration prices or even cheaper and trade them at a profit. However, always research on sites such as sedo.co.uk, afternic.com, ebay.com or other domain auction sites to get an estimate of the hottest selling names. The best way to find good ones is to use terminated domain lists, which contain several expired names that are back in the pool.

Freelancing for Professionals
Freelancing is a great option for professionals who are experts in their respective trades and know how to ensure customer satisfaction. Various freelancing and project-oriented sites allow companies that need help to describe their projects. Freelancers and small businesses offer bids, ideas or proposals, from which the buyers can choose what they find most suitable. Websites such as Elance cover everything from programming and writing to data entry and design, while RentACoder focuses on software programming.

Advertising
You can sell space on your Website or blog for advertisements and you earn when these ads are clicked by visitors to your site. The sorting and placing of ads is free. The profitability of pay-per-click advertising depends on the traffic level of the Website and, most importantly, on the clickthrough rate and cost per click. Google AdSense is the most popular option, while others are BidVertiser, Text Link Ads and Blogads. Direct banner and RSS feed are some other forms of online advertising.

GPT Programme
GPT or Get-paid-to sites are becoming increasingly popular among teens. You get paid for signing up for free Websites, newsletters, playing games and filling out online surveys. These are suitable for people who don't have a skill set but want to earn extra money. Taking online surveys is simple- register with a few legitimate, paid survey sites and answer questions. The topics range from shopping to politics. This might not help you make a living, but you can earn good pocket money. Contests2win is one of the trusted GPT Websites.

Online Marketing
Once a Website is created and optimised for search engine (SEO), the SEM or Search Engine Marketing begins. A treasure trove lies hidden here. An SEO/SEM expert, who is responsible for marketing a Website, can promote it in various ways. These include article marketing, writing press releases, forum posting, blog posting, submitting your site to directories and search engines, social bookmarking, etc. Most companies don't do this in-house and pay you to conduct the SEM for them.

Making themes
As more and more people seek an online presence, the demand for Website templates and WordPress (Blog) themes will keep increasing. If you are good at Web designing and coding, you can earn a lot from designing Web themes. In this segment, there are mainstream Websites, such as TemplateMonster and ThemeForest, which act as a marketplace where you can sell your themes. Templates are sold and priced depending on the rights and features that are bundled with them.

Selling photos
If you enjoy photography and are good with a camera, you could be sitting on a huge reserve of revenue. There are people who will be interested in your collection of images. Nowadays, it's easy to take your photos to the public, providing a convenient way to build a secondary income stream. Many stock photo agencies, such as Fotolia, Dreamstime and Shutterstock, offer incentives for people to earn from their photos.

Support & service
Providing coding or fixing other Webmasters' issues is another great way to earn extra bucks. There are simple jobs ranging from adding a script to setting up sites, but knowledge of Web coding is essential. One can offer support for Web CMS (content management systems) like Drupal or Joomla. After you are comfortable with your own installation, you can help other people to set these up and configure them.

Stock/forex trading
Joining the stock/forex market may seem a bit risky. However, you can start small and continue researching till you gain experience in this area. Once you do, it will be easy to earn from exchanging foreign currencies and/or stocks. Their rates fluctuate depending on supply and demand, and economic and political influences in the world. The aim of any trader is to spot which currency/stock is likely to rise or fall in value against another. The more time you put in, the more you will earn.

Selling your own brand
If you have a flair for designing cool images, don't bother about creating your own inventory. As long as your design can be printed on a product, you can pocket some money. You can upload designs on various Websites such as CafePress, and if somebody orders these designs, the company will print them and distribute the products. It could be designs for T-shirts, hats, bags, books, posters, calendars, greeting cards, etc. You will receive a commission for each sale. Other such sites include Lulu and Zazzle.

Virtual Assistant
Small businesses always need help in running their processes, but may not be willing to hire a full-time employee. As a virtual assistant, you are expected to perform practically any administrative task that a traditional secretary or assistant would, such as make travel reservations, handle expense reimbursements or pay bills. You can do it from the comfort of your home, interacting with clients either online or by phone. Your expertise will decide how much moolah you rake in.

Inbound call centre
Many companies, who are facing space constraints, especially those in metro cities, prefer to hire workers outside their offices or outsource certain processes. You can set up an inbound call centre at home to handle such jobs. Research different companies that are outsourcing their work as they may have opportunities for inbound call centre agents. You can work for more than one company. This can be either a part-time or fulltime engagement, depending on your need.

You Tube
If there's a dramatic performer hidden inside you who craves applause and adulation, upload yourself on YouTube. You can be a filmmaker, musician or comedian who wants a wider audience. Your earnings will come from ads displayed on your video page. This process is similar to the pay-per-click advertising program common to other Websites and blogs. Sites such as Flixya and Mediaflix can be helpful in this regard.

Researching for others
Don't be morose if you can't write, design or code. Lack of talent cannot stop you from making money online. If you're willing to work hard for a few hours a week, you can take up simple research jobs for other people who don't have the time to do it themselves. You could search for opportunities in organisations that provide funding for research and offer to assist them through online investigation.

Building Applications
With smartphones gaining popularity, the demand for their applications, or apps as they are popularly known, has also shot up. There are over 3 million apps for the iPhone and over a million apps in Google's Android market. Most of these are selling like hot cakes. Developing and selling your own smartphone app is becoming a lucrative way to make money on the Internet. Apps cost virtually nothing to develop and entail no storage or shipping costs. So they enjoy the best profit margins.

Transcription
Medical transcription involves making written copies of oral material dictated by doctors or other medical experts. These may include history and physical reports, clinical notes, consultation notes, reports, letters, psychiatric evaluation and so on. The dictated material needs to be transcribed swiftly and accurately, which is the most challenging aspect of the job. To become a medical transcriptionist, you need to have a good knowledge of medical terminology and a high typing speed along with accuracy.

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8 reasons to start an online business and work from home

As always, I’ve probably missed all of the important ones! Feel free to add a comment if you run an online business or work from home and have something inspiring to share.

1. Avoid the office politics bulls#@t

Whenever I catch up with my real-world friends I find that the conversation always turns to how annoying their office is in one form or another. A bad co-worker, a micromanaging boss, not enough pay, etc.

The sad thing is, sometimes these issues are really quite serious. I know several people who have taken stress-leave after being pushed to the limits by managers or board directors. I know of people who get so depressed because they don’t see any way out in such a sub-optimal economic climate.

Well, when you run your own business you have a lot of other problems but you don’t have that one. You can choose who you work with and who works for you. You might have to put up with some annoying clients in the beginning but as you grow you can “filter” it all out.

2. Put your energy into your own asset

While you’re kissing the butt cheeks of that Michael Scott-style manager/owner you’re also working on someone else’s asset. It might even be his asset! That creative thinking and after hours sweat that you pour into your work does nothing for you in terms of ownership and equity.

Now this might be the entrepreneur in me but I find that idea really quite abhorrent. I’d rather work harder and earn less if it meant that I was building my own asset vs another guy/girl’s.

If you feel the urge to create something for yourself and see it grow or fail but do it because it was your own thing then the online space could be for you.

NOTE: This goes for starting a blog as well. Set it up on your own host instead of a free one so you are in complete control.

3. The internet is the modern Gold Rush

Now to some serious financial reasons. The internet is booming. And it has been booming for a long, long time. And if you start to think about stats like the fact that there are more smart phones on Earth than toothbrushes and that whole nations are moving to high speed fiber networks, you’d be wise to invest in the internet while it is growing so fast on so many platforms.

Please don’t take this to mean that making money on the internet is a really easy thing to do. It isn’t. I imagine it’s probably a bit easier than mining for gold (or bitcoins!) but it is still a lot of work.

The great thing about the internet is that you aren’t just doing one thing. There’s shops, forums, Apps, websites, blogs, software, tools, etc. You can jump on the rush and find something new or something to compete with.

4. The barriers to entry are really low

If you’ve ever been to an economics class you’ll hear a lot about barriers to entry. They present serious problems for many industries and even entire countries. Think about all the things you have to do if you want to start a physical business like a factory: get capital investment, purchase machines and vehicles, hire staff, get insurance… the list goes on.

Online businesses, on the other hand, have relatively low barriers to entry. You really just need a domain name and some hosting to get started. The major outlay, at least initially, is your own time. Sure, you can invest money and hire designers, coders, writers, marketers, etc. but you don’t have to.

This particular point means that you can start an online business while you’re still working and leave your job once it starts to take off.

5. You can be who you really want to be

I could be wrong but I don’t see many people who work in offices being themselves. You have to jump through so many hoops to please clients and seniors and usually that means doing or saying things that aren’t totally consistent with the person you’d like to be.

Well, when you work from home you can forget all of that. Don’t shave if you don’t want to. Don’t wear that pencil-skirt if you don’t want to. In fact, my friend Mayi Carles usually works in her pyjamas!

More importantly, working for yourself means that you (hopefully) never again have to compromise on the kind of person that you want to be. You set yourself up so that you’re surrounded by people and things that are important to you.

6. You can go after the things that matter

Okay, so now we are really getting into the deep and furry stuff! When you work for someone else you are severely limited in the other activities that you can pursue. You might get some weekend time and after work time but what if your son has a thing on when you need to be at work? What about if you want to go overseas or do some charity work (Break: I have something VERY different happening in this regard soon) while you write your blog?

Well, when you work have a truly online business you can set yourself up to make those things possible. One of my closest friends quit his job and started an online business so he could spend more time at home with his boys. He works late but he has most of the day with them. That is priceless.

Again, these things are not just “givens” for any online business. You need to make it happen but, unlike the traditional workplace, it is possible.

7. Your industry is changing (and might not be around long)

I don’t want to sound alarmist with this point but an actual consideration for workers these days is that their job might not be there when they wake up tomorrow. It happens all the time.

This is both a result of new technologies, the economic climate, and the changing nature of globalization. So, in this regard, your job might get taken over by a computer or robot, made redundant or outsourced to a cheaper workforce in China, India or the Philippines.

The great thing about starting a blog or an online business is that it can be a very part time affair. That means you get a few extra dollars in the door but also set it up in a way that you could expand if things go pear shaped in the “real world”.

8. You can play video games at lunch time

I couldn’t end this post without the obligatory work from home smugness. Yes, you an set your own hours. Yes, I usually play Battlefield 3 at lunch time. Sometimes I finish work at 4pm to go play tennis with my brother.

The “do your own thing” that comes with owning your own business can, however, be a double edged sword. If you aren’t disciplined you will wind up not being very productive. And if you aren’t very productive you might not have enough money to eat.

When it is all said and done you can have a long lunch break or go to a movie if you want. It might mean you have to make up the time at 11:02pm (like I am now) but at least you have the choice.

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