Many people who are in college or who are working 9-5 jobs are wondering what kind of online business they could start. After all, building an online business is a great way to nurture your entrepreneurship while also gaining some financial security and becoming more independent. Over the last few years, the idea of starting companies that fully operate online has developed. Many young businessmen and women have gained quite a bit of wealth by developing innovative stores and services.
Our experience shows us that not all kinds of companies can thrive while being run fully online. Some just need to either operate in hybrid mode or fully offline in the “real world.”
In this article, we’re going to take a look at some of the best businesses to start online in 2022. That way, we will not only provide you with some ideas and inspiration but also hopefully help you make the right choice when it comes to what kind of company to launch on your own.
Without further ado, let’s get started.
The 10 Best Businesses to Start Online
In order for this article to be as helpful as possible, we will be discussing different types of businesses that you can start online. Usually, these sorts of posts are filled with numerous kinds of ecommerce-like entrepreneurial ideas. However, we wanted to stay away from that model and instead focus on providing you with real, valuable, and new business opportunities that you may not have considered before.
SEO Consulting
If you’re an expert in any particular field, offering your services online is a terrific way to start a business without considering a ton of factors. In recent years, due to the rise in digital marketing, SEO experts are extremely valuable, and almost any company that wants to promote its products online needs one. If you’ve got the skills and experience to help websites rank high on search engines, you will find that many businesses will want to hire you to help them out.
Regardless of whether you have to update the company blog, search for keywords that rank well online, or edit metadata tags, by being a good SEO consultant and having a terrific SEO strategy, you can help a company rank higher on Google and thus bring in more customers. If you market your service correctly and you reach out to the right people, you will quickly find yourself needing to hire help.
Marketing Agency
As we already said, offering your services is an excellent way to make more money if you’re an expert in one niche. Suppose you deem that you’re a marketing specialist who can help businesses craft or re-design their strategy, then you will quickly find many clients you can help. After all, almost all start-ups are in need of marketing advice, and most of them are unwilling to give the kind of money that big marketing agencies want.
That means that if you position yourself correctly and prove that you can bring in the desired results, you can quickly start to grow your venture. One of the best things about starting a marketing agency is the fact that you can scale. In the beginning, if you don’t have the money, you can start by only taking on smaller projects by yourself. After some time, you can begin to hire additional employees and thus take on more and more significant ventures.
Software and App Development
Being a software engineer is perhaps one of the best-paid jobs in the entire world. These kinds of specialists are constantly looked for, and finding a good one is difficult enough to the point where big corporations are willing to pay such experts a huge amount of money. If you’re good at coding and you have years of experience working in a software development company, it’s a good idea to consider venturing out on your own and starting your own company, entirely online. As with the marketing agency, you can always start on your own and expand the operations as you see fit.
Accounting and Bookkeeping
Filing taxes as an individual can be a daunting task, and it’s that much more difficult for businesses. That’s why freelance accountants are always sought out and paid well. If you’ve been working in a corporation for some time now and you’re confident in your knowledge, starting your own accounting service is a great idea. Not only does it allow you to earn some money in your free time, but it can also grow to become a way to quit your 9-5 job and start working in a company you own full-time.
The great thing here is that you can start by offering only some services and then expand your catalog as your business grows. Over time, you will surely be able to win over clients and forge long-lasting partnerships.
Designing and Selling Print On-Demand Clothing
Print-on-demand is a kind of dropshipping model; however, it’s slightly less popular than the well-known version you’ve all heard about. Here you still put the shipping, fulfillment, and inventory handling in the hands of a third-party supplier. However, the main difference is that you focus on creating customized products with unique designs instead of just random mass-produced items.
Nowadays, everything from T-shirts and sweatpants to phone cases and tote bags can be customized, so you’re free to be as creative as you like. You can come up with cool slogans or incorporate memes, TikTok trends, or any other kinds of references that will resonate with the audience. Here, it’s a good idea to target particular communities – pet owners, sports fans, coffee lovers, etc. – people that will want to wear the kind of merchandise that makes them proud to be in that particular community.
The cool thing is that you don’t have to be a designer to start such a business; you can find someone to work with on sites like Upwork or Fiverr. Additionally, most print-on-demand services require you to only pay per product, and even though the price might be slightly higher that way, you have the advantage of not having to pre-pay for shirts, hoodies, or other items that may not sell well later.
Selling Digital Products
Selling unique digital products such as music, podcasts, books, or courses is a good way to start a low-investment business that can operate entirely online. In this scenario, you don’t have to worry about manufacturing, shipping, or inventory – that means your margin can remain high. Your effort can be as significant as you want it to be.
The tricky part here is figuring out what kind of digital product is likely to sell in today’s market. What’s useful enough that you can create and that others would be willing to pay money for?
The reality is that there are many different things people would be willing to give money for; it’s up to you, however, to figure out what you have expertise in and where you can provide value for others. For example, if you’ve been training your entire life and you know you have loads of knowledge about healthy eating and working out, you can create a digital product that’s dedicated to that niche. On the other hand, if you’re interested in politics and can dissect the current situation in the world, many people would be willing to pay money to listen to an expert opinion on a podcast.
Selling Handcrafted or Homemade Products
People will always prefer buying an item that’s unique and that cannot be found in any online store. If you can make anything – whether that’s soap, sauces, candy, pottery, bracelets – literally any product, you can create an online store for it.
Here, unlike any other ideas we discussed, you will need to consider everything: inventory, manufacturing, and shipping. However, you can start only by offering pre-orders or with smaller batches until you start to generate consistent sales.
Many people who now have big DIY stores started small by selling on Etsy or eBay or even on Instagram, and then slowly, they developed their stores and became business owners with many clients.
Also, it’s vital to consider what kind of regulations exist in your niche, especially if you consider anything that can affect customers’ health in any way.
Joining an Affiliate Marketing Program
Affiliate marketing is a marketing tactic that’s focused on performance. Basically, it’s a marketing method where a business pays affiliates (people) to sell and promote their products. If you’re an affiliate, every time you bring in a client, you will receive money – commission from the company.
Affiliates can promote products in any way they like – on blogs, social media accounts, communities, or websites. Many people discovered that they could earn money that way and so it’s a profitable side hustle that can quickly turn into a profitable low-cost business.
Joining an affiliate program is pretty easy; you only have to follow a few steps:
- Find an affiliate program on a site like LinkShare or CJ
- Choose the one you would enjoy promoting or fits with your hobby
- Get an affiliate link
- Promote that link on any platform you like
- Get a commission every time a user performs a particular action through your link
Commission rates aren’t the same for all companies. You can earn as low as 5% for each sale, and others offer high commissions at 50% if you’re promoting an event or a class. Additionally, you can find affiliates that give you a flat rate and not a percentage.
Offering Subscription Boxes
If you don’t want to create products, you can instead curate them. One of the last few years’ most popular small business ideas is the so-called subscription boxes that include items picked around a particular theme.
Subscription boxes are a good idea because you can create them for any niche out there, and you can choose the niches that are also your hobbies and that you are knowledgeable about. For example, if you are a beauty guru, you can partner with local businesses and start a subscription box that includes their products. You can also go for other themes such as pets or yoga.
Another reason why subscription boxes are an excellent small business idea is that they can create a recurring revenue stream. People have to remember to cancel their subscriptions if they don’t want to continue paying. Additionally, subscriptions are a good way to collaborate with already existing companies. When you collect products from different businesses, and you curate them, you can present them to a large audience – which for the companies means more exposure and brand awareness.
Selling Photography
If photography is your hobby, you can quickly turn it into an excellent small business that earns you money. Nowadays, you don’t have to offer your services only for weddings, ad campaigns, or personal photoshoots. You can start a store and sell your art there – many businesses now need to have high-quality photos for their marketing campaigns. Additionally, you can sell prints, NFTs, and posters. Stock photography websites are also great for earning some money off of your photos.
In Conclusion
Thankfully you can start an online business with just a few clicks. All it takes is a good idea, passion, and consistency. Before you leave, we just want to give you one last piece of advice: not to give up. It’s highly likely that you won’t start earning money from your side hustle from the very beginning. It will likely take a few weeks or months before you start getting some of your investment back – that’s why it’s vital that you remain consistent and patient. The results of your work will come over time.
In the meantime, you can follow us on all social media networks for more marketing and entrepreneurial tips. Along with that, we keep our blog fresh with new articles each week, so make sure you keep on reading our work.