A few decades ago, the only people starting businesses from home were envelope stuffers, Amway representatives and that crazy uncle of yours who was always looking for the next get-rich-quick scheme. But today, millions of people run successful businesses from home and some make six figures or more doing it. Let’s look at five businesses that you can start at home over the weekend.
Amazon Affiliate Business
One of the easiest businesses to start is one promoting Amazon products as an affiliate. Here’s how it works: you get someone to go to Amazon via your link and buy something; Amazon gives you money. It’s that simple. They don’t even have to buy it right then and there. If they come back to Amazon within 24 hours and buy the product – you still get the commission from it. The great thing is, you don’t even have to have a website. You can use a Web 2.0 publisher like Hubpages and start getting Amazon sales right away.
Clickbank Product Promoter
Becoming a Clickbank product promoter takes a certain amount of discernment and a thick skin. That’s because there are a lot of Clickbank products out there that are pretty crappy. Think of a five page eBook on dog training that the author wants you to sell for $59.99. But there are also some really terrific products on the site if you look for them. The nice thing about promoting Clickbank products is that the payout is usually pretty good – 40% or more on products ranging from $20 to several hundred dollars. There is somewhat of a learning curve however, as you figure out what a sales page is and how to write a good one.
Kindle Book Publisher
If you can figure out how to determine Amazon search keywords and then use them to find niches where the competition is very weak, you might have a career as a Kindle book publisher. Lots of people make a nice living outsourcing short non-fiction books and publishing them. But learning how to find Amazon keywords and how to know the difference between weak competition/strong search traffic and weak competition/weak search traffic takes some time and research.
Online Service Provider
If you have a particular skillset, then you might be interested in starting your own service provider company online. Lots of people do this nowadays. In fact, nearly every “freelancer” out there gets their customers almost solely from the internet. Popular service providers include writers, editors, graphic designers, programmers, personal assistants, tutors and many more. Figure out what you are good at and start trying to find clients online. You can research the rates and a lot of other factors as well as get some step-by-step tutorials on this kind of business with Google.
Advertising Publisher Business
If you think you can build a website from the ground up and get lots of traffic – or if you can buy a website and make improvements so that traffic is flowing – then you might want to consider starting a weekend job as an advertising publisher. If your website gets traffic, then you will be able to find advertisers.
The Bottom Line
No matter which of these businesses you are going to start, you will need to market yourself. Setting up your own website, advertising, producing videos and setting up social media profiles are all part of that marketing effort. If you can get the word out, you’ll soon have customers flocking to your online shop and spending money. You just have to take the leap and hang out your virtual shingle.