Tutoring
More people are becoming frugal, more entrepreneurs are becoming bootstrappers, and more ex-employees are entering entrepreneurship.
All three of the above combined, you would want to start a business that requires minimal investment. Take heed, there are business opportunities that involve no financial investment to start with – Not even a dime.
10 business ideas to start requiring no financial investment
- Online business / make money online
Blogging, SEO/link building, online freelancing, selling goods online are some of the example of online business and make money online. Many online business requires nothing down – This is why the potential is extraordinary, despite harsh competition. - Virtual assistance (VA)
Helping others to get their job done is well-sought after – You can start with zero investment by offering your services in forums, classified sites and other public domains. The best bet – Join a VA network. - Intermediary services
Intermediary services were thought to become obsolete due to the Internet. Not exactly. Product sourcing, product distribution and contracting services, and many other intermediary services are here to stay. Due to their busyness and time constraints, business people do need other help no matter how easy to DIY their search for new products or business resources. - Organising services
Event and wedding organising are two of the most common organising services. Personal assistance and personal shopping are the niche in organising services. - Tutoring
Helping school children and students to ace their school subjects or tests can be lucrative. Teaching math, tutoring English and such are simple and free to start. Get the buzz from your neighbours and you’re off the ground. - Brokerage services
Real estate brokerage, business brokerage, investment brokerage – The list of brokerage services is endless. In exchange for a certain amount of commission, brokers use their expertise in winning buyers on behalf of sellers. - Consignment products sales
Looking for the right supplier to arrange for a consignment is rather trivial – Not many want to engage in such a risky product sales strategy. However, finding one would be a great way for you to sell products without any investment involved. - Consulting and training
Experienced professionals and business owners can offer their expertise to help other individuals and organisations succeed. - Freelancing
Graphic design, web design, and copywriting are some of the example of freelancing. The competition is stiff, but the ability to create a business out of it is rewarding. - Down-payment-enabled business
I’m not sure whether to include this or not, but this is what many often overlook as one of the better business strategies. Either you offer products or services, ask for down payment (even full payment) up front. This way, you have the capital to produce the ordered products or perform the requested services – No financial investment involved on your side.
Most of the zero-financial-investment business ideas I present are service business – With that said, I recommend you to explore any other service business opportunities, as no business is thriving in today’s recession better than service business.
Ivan Widjaya
Business ideas with nothing down
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Hey Ivan,
thank for sharing all this info.
my question is; How to do it? where to start… I just go to those sites? and take it from there ?
I mean how does it work in the real life… services like ..consultant,or personal shoppers etc. how i get paid , can you guide me a bit please..
thank you,
Mel
Hi Mel,
Thanks for dropping by :)
The “how” and “where to start” parts are always challenging – In fact, in my own experience, finding out to answer those questions take about 80% of my time investment to start a business.
The best place you can start from here is the search engine – Google (or Yahoo!) about them and read as many info as you can. Don’t get too overwhelmed by the wealth (or lack) of search results… Get some legitimate info, and take it a bit further – Going to forums… You can start asking some (probing) questions there. You can also use Yahoo! Answers or Mahalo to ask questions and get some great ideas from the members.
I hope this helps to get you started…
Hey Ivan,
thank for sharing all this info.
my question is; How to do it? where to start… I just go to those sites? and take it from there ?
I mean how does it work in the real life… services like ..consultant,or personal shoppers etc. how i get paid , can you guide me a bit please..
thank you,
Amit,
The number one place (in my case, at least) to start is: Online forums!
Seek niche forums (e.g. if you are a webmaster, you should go to forums.digitalpoint.com; if you are a graphic designer, you should go to forum.howdesign.com; etc.) and start involving yourself in them – ask questions, offer opinions, see what other members are doing… bid on projects, create a project yourself, etc. Soon, you’ll see that there’s a need to fill and you can make money filling those needs.
there are definitely tons of freelancing sites out there, easy way to make some money for sure, great post.
thnx for sharing…riyaz
I think certain ideas are very well known and most of us knows it. question is how to implement, run and start with it.
the concept of entrepreneurship is important and whatever you do, i believe to start it with name, concept, clear vision and have one website which you can start with blog and buy domain name in just 10 dollar a year (google).
put your website and services on Facebook, Twitter (it does not help directly but until you start making money, why dont you want to work on building brand)
get engage with NGOs, and other online selling site such as Ebay. sale on it.
then, google, google and google it, i bet you will find people sharing similar interest and may you find opposite person in same services that you are in, means, if you sale then you may find buyer in a same area.
cost to start is 0 dollar. to grow it takes about 13 dollar a year then depends.
i develop social entrepreneur concept, while doing social work, i focus on socio-economic development and then i started. i have not invested a single penny since i made about 80,000 bucks.
now using blogger FREE host i pay 10 dollar to google a year thats it. but i remain passionate, honest and genuine with my work and business whereas now sometime, i give free services to most needy, but sometimes i get paid client from those free clients.
Karnav,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Yeah, the article is about ideas only – so I don’t cover how to do with the ideas. Your comment has outlined some useful tips our readers can benefit from. So, many thanks for that!
I am thankful for Karnav’s followup to your article Ivan- very good how to tips. Just a suggestion Ivan, how about more on the how to get started, like a mentorship program/matching system. I am in an infancy stage of a business idea and could use a mentor to guide me. Just a thought….
Barb,
That’s a great idea. I will write a blog post on how to get started topic.
Many thanks for your suggestion!
I think that this is an informative blog and I will tell others about it!
Cheers, Richard!