In economic downtimes starting up your own small business may seem like a risky thing to do. But the reality is that no job is secure anymore, and so you may as well paddle your own canoe as have it sunk for you by someone else.
Many companies that are now big businesses were started during periods of recession, including Hyatt Corp, General Electric, Fortune Magazine, Microsoft and Burger King. And yet these companies all started out small with entrepreneurs who refused to listen to the voices of economic doom that were all about them.
Here are 10 Ideas for Small Business Start Ups that you could try:
1/ Window Cleaning
Consider for a moment quite how many windows there are in the United States. Window cleaning is a great small business to start with because it requires virtually no capital or materials (except for a ladder and some sponges) and you can do it on your own until you build up a client base.
It is however almost infinitely scalable. There will always be people who want their windows cleaned, regardless of how much the economic sky is falling in, and so there will always be work available.
If you start having more clients then you can handle then you can always hire someone to help you.
2/ Tidying Offices
This is in a similar vein to window cleaning. Businesses always want to have clean premises, and so this is a business you could start up today without any expense.
You simply have to pound the pavements and start to drum up some business to get you started.
This is not glamorous work, but then neither is selling burgers, and yet Burger King seems to be flourishing. The key is to build up clients and once you have enough to step back from doing the cleaning yourself, and hire others to do it for you.
If you already have some capital available, then you may even be able to do this right away. You simply need to get started.
3/ Set up a Hot Dog Stall
There is a lot of money in selling food. The only problem is that normally the costs of setting up a restaurant are prohibitive and require lots of capital to get started.
A hot dog stall avoids these problems because start-up costs are minimal. Admittedly, there are some, and you will also have to check with the town planning department of your local city to see what the legal requirements in your area are to sell hot food. But nevertheless there is a lot of potential to quickly get setup and making money.
Successful stalls make hundreds of dollars a day. And once you have one stall there is nothing stopping you from hiring other people to run stalls for you and build your small business into a big one.
4/ Online Affiliate Marketing
This is a little more complicated and may take more learning, but if you are already fairly computer savvy, then this is definitely an option.
There is a lot of money floating around online, and as an affiliate marketer you act as a middleman between buyers and sellers and get paid a commission for the privilege.
This is not as easy as some would have you believe, but it is certainly a viable small business strategy.
5/ Drop Shipping
Drop Shipping takes this principal one step further. You could set up an online store that sells products, only the twist is that companies send the products directly to the customers without you having to intervene. Do a search on “drop shipping” on Google to learn more about this opportunity.
6/ Writing
There are plenty of magazines, newspapers, and offline media, as well as millions of websites that all need content. If you are just setting up on your own and have specialist knowledge in a particular area, then offering to write content for these publications and websites can be a very realistic way of creating your own small business.
7/ Building
If you have experience as a builder or are handy around the house, then set yourself up as a handyman. You can advertise in local newspapers and shops very cheaply, and once you have completed a job you can ask for a review on one of the many ‘Find a Tradesman’ websites that have sprung up online.
The good thing is that word-of-mouth is often the ways that people find a good tradesman. So it won’t take very many satisfied customers before you start having people phoning you up with work.
8/ Gardening
A gardening business could be a great small business and a really nice lifestyle choice at the same time.
9/ Party Entertainer
Can you juggle? Can you make balloon animals? Then set yourself up as a children’s party entertainer!
10/ Build a High-Quality Website
If you have a passion for something then why not start up a website and monetize it with something like Google Adsense. This is exactly what a website like AskTheBuilder.com did, and it could work for you too.
Mull over these ideas and then pick one and take action on it. Move one small step in the direction of setting up that business and very soon you will find yourself gaining momentum and movement towards it getting firmly established.
895 words.