Are you ready to turn your expertise and passions into profit and embark on the journey of starting an online business. Whether you’re a professional service-provider, a creative or something in between, this guide is tailored specifically for individuals like you who want to carve their own path in the online space.

Let’s start by taking a look at just a few of the benefits of starting an online business based on your skills, passions and interests.

The Biggest Benefits of Starting an Online Business

1. Low up front investment: typically the biggest outlays to get you starting with your online business are going to be your tech set up if you don’t already have a reliable phone, laptop and internet, plus hosting fees for your website.
2. Quick to start: another big benefit of online business in the expert/service space is that unlike product/ecommerce businesses, you don’t need to account for lead time to organise inventory or design and manufacture products. You can get started today selling your time and expertise!
3. Flexibility with your time: unlike clocking into a job for set hours, starting an online business allows you to pick the hours that best suit you – whether that is around school drop off/pick up or large breaks for holidays!
4. Location independence: if you are someone who loves to travel, or you need to be on the road for different reasons, starting your own online business can allow you to work wherever you can connect to internet reception.

Let’s dive into the essential steps and strategies to kickstart your online business and make your dream business a reality.

Defining Your Niche – It Takes Time (and Experience)

There’s a saying that ‘the riches are in the niches’. However, when you are just starting out in business, it’s almost impossible to know exactly who you want to work with until you start experimenting.

At the start of my business, I spend a lot of time wondering what my niche should be, asking myself questions like “What am I even like good at? What should I specialise in? What am I best at?”.

But what I came to realise is that when you’re in those earlier stages of business, it’s about tasting different things – just like you’re at a buffet trying as many different flavours as possible. This allows you to develop different experiences, learnings, an understanding what really lights you up and type of clients and/or businesses you enjoy working with the most so you can pinpoint exactly what I wanted to offer from there.

Your early business experiences will help you to develop your niche – so take the pressure of and get going!

Clarify the Problem you Solve – and Communicate this Consistently

Businesses exist to solve a problem. And the better you can articulate this – in the words of your target audience – the more success you’ll have.

For example, you may be a health coach. But you need to communicate to your audience the outcome that they can expect from working with you. Perhaps when it comes your business, you help your clients sleep better, or maybe you help them to beat the sugar cravings. Whatever the problem is that you help to solve for your customers, make this front and centre of your marketing.

Design Your Business Model to Suit Your Strengths

There are endless ways that you could package your skills and expertise when starting your online business – and chances are you’ve come across many different examples.

The great news is that you have the ability to design your online business in a way that best suits you, your strengths, how you want to work and your lifestyle. There is no one way to do it.

For example, if you know that you prefer to work in short, intense bursts, then you might like to offer a ‘VIP Day’ – where you help a client with a specific problem for a set day.

Or perhaps you love to develop ongoing working relationships with your clients – in which case longer term packages or a membership style model may work best for you.

For me, when I launched the online side of my business, I decided to create a membership – The Modern Marketing Collective – because I love to help clients learn and grow over a certain time period, along with bringing business owners together. Offering a self-study course just wouldn’t have felt as fulfilling to me based on my preferences and strengths.

Attracting Your First Few Clients When Starting Your Online Business

I have a question for you! Are clients actively coming to you right now? I.e. are people reaching out to work with you and then paying you to help them?

If the answer is no to this, then there’s one thing you need to focus on:

You need to actively get yourself in front of potential clients instead of waiting for clients to come to you.

When you are starting your online business, you don’t need to have a large social media following, email subscribers, branding, website, podcasts, Facebook ads – i.e.: ‘the works’! What you do need is to be actively finding people to tell them about what you offer and how you can help them – and the best way to do this is by networking, attending events, joining communities and actively reaching out to people – both in person and online.

I have paid for many services simply because I met that person or I was referred to them by someone else they had met – and I’m sure you’re the same. Even though you’re starting an online business, the quickest way to get started is by generating word of mouth marketing!

Prioritise meeting people online and offline to fast-track building your brand, and generating enquiries and referrals.

Building Your Online Presence

While the quickest way to kick start your marketing it to network and meet people in person, you will at some stage need a website so your new contacts can find you online!

When you are just starting out in business, your offers, message and even your audience are likely to change rapidly as you work out exactly who you want to work with, what your offers should look like – and how to communicate that.

This is why I’m an advocate for starting lean when it comes to your website. As your business (and revenue) grows, you can invest in it further over time by hiring professionals.

The first versions of my website were all based on templates, while the current version of my website is a template that the fabulous website designer customised specifically for me and my brand.

[Side note: if you love the feel of my website, you will love my website designer Emma Troy’s website templates. Save $100 off by entering “VIPEMILY” at checkout.]

The Courage to Start Your Online Business

My clients often tell me that they have fears and hesitations around what other people will think: whether that’s their former colleagues, their family… or anonymous people on the internet! And so they may stall getting started, hide behind their business (and laptop!), or avoid doing the really meaningful things that will really help their business take off.

I like to think of message that is repeatedly told in the children’s book ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt’:

We can’t go over it. We can’t go under it. Oh no! We‘ve got to go through it!

When it comes to business, hard as it may feel, there’s really no avoiding putting ourselves out there. And the fears are a rite of passage that everyone I have come across (including myself) feel in some way or another. Sometimes it’s a fear of failure – or even fear of success.

But we have to become visible when we are starting an online business so that the very people we know that we can help know that we – and our offers – exist.

And when you need an extra boost of encouragement, remember: Connection over perfection – you’ve got this!