Home business ideas?

I’ve done some of that although not much.

But there are some training platforms that are really big like udemy, Lynda.com or Learnable

You’re right about the amount of free information on the internet but people still pay for their training… Why?

Because they want results, they need someone to push them to finish and because the amount of information on the internet is huge but, most of the time, not very well organized. And they need someone to turn to, to ask questions, a mentor.

We all need it. That’s why it works.

As suggested, you can use skype or similar. I’ve used anymeeting, gotomeeting, etc. for larger groups.

The thing is that the limit of things that you can do is in your imagination. And anything is going to take some work. And you’re different than anyone else, you have your own style so success only depends on you.

Typical home based online businesses would be

  • bloging
  • remote training/teaching
  • remote computer assistance
  • Your own website to sell your own products (ebooks, your classes, videos, music…) or affiliate products (amazon, commission junction…)

As I siad, you can be a bit more personal and have a meetup at home, once every other week or maybe every week (look at meetup.com for examples)

You charge them for providing them a service: teaching them about computers, photography or whatever.

In big cities, it works great for language exchange. So if you have foreigners nearby, I’m sure that they will pay for the extra help to get rid of the bad habits and mistakes.

And from there onwards, you can do whatever you want: candles, soap, knitting, transcript or administrative services…

There’s no limit. So choose something you really like because you’re going to end up fed up with it :slight_smile:

I use my website skills and Apache Cordova to make iPhone and Android apps in my spare time. Cordova takes your HTML/CSS/JS and turns them into apps that work on several phone platforms. I focus on iPhone (App Store) and Android (Google Play and Amazon Apps).

Marry your apps with your hobbies. For instance, I write Bible devotionals and do calligraphy, so my apps reflect those interests.

I’d love to try that. I have many app ideas, just not the time to program them!

Lately I’ve been trying to find ways to find a partner to work on a finance app I’ve been wanting to write. If anybody wants to partner up with me and get it programmed, we can split any future profits it might generate.
I just don’t have time, and perhaps even the skills to get it completely finished myself.

Good luck finding a partner with that last sentence! LOL

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This made me laugh. But honestly, I side with him. Being alone and looking at a huge mountain of work you need to complete by yourself, with nobody really pushing you… kinda sucks and it’s very hard to stay motivated. There’s no shame in admitting you’re not superman.

Why? My skills are not complete, or perfect, so a partner rounds out the skillset and maybe they can do the sorts of things I can’t do very well. Maybe they are better at testing and bug finding while I’m better at UX/UI and graphics? I don’t know.

What I meant by that statement is: “don’t have time”, means I have a family and full time job and responsibilities. Thus if I can only spend a couple hours a day, and the partner can spend a couple hours a day, now there are 4 hours a day of project being completed instead of two or less.
Skills: already mentioned.
Get it finished: I’m not the best at fully completing projects, I get them to a functional “works for me” state but don’t have the full skillset to finish the project, test it, hunt for security issues, document, or whatever. A partner with a different skillset can help the project finish and be ready for the public.

I’m not looking for a partner to do all the work while I be lazy. I’m looking for one who is interested in a nifty online tool and will invest time in the hopes it can bring in some money some day.

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i think it has already been said above but the ideas i have toyed with centre around doing something that is relatively quick to do but is custom. As you say its hard to try and sell ‘stuff’ as everyone is selling it and making their money by selling a lot at a low markup.

(I doubt this would make money but) as an example if you lived near a beach you could collect driftwood and make custom door/house signs … charge per letter and carve them into the wood, add a hanger and slap some varnish on and you’re done. Sure you can by a plastic sign for £1 but some people will pay a lot more for a unique customised product. This obviously assumes a manual type of skill but perhaps you could find something that suits your skill set.

I’ve made some stuff that i believe is different to anything i can find on the market (a google image search is useful to see how common/unique your product is) and i hope to sell some soon once i’ve worked out costs. Sorry can’t tell you what it is :slight_smile:

Watch the ‘penny blossom’ episode of Big Bang Theory its funny cus its true.

I had no intention of putting you down, sir! I was under the impression you had time on your hands and wanted to take on more work or was out of a job. “My wife and I are desperately trying to find something we can do from home for extra income.”

The key concept here was “extra income” but I’m sure that @zackw appreciates your good intention :smile:

@zackw Even if you don’t have the skills and you have no partner right now (I’m sure that you’ll search for one), you may want to start that project yourself and, in this occassion, you may want to set up a realistic timetible to see it to the end. And, in this case, you shouldn’t go for “it is good enough for me”

Even if you just dedicate 1-2 hours a day to this particular project, your skills will improve and, if you’re able to push yourself and finish it like a professional, your confidence will rise and with your new skills may even get a salary rise or a new and better paid job.

In addition to that, if you’re really professional about it, you could make good money from it.

So, if you really believe in it, make this project an excuse to forget your “meh… good enough for me” attitude and give the extra mile that will allow you to rise above the rest of good-but-not-exceptional people

The real problem is talking people into your idea. Everyone has their own and you can really only work on 1 at a time in your spare time.

This is true. I’ve got at least a few ideas for online tools but no push to do them. My wife doesn’t understand programming and doesn’t like the idea of me being locked in a room all night for 8 months and not see a dime from it, just a hope that it gets used by some people. Online apps take a lot of time dealing with support and bug fixes and updating, it’s not so passive in nature.

It’s the same thing with freelancing websites. I usually take full payment at the start, so after we take the payment, deposit, and spend it, I’m stuck having to spend hours and hours on a project with nothing to show for it since we were already paid. Or in other words, I have to spend long nights, with no checks to deposit.

There is something about “doing work” and not being immediately paid for it that she is not grasping very well. Being paid in advance and now having to work all the hours, or trying to work on something first, and just hoping to be paid later, are both situations we don’t like very well.

I guess all that means is we’re looking for something we can DO that creates income when we do it. So if we say to ourselves, let’s do 8 hours this week, we know we’ve got 8 hours worth of income to show for it. It helps with planning, scheduling, tracking, etc.

Anyway, thanks to your suggestions, I’ve got two endeavors I’m pursuing. First I want to see if I can create video training online, if it works out, it should be decent passive income. And secondly, I want to try teaching private computer classes in my town. There is a local college with super cheap classes, like $65 for 4 hours or so, but I’m hoping to have small personalized classes with 5 or 6 people and charge $75-$100 for a couple hours. We’ll see how it goes with both!

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I understand your wife but that’s the life of a freelancer or an entrepreneur. You have an idea, you beliefe in it, you build it and market it. Or you get paid and work long hours (according to expertise and workflow… .you know what they say, work smarter, not harder)

In terms of freelancing, your success will depend on how well you market yourself and that how accurate you are to calculate the amount of hours a job will take.

[quote=“zackw, post:52, topic:189541”]
Anyway, thanks to your suggestions, I’ve got two endeavors I’m pursuing. First I want to see if I can create video training online, if it works out, it should be decent passive income. And secondly, I want to try teaching private computer classes in my town. There is a local college with super cheap classes, like $65 for 4 hours or so, but I’m hoping to have small personalized classes with 5 or 6 people and charge $75-$100 for a couple hours. We’ll see how it goes with both!
[/quote] While I do encourage you to do and I believe that it will give you the amount of cash that you want (and possibly more), I feel the need to burst your bubble.

Online courses can’t be consdiered passive income. If you don’t do anything, you’ll earn a bit for a few months and thenit will slowly die. Why? Because there are new courses coming out everyday and because someone will, soon enough, put it somewhere for free download. So you do need to do extra bits and pieces to encourage people to keep on buying

Of course. And you have to maintain the classes, answer comments, fix bugs or errors etc etc. But it is considered passive since it actually CAN bring in income while I sleep. Marketing, which is what you’re talking about, it another beast entirely!

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I thinks different guy has a different thought, but you think to start a business it’s upon your local area, first of all visit your area then finally you will found out what you should do. Remember one thing that start a business which has low competitors.

You can start a consulting business, but you have to decide which field you would choose. If your wife is creative and she likes making things like handcrafted decor pieces or jewelry, then you can sell that online too. In fact, you should create a Facebook page to promote such products.

Well, working from home has also been an easy and comfortable thing for me since you do not have a boss to be led by the nose. Furthermore, in most of the online jobs, you have the flexibility to carry out the work at your disposal which gives me great delight and fun. By the way, I am a so-so experienced SEO analyst and often undertake SEO analysis projects on a freelance basis at my home. I am relatively at ease to carry out such projects since not only they give me big bucks every month but more importantly the level of satisfaction I get is beyond compare. So, by long odds, working from home has always been an unforgettable experience.

I’m curious how your marketing strategy looks for your home business.

We live in a city with about 40k people, though there is another city about 15 miles away with another 40k. So let’s say all total my local area has maybe 100k people. Do you advertise? Work locally or country-wide? Use a website alone to attract clients?
I’ve had a personal work website for like 2 years yet it’s never attracted a single customer. Need to change something!

Well, there are a lot of business to choose from that could make you earn a lot. I must suggest that you should engage to something that you are very much familiar with because you need to know first your product and services before you introduce them to the market as well. My idea too is go for one that you are passionate and interested with.

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