1) Introduction
In this modern era of digitalization, opening up their venture rather than working for someone else is a dream for many. So, people look for business ideas with low investment and high profit. 'ROI' has become a significant factor in setting up businesses. It is a determining factor in deciding whether to go ahead
Starting your own business can prove to be challenging. Small business owners must consider multiple factors like finding investors, possible losses, securing location, shipping, and more. In this article, we will look at the top 10 online business ideas with low investment and high profit.
2) Top 10 Online Business Ideas with Low Investment and High Profit
2.1) Dropshipping
Dropshipping is an order fulfillment method where third-party supplier stores and ships inventory to the customers on your behalf. In simple terms, as a dropshipper, you will have agreements with wholesale suppliers. They offer you their products at a discounted price. You must add your commission and promote their goods through your website or social media platform.
How to Start Dropshipping Business?
Step 1: Picking a product niche
The product you decide to sell can either make or break your business. Your product should be: engaging, searchable, profitable, cheap to ship, and brandable. Do your own research while considering these factors.
Step 2: Competitor Analysis
Competitor analysis is a complex process of analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of your competitors. Some ways to do this are mentioned below:
- Running a google search: Search engines like Google can serve you as a starting point. Use Google to list your top 10 competitors and see how they promote their products.
- Using social media: Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram serve as the best marketing platform. Search for your competitor's accounts and look at how they manage them - including customer engagement, response time, feed layout, etc.
- iii. Using spy tools like Alexa: Online tools like Alexa are great for analyzing your competitors' online activity like competitor website information such as the number of visitors, social media profiles, top traffic sources, etc.
Step 3: Creating your online presence
Create your online presence through Facebook, Whatsapp, Instagram, Linkedin, or other social media marketing platforms. It is simple and easy.
Step 4: Listing out Suppliers
Create a list of around 30 suppliers and email them about your work. Negotiate your commission, and then only start promoting their product through your social presence.
Step 5: Shipping
After receiving an order, ask the supplier to ship it to the customer.
2.2) Digital Marketing
With many businesses going online, there is now a massive demand for digital marketers. As a digital marketer, you have to promote a website or blog and get it on the top of google results. This requires skills such as Search Engine Optimization(SEO), email marketing, and social media marketing. Digital Marketing doesn't cost much. All you need is a computer, a stable internet connection and the mentioned skills.
How to Start a Digital Marketing Business?
Step 1: Defining your offer and target audience
It would be best if you defined the ROI that your clients will get from your digital marketing services. Further, you don't need to offer your services to every kind of company out there. Instead, find the ones which suit you the best.
Step 2: Creating your online presence
A website is a non-negotiable part as people want a place to go and see the work you have done before for your clients. Moreover, you need to utilize social media properly. Some businesses may benefit from an Instagram account, whereas some might grow well on Tiktok.
Step 3: Building a business model
Before getting a client, you must decide how you plan to bill them. Whether you want them to pay by the hour, flat retainer (getting paid the same amount by the end of the month), or performance basis, depends on you and your work style.
Step 4: Generating Leads
Now, when your business structure is sorted, you need to bring in the clients, which can be done either by pro bono work, i.e., offering your services for free to the first few clients to help build your reputation, or through cold emails.
Step 5: Turning your leads into clients
Once you have generated leads, you need to turn your leads into your clients. All you need to do is research well about the company or person you are offering your services to. Also, bringing in a presentation to show your leads the work you have done before and how it has helped your client will help.
2.3) HR Recruiter
HR Recruiter is one of the best high-profit margin businesses. The main task that you need to do is to act as a middleman between job seekers and recruiters. Once recruitment is done through you, you will gain a commission.
How to Start an HR Recruiter Business?
Step 1: Listing out companies.
The first and the foremost step is to prepare a list of the companies looking for a candidate. Your contacts can help you with that.
Step 2: Finding out a job candidate
This can be quickly done with the help of websites such as Naukri, Indeed, etc.
Step 3: Middleman
Once you have found the job candidate, you need to connect the candidate and recruiter and help both parties with recruitment.
2.4) Hyperlocal Delivery
Hyperlocal delivery is an attractive business model where you can start a company that takes online orders and delivers essential items like food and groceries at the doorstep. Small shop owners struggle a lot for delivery in small towns. You can take advantage of this opportunity and start your own delivery business.
How to Start Hyperlocal Delivery?
Step 1: Create a list of small shops ready to work under you. Negotiate with them the prices, share in profit, and other things you consider necessary.
Step 2: Promote your business idea through these shop owners.
Step 3: Start the delivery by signing contracts with the owners.
2.5) Online Gift Hamper Business
You might have come across a huge number of pages selling beautiful gift hampers or decorations. Online Gift Hampers is a low investment business idea now trending on social media such as Instagram. Though competitive, this business has a huge profit margin.
How to Start with an Online Gift Hamper Business?
Step 1: Market Analysis
Before selecting a niche for your gift business niche, analyze the consumer base for whom you are targeting your business.
Step 2: Finding Suppliers
Find out the suppliers who can help you by providing items that complement your gift baskets.
Step 3: Promotion
Create some samples of gift baskets and post their pictures on social media platforms like Instagram to attract many people.
2.6) Healthy Meal Delivery Business
People desire healthy, tasty, and economical meals in today's world. People are becoming health conscious and joining a local gym, maintaining diet charts, etc., to maintain their fitness. This is a wonderful opportunity for anyone willing to start their own healthy meal delivery business.
How to Start a Healthy Meal Delivery Business?
Step 1: Food Hygiene Certificate
To sell legally, you need a food hygiene certificate. An inspector will come to your kitchen to inspect, and if it meets the requirements, you will be awarded the certificate.
Step 2: Setting a Meal Delivery Budget
Determining a budget is the most critical part of a healthy meal delivery business. You must purchase cooking equipment as per your need from an appropriate place that suits your budget. For Ex: You need a fryer if you avoid frying food altogether.
Step 3: Creating a Menu
Create a menu while considering your specialties and target audience. For Ex: if you want to start a vegetarian meal delivery business, include all the popular plant-based foods.
Step 4: Hiring Skilled Employees
Hiring skilled employees is the most important part while setting up any business, as consumers love to read the qualifications of your employees. Hire skilled employees to ensure the customers that they will meet with high-end foods.
2.7) Online Tutor
Online Tutor is next on the list regarding low investment business ideas. An online tutor's primary role is to verbally communicate with the students verbally and assess & enhance their performance in a particular subject or subject.
How to Start an Online Tutor Business?
Step 1: Choose a Subject
The first and foremost step is to choose a subject you are most comfortable with beginning your teaching. Teaching one subject or several, that's completely your choice.
Step 2: Making a Business Plan
A business plan is a must for every business out there. A plan gives you a set of goals to work with; What do you want to achieve in a year? What set of students are you targeting?
Step 3: Setting up a Tutoring website
A website is the face of your tutoring business. There are multiple ways to build a website with free tools like WordPress, Pinlearn, etc.
Step 4: Promotion
It would help to create a social media presence to promote your tutoring business. Platforms like Linkedin and Instagram is an excellent choice for this.
Step 5: Mode of Payment
It would help if you offer a few free trials but clarify the payment mechanism in those trials, i.e., mode of payment, payment policies, etc.
2.8) Voice Over
If you have excellent reading skills, then you can think about starting a voice-over business. Voice over means reading a script and providing high-quality audio to the clients for a fixed money. Having a good voice quality can make you earn around Rs.25,000 a month or even more.
How to Start a Voice Over Business? :
Step 1: Opening your account
You can open up your account on sites like Fiverr.com, mentioning that you are interested in providing voice-over services.
Step 2: Recording the script
Once you get an order from a client, you take the script and record it using a microphone. A simple microphone is more than sufficient for this.
Step 3: Improving the quality
Once you are done with the recording, use free software like Audacity to improve the quality.
After being done with the quality, send the audio clip to the client.
2.9) Online Fitness Coach
"Health is Wealth." As the awareness about the importance of fitness and health increases, the fitness business continues to gain popularity. Fitness Coaching is all about helping out people to achieve their fitness goals.
How to Start an Online Fitness Coach Business? :
Step 1: Deciding on your Virtual Fitness Model
The most important step is deciding on your virtual fitness model. Offering one-to-one personal training, leading Livestream group classes, or offering pre-recorded workout videos to clients depends on your wants.
Step 2: Getting Right Equipements
Having a stable internet connection is vital for any online business. The National Academy of Sports Medicine recommends equipment like a large exercise ball, resistance bands, kettlebells, a slam ball, and a medicine ball.
Step 3: Setting up your training space
While considering a proper training space, ask yourself questions like is the room spacious enough to demonstrate the exercises? Is it quiet? Is there proper lighting for the camera to record properly?
Step 4: Prepare to run your business.
While setting up your business, ensure you have an efficient business plan, organized accounting systems, and proper marketing strategies. These are the core of setting up any business.
2.10) Live Indoor Plants Selling
Live Indoor Plants Selling is another popular trending business idea nowadays. Most of people are looking for beautiful indoor plants to decorate their offices and homes. This product type isn't available on any e-commerce company site like Flipkart or Amazon. This can serve as a massive opportunity for anyone interested in doing it and can generate huge revenues.
How to Start a Live Indoor Plants Selling Business? :
Step 1: Contact local vendors
Take some photographs and contact the local vendors willing to sell live plants.
Step 2: Create your social media presence
Market your products through good social media platforms. Linkedin and Instagram will be a great choice to begin with.
Step 3: Getting the order
Once you receive an order, accept it and deliver the plant.
3) Advantages of Investing in Online Businesses
3.1) Low Start-up Costs
There was a time once when setting up an online business cost the owners a fortune. With new emerging technologies, the same can be done cheaply and easily. There are free website building tools and open source content management tools like WordPress and Drupal, which allows you to build a website for free along with the templates.
3.2) Flexibility
With the Internet, you can work from anywhere worldwide, as long as you have a stable Internet connection. In simple terms, you can spend more time with your family or explore other ventures while running a profitable online business.
3.3) Advanced Marketing Tools
Marketing is one of the most vital ingredients to any business.
You can take advantage of a tremendous number of marketing channels, like email campaigns, blogs, and social media like Instagram, eBooks, etc., which can all be used to attract people from different domains.
Scoring data from online marketing companies like Moz and using tools like Google Analytics, you can monitor your customers and your business rivals in real-time.
3.4) Lower risk on investment
Online businesses usually have a lower risk because setting up one doesn't cost a lot due to their adaptability. With the right strategy and investment in the form of online marketing, a losing business can be turned into a profitable one in a relatively short time.
3.5) Better Customer Feedback
With the advancement in technology, it has made it easier for online businesses to provide better customer support. Earlier it took days for any company to deliver products or service update information to the customers. The same can be done today without any waste of time. Online businesses can add or make changes to their company info or their product description virtually and share them with customers on social media within no time.
4) How to get started with low investment and high-profit online business?
4.1) Selling without holding inventory
Managing inventory can turn out to be a big commitment. Buy stock, store, pick, pack, and ship it. Still, you can reduce your operating expenses and investment by eliminating inventory problems with third-party models like dropshipping.
4.2) Selling a service
Services are businesses with lower operational costs than products that require sourcing, stocking, and development. Depending upon your chosen service, you will have ample opportunities to lower your running expenses.
4.3) Creating and selling digital assets
There are several ways to replicate an asset into infinite copies without additional expense. In simple terms, the marginal cost of scaling is zero. Further, your production cost is limited to the tools and technologies you use to create the digital product.
4.4) Turn a hobby into a business
If you love spending time on a hobby and want to convert it into a full-time business, search if there's a market for it or not. This way, you can turn your passion into a business without too much effort or investment.
4.5) Exploring emerging niches
How your product reaches your consumers plays a vital role in any business. Further, Marketing puts a heavy expense. Targeting emerging niches is a cost-effective way to reduce your investment as it would be easier to reach the customers and convert online.
5) Conclusion
The top 10 online business ideas mentioned in the article require low investment and can help you achieve higher profits if you manage them well. This is the best time to start any online business as the aftermath of Covid-19 has increased the demand for online businesses, which isn't going to drop anytime soon.
6) FAQs
6.1) How do I find good business ideas?
Ans - The best businesses are the ones that are trending in the market currently. To find a business that suits you, consider the following steps:
- Make a list of things you are passionate about doing business on.
- Taking into account the stock of your finances, assets, skills, and time.
- Doing competitor research.
- Building your USP.
6.2) How do I get to start a business with no prior experience?
Ans - If you have no prior experience in this field, be enthusiastic about learning. There are many courses available on Youtube, on platforms like Coursera, success stories shared by other entrepreneurs, etc. Take advantage of these courses to learn.