8 Self-Employment Business Ideas & How to Get Started

Some of us venture into entrepreneurship knowing what industry we want to conquer or what type of career we wish to pursue. At the same time, there are others who are committed to being self-employed but aren’t sure what options are available to them. If you’re looking for a way to make a living, the following businesses are profitable, sustainable, and growing quickly.

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1. Virtual Assistant

A virtual assistant (VA) is someone who offers services to other business owners in exchange for a fee. There are over 275 standard VA services you can offer, but they mostly fall under the umbrella of social media management, marketing, content creating, and website design.

To become a VA, you need to identify your skillset. Virtual assistants must have computer proficiency, great communication, and editorial skills, and are able to keep to strict schedules.

Then, identify what services you’ll offer and your pricing structure before creating a portfolio.

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2. Create Information Products

Anyone can start creating informational products as long as they have expertise in a topic. That doesn’t mean you need to have a degree or years of experience within the industry you wish to write about. Great research skills will go a long way in supporting this business idea.

Choosing the right product to sell is crucial if you want to be successful, so experiment with different mediums (ebooks, podcasts, etc.). When deciding on a niche market, always choose what’s popular (fitness, dating) to have the highest chance of selling.

3. Become a Real Estate Agent

Becoming a real estate agent is relatively simple. All you need to do is be at least 18 or 19 (depending on your state), have legal US residency, complete high school, and pass the state licensing exam. To obtain a real estate license, you may need to study with a mentor.

The hard part begins after you earn your real estate license because you need to learn how to market yourself, maintain client relationships, host open houses, and close the transaction.

You’ll also need to find a broker who is willing to work with you and help you find leads.

4. Dog Walking/Pet Sitting Service

Dog walkers and pet sitters provide a service to busy pet owners or vacationers that need someone to temporarily house their furry friends. Rover, a dog walk app, can help set up private contractors with leads. You’ll need communication skills, a love for animals, and the following:

Dog Walker Certificate: Proof you’re an official dog walker.
CPPS-Certified Professional Pet Sitter: Proof you’re an official pet sitter.
Liability Insurance: Insurance that protects you if something happens to the pet.

The best dog walkers grew up with dogs, but that isn’t a requirement. As long as you love pets and have a lot of empathy for animals, you’ll likely perform well in this role.

5. Become a Landlord

A landlord is someone who buys and rents out property to an individual. To get started, you’ll need to buy a rental property. Then, figure out the capitalization rate because that determines the rate of return on an investment property based on the annual rental income.

Take the time to figure out the landlord-tenant laws in your area, and ensure your lease is written to match those same laws. Picking good renters, properly maintaining your properties, and keeping accurate tenant records will help you earn an income as a landlord.

6. Social Media Consultant

With over 3.2 billion people on social media globally, a social media consultant provides a needed service that includes management and marketing. They’re responsible for helping brands and businesses affect their social media strategy, drive traffic, and increase engagement. To start, enroll yourself in a social media marketing course and create a portfolio.

Be sure to network as soon as you can and start saving for your consulting business if you need more skills later on. Place your marketing focus on Instagram, as it will increase your client pool.

7. Freelance Writing

To become a freelance or essay writer, you’ll need strong writing skills, organization, independence, the ability to accept criticism, and confidence. You need to be a good juggler with your skills. After all, a freelance writer is a marketer, customer service agent, creative artist, and much more.

There are many different kinds of freelance writers:

Article Writer: Write for publications
Blogger: Write for blogs
Website Copy: Copywriting for a business website
Social media: Write captions for social media
Editing: Edits copy instead of writing it
Technical Writing: More complex writing for specialty fields
Ghostwriting: Write under someone else's name

All of these examples offer a lot of variety in skillset and writing style. To start in any of these writing careers, you’ll need to have relevant samples on your freelancing website.

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8. Blogging

Blogging requires the same skill set as freelance writing, except your focus is more on running a successful blog for yourself. If you have a particular passion you want to write about, creating a blog is a perfect way to show off your writing skills. To make money blogging, you could sell your WordPress skills, sell products, offer courses, or become an affiliate marketer.

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Just by those pointers above, one can immediately discern that there are so many ways and businesses to venture, not to mention the perks of being self-employed. Similar to this product offered by Leaderonomics called Happily. Take a look at the short video below on how you or your organisations can leverage it: