So, you’ve been thinking about starting a business online and you fell down the rabbit hole of research. However the more you look into the topic, the more confusing things get. And you wish that someone had put together a guide to tell you everything you need to know about starting a business online in 2023 and beyond. Well, you’re in luck! Because here is your full guide.

I started my own online business in 2016 as a service-provider and since then I have supported countless online business owners in various different types of online businesses (coaching, consulting, digital product creation and e-commerce), and I’m packing everything I’ve learnt about what matters and what doesn’t in here, so you can learn from my insights and also my mistakes (and there have been a lot).

So, if you’re ready, read on and get started with your own online business!

Who this article is for?

Starting an online business is a great way for many people to earn a living, but especially for these groups of people:

Traditionally Marginalised Groups: I myself am neurodiverse and I’ve always struggled with the incessant BS in “real companies”. So why wait for someone else to see your worth? For someone else to decide to pay you the money you deserve to be paid? For someone to see that your limitations are offset by a huge amount of talent in a specific area and give you work that lets you shine? Why spend all day in an office with people that seem to hate your guts just because you walk this earth? I say fuck that, do your own thing.

Aspiring Entrepreneurs: If you’ve got a business idea but don’t know where to start, this guide is your roadmap.

9-to-5ers Seeking a Side Hustle: Looking to diversify your income streams without quitting your day job? This guide will show you how to build a business in your free time.

Stay-at-Home Parents: Want to contribute to the household income without sacrificing family time? An online business allows you to work from home on a flexible schedule and could be the right option for you, if you can make enough time or get support from those around you.

Retirees: Think retirement is a time to slow down? Think again! If you’ve got skills and time, an online business can be a fulfilling post-retirement project. Keeps you occupied and you get some extra money in!

Students: Want to pay off student loans faster or gain real-world business experience while still in school? This guide is your starting point.

People with Limited Mobility or ongoing health challenges: If physical constraints make a traditional job challenging, an online business provides an accessible alternative because you don’t have to go anywhere to get your work done.

Residents of Remote Areas: Live far from commercial hubs? Or in a place where the local wages make going to work for $500 a month a joke? An online business lets you tap into global markets without relocating.

Creatives and Artists: If you’re looking to monetise your art, crafts, or digital creations, this guide will show you how to turn your passion into profits.

Tech Enthusiasts: If you’re comfortable around tech and want to leverage it for financial gain, you’re in the right place.

Social Impact Makers: Want to make a difference? An online business can be a platform for advocacy and social change, and this guide will show you how to do it effectively.

Why start a business online?

I fell into the online business world by accident. My background is actually in early childhood and special education, as well as teaching adults.

As you probably know, this industry is one of the lowest paid and also one of the most unforgiving jobs to work in when it comes to looking after people, and I felt pretty hopeless. I was 24, I was the manager of a private daycare setting in London, so there wasn’t much further for me to go beyond moving up the corporate chain with one of the big daycare providers (a nightmare idea) or trying to get a job with the local authority in early years development (and those jobs were being cut year on year). I had enough money to pay the bills every month, but no way I could save money or have a holiday that involved traveling far.

One night I was sitting on the sofa doom-scrolling and I accidentally clicked on a Facebook Ad. I didn’t even see what the ad was about. Next thing I’m on a sales page for an online business membership.

Online Business…that’s a thing?!

I went down the same rabbit hole that you’ve probably gone down to be landing here.

And I decided to join. It was only £37 a month at the time, and what better way to figure out what you want to do in future than to surround yourself with people that are already doing it.

Now, more than 7 years later, this was the best decision of my life, because my life is now looking vastly different to what it used to look like. I work on my own terms, with clients I actually like, I moved to Albania and I finally have my life back. No more low wages, no more unpaid overtime, no more being the scapegoat for children misbehaving.

There are many reasons why I love having a business online, and these include:

Low startup costs: If you make smart decisions it doesn’t take much for you to get started online. This varies depending on the business model you choose (we will come to that in a bit), but in general it doesn’t take much.

Global reach: You can supply or work with customers and clients all over the world, this has meant that while the UK has gone done the drain economically, I can work with clients from all sorts of countries across the world, and that meant that even during pandemic I had plenty of work. Whereas if I’d stayed in daycare, I’d have been unable to work for closes to 2 years as many of my friends.

Operational Flexibility: You can run your business from many different places and in the way that YOU want to. This means you can actually work to make your business better, without having to convince 50 other people that it’s a good idea.

Easy to scale: You have more customers? Great, you can put better systems in place, and change your offers so that you’re able to help more customers. If you have a physical location, scaling up is a nightmare to achieve with new office space needed, new equipment needing to be purchased etc. this let’s you move faster and cheaper.

Personal Freedom: You don’t want to work on Fridays? Great, don’t. You have young kids and limited time to work on your business. Okay! I don’t want to tell you that you can build your business in your sleep without having to put in work, because that’s a lie and anyone that tells you that is probably trying to sell you something. However you can build a business that flexibly works around your life. I overslept today, I went to the gym later, and I started sitting down to work in my favourite coffee place at 10am. This would be unimaginable in any job I’ve ever had.

Customisable and combinable business models: You’re not limited to just doing ONE thing or generating revenue in ONE way. I for example work 1:1 with new service providers helping them to start and scale their business. I also do tech and systems implementation for said businesses to help them get started or put new systems in place for growth. I do this on limited days of the month. I also take part in summits and invite people to join and when someone upgrades I receives affiliate commission, plus I do trainings on various softwares and when someone joins with my link I also receive an affiliate commission. These are small, but over time they do add up and it’s always appreciated for the free content I create. I also sell some Notion Templates that I use in my business as well as one-off trainings. All of this builds a stack of revenue some of which is one-off, some of which is recurring and I can build and combine these things as I wish.

Data-Driven Decisions: Data is everything when you’re trying to make decisions about your business. With an online business you don’t have endless data sources and people to worry about, you can easily gather and analyse that data and make solid decisions on what’s working and what’s not.

Automation: There are many aspects of online businesses that can be partly or entirely automated (eg. product sales and follow ups). So you don’t need to worry about paying people to sell your products.

Niche markets: If you’re targeting a very niche market that you’re passionate about, it’s likely that you can find a group of those specific people online – or make one yourself which becomes the home for your people. This makes building a community and generating sales in your business easy.

Low risk: You can start this up alongside your job and mostly with funds you can potentially spare by foregoing a few things here and there. Therefore the risk is way lower than if you had to take out a loan from the bank to open a physical location or buy stock somewhere.

All in all starting an online business in 2023 is a very worthwhile thing. You do have to be dedicated and put in effort, but that goes for anything new you’re wanting to build in life.

So, with the frame for starting a business online set, let’s dive into what you really need to do to get the ball rolling.

Setting the end goal for your online business and life

The first thing I really want you to do, is to decide why you’re starting a business and what kind of business and life you really want to have.

And here I don’t want you to think of what you think you can achieve, but what you’d want if everything was possible.

If that’s difficult for you you can also think about “what would life look like if I had already achieved all of those things”.

There are different definitions of success, and when you enter the online business world you will very quickly be sold on other people’s idea of success, so I want you to write down what success looks like for you right now. This may change in future and that’s okay, but you do need a starting point.

Do you want to a lifestyle business, where your business simply pays for your bills? Or do you want to go bigger than that? Are you looking to build more of a social enterprise?

What does that look like?

This will influence a lot of decisions you will be making in future, so think about this carefully.

Business Models for Starting a Business Online

There are quite a few business models out there. The one that you choose will depend on you personally. There isn’t a “best business model” and your business could incorporate more than ONE of these, but I want to give you an overview here so you can make decisions on what is right for you to achieve the life you’re looking to have.

Service-Based Business Online

In this business model you are taking your expertise in a specific area and offer it as a service online. This includes things like paid media, digital marketing, virtual assistance, copywriting, design, tech and so much more.

If you’ve been doing something like this already in your job, this is often the easiest thing to get started with, because you have experience, you have gotten results doing this before, so it’s an easy step to get some work on the side while you keep your job until you can replace your income.

Even if you do not have any experience in this, you can look into virtual assistance as a stepping stone in to a more specialised service.

This method is best for professionals who have specialised skills or are happy to invest the hours to develop them. Also most likely you need the time to work more closely with clients to achieve the result promised within the deadlines so this is definitely a commitment.

The start up cost is fairly low, however you will need to spend time to market yourself in the online space, so it’s something that may take about 3 months to really kick off.

Coaching and Consulting

If you have a large amount of experience in an industry, then moving into consulting remotely can be a great way to get started with having your own clients online. Alternatively you can also get certified as a coach if that’s something you have an interest in. You do not need to be certified to coach online, but as someone that has done the NLP Practitioner with Richard Bandler I would solidly recommend going through a thorough training program, because the techniques you learn are honestly transformational and will help you to actually get your clients results effectively.

This will only work for you if you actually enjoy teaching, mentoring and coaching others.

Online Courses and Digital Products

You can also sell online courses and digital products online. This one is one I am split on. Because of the often lower price point you do need to sell a lot. And when you’re just starting out online you don’t really have an audience to sell to, so you’re going to need to spend a lot of time marketing and the income may not be all that good. However if you have a hand for this kind of stuff this can be a great side-income which can grow into enough of a full-time pay.

Here it will also be beneficial for you to leverage paid ads if you have a high-converting product. So there are definitely things to be learnt.

I would mostly recommend for you to start with offering a service if you have these skills to be teaching a course or developing a digital product on something and focus on building an audience online as well as learning more about marketing your online business.

Subscription Models

You are also able to offer a product or a service on a subscription basis, these are things like stock-photography subscriptions, monthly content memberships or physical subscription boxes.

Again because of the lower price point you need to achieve higher numbers. Depending on how long it takes or how much it costs to acquire a member and how long they stay a paying member in your subscription you may find it hard to justify the constant updates and maintenance for the membership if you do not have enough members.

This again is something I would offer after I have another thing that is earning money.

Print on Demand and selling on marketing places like Etsy

This could also apply to the digital products category as I know many business owners that sell their digital products both through their website and through third-party marketplaces like Etsy.

Print on demand is a great option for designers. If you have an eye for making great designs, then you can develop the skills that it takes to sell these designs through marketplaces and then have them print on demand onto mugs, shirts, bags, posters, etc.

The pro for this is that there is an extremely low cost to entry (Canva Pro Subscription, plus some cash to cover Etsy listing fees), the con is that it does take a while to understand these marketplaces and to generate revenue. And you may need to invest a decent chunk of time to keep designing and keep listing products.

Content Monetisation

You could also focus on becoming a content creator, whether that’s having your own blog(s) or a YouTube channel and then you can monetise that content through ad placements, sponsorships or selling your own products once you have an audience.

This is the thing that will probably take you the most time to get off the ground unless you have something really special to share. To be monetised on YouTube you need to have 1000 subscribers and 4000 watch hours, so that is quite a high barrier of entry, and the money that you’re being paid through the platform is low for most industries (unless you’re in finance or insurance, then it’s more profitable).

But, you do get creative freedom and you love sharing content, this could be for you, just don’t expect a return until you’re probably a year or two into it.

SaaS (Software as a Service)

If you’re a developer or you know someone you can partner with to handle the tech side of things, then building a software product can be a great way to build your own online business on the side.

You do need a good idea and you need a solid agreement and a partner that is as involved as you are (and this is a huge difficulty point), but then the model is pretty much infinitely scalable, so this is a great option if the stars align on this for you.

Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is when you promote another company’s product or service and you earn a commission for every sale that you make. Again to be able to earn commissions you need an audience that trusts you, so you will need to combine this with some of the previous models like content creation, so you can have a big enough audience to offer these products to.

The upside is that you don’t need to have any specific expertise in a lot of areas, but the downside is that the income is volatile. I used to get hundreds every month for being a ConvertKit Affiliate and then they made changes to their affiliate programs and refused to keep sending recurring payouts for people that signed up with my link 3 years prior. So I basically lost most of my affiliate income over night.

So, if you’re doing something like this you are going to want to go hard and diversify, so in case this happens you’re not completely out of money over night.

Dropshipping

Dropshipping is when you sell products to consumers and those products are shipped to your customer directly from the supplies, so you basically never hold the stock.

This is great because again you don’t have a huge startup cost, you don’t have to worry about imports, about storing products and shipping them to customers. The downside is that it an be hard to establish relationships with trustworthy partner and there is no way for you to ensure that the products sent to the customers meet your quality standards and don’t degrade over time.

Also there are a lot of people wanting to tell you that it’s super easy and you can make millions in a month, but that’s just because they’re trying to sell you their program 😉

In my opinion customer reviews etc. are THE most important things for e-commerce businesses and this is something I wouldn’t want to risk with a crap quality product being shipped.

Planning and Strategy for Starting an Online Business

Now that you know what you want your life to look like and you’ve chosen a business model that works for what you want to achieve we need to do some research and planning.

I don’t want to say that you need to write a full business plan, but you’re going to want to write this down as your strategic overview. To be able to do that well you need to understand the market and how your service fits into that.

Market and Competitor Research

The first thing you’re going to want to do is market and competitor research. You need to be clear on what the market wants, how they want it and what your competitors are providing right now – and also where their shortfalls are.

How you might do that really depends on the business model you’ve chosen. You may do interviews with potential customers and clients to understand more about their challenges and problems. You may look at other products out there and their positive and negative reviews. You may search through Facebook Groups and other online communities to gather information.

This will help you to get a clearer picture of what the lay of the land is and how your offer fits into that, or you m

Some thoughts on “finding your niche”

Some people will tell you that you absolutely HAVE to have a niche. So a specific market segment that you speak to. I’m not really sure I agree with that. Finding your niche is a process. And you can only do that process when you work with a variety of businesses and try out a few different things. And then slowly you will refine what you do and see what is working. Also I feel that through being you, you will naturally attract a certain type of person that will resonate with you, so I think particularly in the beginning it’s more important to learn to show up in your business as yourself.

If you’re going for more of an agency or larger business as a goal, and you don’t act exclusively as yourself, then niching will undoubtedly help you, but again it’s a process of discovery and I don’t think that process can be hurried along unless your business only provides products for example teaching resources for teachers. Then it’s clear that you’re niched because you’re going to focus on a certain syllabus in a certain country for a certain age group – and that’s going to be your niche.

And then it makes sense to get VERY specific, so you provide digital classroom resources for pre-K Montessori teachers. Or potentially even more granular. But when you’re a service provider, then it’s not as simple when your service doesn’t inherently have a niche “built in”.

This is something I spend a lot of time helping clients figure out in a one on one setting, and there isn’t a right answer.

Defining your offers, products or services

Now you know what your business should look like for you to consider it successful, you know what type of business you will be running, you also know what is currently on offer and what is missing in the market or could be done better and you know potentially who will most benefit from your services.

Now it’s time to start designing your actual offers and pricing.

I would highly suggest that you focus on one core offer that is most likely to get you paid asap. eg. as a service provider focus on ONE core service that you’ll deliver. As a product business focus on ONE category (eg. notebooks), as a course creator create ONE core course and refine that.

Then it’s time to flesh out that product or service and set a price. Again this is something a lot of thought goes into and you will most likely refine your pricing over time.

Simple Business Plan for an Online Business

Now I’m not a huge advocate for online businesses to write this massive business plan, but I would suggest that you make notes of the things that you’ve figured out so far. As well as get clear on a few additional things. This document should be reviewed regularly (I usually do it once a year).

I usually include:

Executive Summary

• Business Name: What’s your business called? Will you be doing business under your name or a brand name?
• Mission Statement: What’s your “why”? Why are you starting this business? Why should anyone care? What is your plan for the future?
• Summary of the Plan: A quick overview of what your business is about and what the plan aims to achieve

Business Description

• Business Model: Dropshipping, affiliate marketing, service-based, etc.
• Niche: What market or audience are you targeting?
• Unique Value Proposition: What sets you apart from the competition? This could be your unique combination of skills, your specific way of designing products etc.

Market Analysis

• Target Audience: Who are your ideal customers? Include demographics, psychographics, and any other relevant details.
• Market Needs: What problems are you solving or needs are you fulfilling?
• Competitive Analysis: Who are your main competitors, and what are their strengths and weaknesses?

Product or Service Line

• Product/Service Description: What are you selling? Include features, benefits, and pricing.
• Lifecycle: Is this a one-time purchase, or is there a recurring need?
• Research & Development: Any future plans for updates or new products/services?

Sales and Marketing

• Marketing Channels: How will you attract customers? Think social media, SEO, email marketing, etc.
• Sales Strategy: How will you convert leads into customers? Consider sales funnels, calls-to-action, and sales scripts.

This is something I will cover extensively in another guide.

Operational Plan

• Daily Operations: What are the day-to-day activities to run the business?
• Suppliers and Partners: Any third parties you’ll be working with?
• Technology Needs: Website, CRM, other software, etc.

Financial Projections

• Startup Costs: What will it cost to get the business off the ground?
• Revenue Model: How will you make money? Include all revenue streams.
• Financial Forecasts: Projected income, expenses, and profitability for the first year.

These are the basics that you’re going to want in your business plan, and as I said this is a living and breathing document that should get revisited time and time again.

Legalities and Paperwork

Now that you know what your business is going to be offering and you’ve picked a name for your business, it’s time to get the official stuff out of the way.

If your country allows you to start business operations and THEN get registered once you actually earn money, then I’d strongly recommend you do that. Always prioritise activities that get you customers and clients whenever you can. Otherwise you may find that you end up never starting it because you’re stuck in a sea of admin and waiting on approvals and papers and loose the enthusiasm.

Of course, if that’s no option in your country, then do what needs to be done and get support from an accountant or lawyer depending on what’s more appropriate in your country.

I won’t get into details here on business registration and things because my audience is based across the globe and every business structure has advantages and disadvantages in every country.

Tech and Tool Stack

The next thing you’re going to want to do is to build the most minimal tech stack that allows you to sign clients or get customers.

The exact tech you need really depends on what you’ll be offering.

Website

I’d recommend if you have the funds to get started with building a website and getting a business email address. I recommend getting a domain name from Namecheap, they have a great selection, hosting from my host Lyrical Host (you can get 10% off hosting with my code JESS2023), WordPress and Divi by Elegant Themes as your WordPress Theme.

If you don’t have the funds I recommend setting up a free Notion account and building a minimalist website with it. I’m going to be releasing a training on this soon. If you have some funding you can user Super.so to publish your Notion page on your own domain and you can get business email via Google Workspace.

Booking Sales Calls

The website should include a way for people to book a call with you if you’re offering a service, coaching or consulting – you can use Calendly to set that up (and also take payment this way).

Course and Membership Site Hosting & Checkouts for Digital Products

If you’re selling a course, you’ll need somewhere to host it. There are many options and without knowing exactly what you need and what your plan is I can’t give you any advice (that’s why I created my tech membership where you can ask about stuff like this any time).

The main providers I like to use are Membervault, Teachable, Kajabi and Podia. But there are many more and not every one of them is right for your use case or worth it for you, so check the offers out carefully.

If you’re selling products like templates or trainings you will need a checkout solution. If you’re just getting started with one or two products and you don’t have audience look at using Gumroad, LemonSqueezy or Digistore24, because it takes the hassle out of getting started.

If you have more products or you anticipate a large volume of sales, you can look at hosting this yourself with WooCommerce or use a hosted checkout like ThriveCart or SamCart for this.

And if you’re selling only products, then you may want to look at having your own Shopify Store.

Read More: The Ultimate Guide to Building Your Online Business Tech Stack

Take a Training: Online Business Tech Explained [for Newbies] (this is most suitable for online service providers, coaches, consultants and course creators)

Keeping yourself Organised

When you’re starting a business you are initially the person wearing all of the hats. This can make life challenging as it gets busier, so it’s super important that you get yourself organised.

I’d recommend setting up a system for managing all of your tasks in Trello or Notion, so stuff doesn’t fall through the cracks when it gets busy.

This would be a non-negotiable for me. Personally I love Notion because I can build my systems exactly how they work for my brain and I can combine storing information with contact details of people AND tasks in one place.

Read More: Notion for Business Owners: Boost your Productivity and Streamline your Workflow.

Take a free Course: Notion Essentials for Business Owners

A note on branding and design

Instead of doing the things that get you clients, new business owners tend do decide that they need their branding done first, and they need a proper logo, and a photo shoot and business cards and and and… and then you find yourself 10k in the hole and you have no way of making that money back.

This is why I do not advocate for you to get your branding done, and I’d pay $50 for a logo off a fiverr and be done with it.

The most important thing you can do right now is to SELL your offer.

The rest can happen once you’ve validated that everything is working and that you can get paid.

Marketing your new Online Business

Now, the famous theory “build it and they will come” is sadly not true.

You might have your website ready to go, but no one is landing there. It’s because you need to bring traffic.

This isn’t the space to be diving into all things marketing your new business I will write a separate article for that and link it here. But I do want to give you an overview.

Marketing is basically an activity that makes your business known to more people. There are some marketing strategies that work fast and that you have control over and some that are very sloooow and a long-term game.

As an example sending cold emails to potential customers is an activity that brings fast results and you have some control over it. Posting on social media is something that takes a lot of time and you have limited control over the platform, who sees your content and the results.

So early on in your business you want to do things that allow you to actively get eyeballs on your stuff.

And learn to be happy whenever someone says “no thanks” it doesn’t mean anything, it just means that whatever you offered at this moment in time wasn’t the right thing for them. Keep pushing.

If you’re a product-based business or mostly a course creator you’re going to need a decent amount of traffic, so you’re going to want to focus your effort not on cold email but potentially on paid media, as well as partnerships with influencers etc. to get your name out there.

This is where you need to develop your own marketing strategy for your online business.

Sales and Conversions

A business needs to earn money or else it’s an expensive hobby.

So, you need to make sure you get paid. Marketing is one part of your revenue-generating activities because marketing brings eye balls. But sales and conversions bring cash in the bank. You need both.

If you’re a service-provider learn to sell on calls. I honestly recommend watching this video by Alex Hormozi. He is a sales and marketing person at heart and while I don’t advocate “don’t take no for an answer” I do agree that sometimes people can’t make a decision that is actually good for them. I have many times not taken action on something because I had some weird beliefs about what’s possible for me. And then I ended up in the same program through coincidence because one of my clients paid to send me – and it was HUGE for me! And if I had spoken to someone about it, I might have taken on a different perspective and done this training 2 years earlier.

Remember: Selling is helping.

So while I do take no for an answer. I don’t take excuses for an answer. Because sometimes the thinking of your potential customers is flawed. I’ll pay for tech support when I no longer lose money in launches because my tech doesn’t work?! That’s like saying “I’ll go to the doctor when I no longer have cancer.” and it’s your job to point this out to people on sales calls.

If they after honest consideration tell me that doing this would bring them in financial difficulty, then I say that I understand, I give them a couple of suggestions on where I see cash on the table and wish them a great day. They usually come back when they CAN afford to work with you and I’d rather have it that way.

If you’re a product person, then you need to learn how to convert with the text on your pages, the images you use and the stories you tell. And you need to learn to measure and optimise that.

Customer Service and Retention

Part of your business is to deliver the product or service someone bought. That is part of your marketing as well as your delivery.

Because unhappy customers will take over your marketing by spreading not-so-nice things about you. They will leave bad reviews on your product in as many places as possible, and an unhappy customer is 7x more likely to tell someone else about you than a happy customer.

So make sure you have an airtight process for delivery and customer support / success as well as retention.

Acquiring a new customer is way more expensive than selling to an existing customer.

Make offers to them regularly and give them a good deal as a thank you for being around.

Conclusion – Starting a Business Online

Starting an online business is like starting any other business. It takes work. It takes time. It takes dedication and passion, but with the right setup and strategy it’s doable in a relatively short amount of time. And for me the effort it takes to run my own business doesn’t compare to the effort it took me to go to a dead-end job I hate.

Plus I have learnt so many more things about myself in these 7 years than I ever would have in a job. I have discovered sides of me that didn’t know existed and it’s been a journey that I wouldn’t want to miss.

If you want any support on your journey, you can book a one-off Breakthrough Session here at any time. Or you can get tech and systems support in my membership here, I’d love to help you grow this thing!