Ideas for starting your own Business (Realistic and implementable)

 

Staring at your own business nowadays has been made easy. With the existence of the internet, a lot of opportunities are emerging hence creating fulfilling ways of making extra money at home.

You will learn a couple of ideas for starting your own business that works to enable you to make money on the side.

Reason for starting your own businessonline?

Technology comes and replaced the traditional way of doing business, but in return tons of new jobs are emerging. Many have blamed its existence for killing brick and mortar businesses.

However, emerging businesses sprouting as a result of the internet can be done by anyone. That the great thing about the whole thing.

Starting a business today is very easy and realistic with just a computer and an internet connection. There is no need to put money up front to start a business.

Not better than if anyone misleading you that you can get rich within a short time, think twice about that. You might be lured that in exchange you have to give money to see results, but to be sincere, it does not work that way.

Now let’s dive in on some ideas to start your business online

Ideas for starting your own Business

#1 Start a membership website

Membership websites generate income when members subscribe to premium content offered by a website. It is a great way to generate money rather than relying on displayed ads. It could be a lucrative way of making money by allowing your subscribers to support you through direct subscription.

There are various types of memberships. Some membership sites offer exclusive content to their members, while some offer forums like featured content. It may be a group from a specific Facebook forum or slack group.

It is imperative to venture in a suitable niche and develop valuable content or material that members may feel it’s worth paying.

It is not as complicated as it may seem though words as there is software available to make things easier. This software helps to build any kind of online community you may have in mind. It is easy to choose different subscription models that are possible to manage by receiving payment while engaging with members with ease.

The best Plugin for a Membership website

Looking to build a membership site with the best plugin? WordPress got you coved as it is crucial to make the best choice for your business. The better the plugin, the good the future growth of the business due to flexibility that comes with it.

List of the Best Plugins

Factors to consider

When it comes to the development of a membership website, there are many plugins available but not all are good for your site due to the ease of use.

Some are good for just a single membership subscription, while others are good for advanced levels of subscription and management.

Similarly, others have features that allow you to create content and slowly release them for users. Others are tailored to restrict content release and they hide it.

There is also the consideration of payment gateways to be used. Whether you want to use only credit cards, PayPal, or both. The plugin ought to have the gateway for the payment mode whether in-bulk or as an add-on.

With that in mind, let’s dig dipper to what you need for your membership website

Requirements to run a WordPress Membership website

These sites sare intentive resources, hence the need to choose the right host for better performance now and in the future. First, it's crucial to choose the best host for your site.

There are best hosts such as Namecheap, Bluehost, or HostGator. They are great providers if you are on a budget. They offer a business Pro plan that is inclusive of SSL Cert for secure collection of payments, dedicated support line, and also offer a dedicated IP.

However, if a budget is not an issue, its recommendable to go with a WordPress managed to host such as WPEngine for even better performance.

First, choose a domain name for your website if you haven’t. Then we come to the part where you need to choose the right plugins essential to run your business. For instance, OptionMonster is the first one to help capture your leads while also boosting subscriptions.

Without farther ado, let us now dive into the next thing on capturing the best plugins for your site.

Top WordPress Membership Plugins

MemberPress

This is the most popular plugins well known for a membership site. It is easy to use as it comes with robust features that make it manageable.

Its Pros

It is easy to set-up - It makes it easy to set up a membership site WordPress. It automatically sets up the logins, pricing, the account, and the thank you pages for your audience. It is straight forward to add the membership plans with its presence.

Content Access and control – MemberPress comes with very powerful control and access. You are easily able to control or restrict access to pages, courses, or files.

Integrations – It is easy for MemberPress to integrate with AWeber, GetResponse, MadMini, or MailChimp mail services. It is also manageable to integrate with Amazon Web services coupled with BluBrry suitable for podcast hosting.

Content Dripping – This plugin helps you to control and restrict content. You can choose who to allow and who to hide content from. It is a useful tool when you are selling online courses to users.

Payment Gateways – It comes with already built-in support for PayPal and Stripe (Formerly Skrill) payment gateways. It also allows developers to include add-ons such as Authorize-net support.

Cons

Limited Payment Methods – MemberPres comes with a limited number of payment modes. If you happen to live in regions that don’t support the three modes, you cannot use it despite its usefulness and ease of use.

Limited Integrations – Despite its support and popularity due to the services it comes with to run a membership site, it still lack efficient support to integrate with the most popular services. It is also easily extensible as you can pay a developer to integrate with a third-party you may want.

Pricing – The rates range from $129 per year for the basic plan while the Plus plan ranges from $249 annually.

LearnDash

LearnDash is also easy to use and flexible plugin. It is featured with advanced membership modules and countless integrations.

Its Pros

Ease of Setup – It is easy to set and add content using LearnDash. It comes with easy to organize tools for your membership content that can be aligned to levels or groups.

Easy content restrictions – It easily allows you to hide or restrict content to different members.

Drip Content – Comes with powerful drip content a feature that allows you to roll content upon completion by a member.

Built-in features – It comes with powerful features that easily allow you to create and engage with members with quizzes, budges, specific course based forums, or user profiles.

Integrations and payments – LearnDash comes with an incredible set of interactions and payments gateways which you can easily integrate with MemberPress, bbPress, Slack or WooCommerce.

Its Cons

Lacks some membership Features – If you are creating your site and you don’t want to sell online courses, some features on LearnDash may not be useful.

Pricing – Pricing ranges from $159 annually, a single site license and updates.

This plugin is perfect if you want to sell online courses on paid mem

membership. It is also useful in building an engaging platform.

Teachable

This plugin is an inclusive online course builder. It comes with membership pack, discussion forum, LMS, analytics, and email marketing, all under one dashboard.

Its Pros

Ease of use – No technical skill is required to set teachable plugin making it easy to use. It comes with features that make it easy to create content as it has in-built tools that enable easy upload of videos, PDF, or texts.

Drip content – I come packed with drip content features that make it possible to roll out content based on subscription or user’s progress.

In-built engagement features – This feature offers quizzes, content forms. discussion forums, and more to boost user engagement for the buildup of powerful communities on the internet.

Its Cons

It is not a WordPress plugin, hence you ought to add it using links or subdomains for integration.

Expensive – It includes everything that may be needed to build a perfect membership site, making it more expensive than any other WordPress plugin.

Pricing – Basic plan ranges from $39 per month, professional plan $99 per month, and business plan $499 per month.

Restrict Content Pro

It is known as the best plugin for a membership site. Build by the team behind the development of Easy Digital Download and AffiliateWP plugins.

Its Pros

Ease of use – It easily integrates with the WordPress interface, hence making its use very manageable.

Built-in Integration – It comes loaded with built-in integration which is not common among other plugins. It comes with PayPal, Stripe, CSV export, MailPoet, MailChimp, and much more.

Payment Gateways – featured with Stripe, Braintree, PayPal, 2Checkout, PayPal Website Payment Pro, Stripe Checkout, and PayPal Express.

Easy Digital Download – It is perfect if you are running Easy Digital Download to sell digital products.

Excellent Support – Comes with free documentation for all users. It also comes with professional email support for a fast response.

Its Cons

Limited Integrations – Comes with limited third-party email services providers. They are fewer compared to other plugins.

Pricing – starts from $99 with 12 addons and a single license, 5 sites license for $149, and $249 inclusive of all addons but limited sites. It also has an option of a lifetime plan at a range of $499.

Restrict Content Pro is one of the easy to use plugin coupled with user-friendliness and features that are needed for a perfect membership website.

S2Member

This is a popular WordPress plugin that comes with a free version and a premium Pro.

It is user friendly and has been around for a while.

Its Pros

Freebase Plugin – It has a free downloadable version although it comes with certain limits. It is a good plan to start with if you are on a budget.

Content Dripping – Has content dripping features for content rollout.

Payment Gateways – The free version support PayPal while the premium Pro comes with additional Stripe and Authorize.net.

Integration – Comes with MailChimp, BuddyPress, and bbPress.

Documentation and Support – It has got a knowledge base that is available for all. It also comes with email-based support.

Its Cons

Not completely user-friendly – It has proved to be a little difficult for users.

Free version – It has limited features such as Paypal Support and it only limits 4 membership levels, and it also lacks a drip content feature.

Pricing – The base version is free, pro version comes with a single license at $89. The unlimited Pro Version comes for $189.

#2 Make an online Job Board

Creating a job board website is another great way to generate income from the internet. A job board assists job seekers connect with job creators in exchange for a small fee.

Over the years a lot of job search engines have been created. It is therefore imperative to be creative and choose a unique or less competitive niche if you choose to go this route.

After you have attracted employers, you will then start charging a small fee from each job listing. Make offers by allowing multiple job listing at discounted rates. Or you may choose to cut a small fee from taskers after a job is reviewed and accepted by an employer.

WordPress got you covered if you want to develop a job board website as they have varieties of plugins and themes tailored just for you if you choose to build such a site.

Best Job Board Themes and Plugins

If you are looking to develop a job board website, here are several themes and plugin sorted out to come up with the best in the market.

Creating a job board website is one way you can start a business of your own and help others post jobs for freelancers.

Without farther ado, let’s get started.

Building a Job Board website with WordPress

WordPress is the most popular website builder there is in the market. As discussed earlier, it currently powers more than 30% of the websites available on the internet.

Let's understand one this about WordPress, there is WordPress.com hosted by WordPress.org. Wordpress.org is a self-hosted by Wordpress.

After you understand the difference between the two, it is recommendable to use WordPress.org as it comes with all features you may need to run a website.

After you get a domain name, get a hosting service from companies such as Namecheap, Bluehost, or HostGator.

Then after purchasing your hosting services, we recommend you follow this step by step guide to build a website.

Now we can look at the best themes and plugins you may use to build your website.

WP Job Manager

This is an easy to use WordPress plugin for a job board website. Just create pages, shortcodes, and you will have your website running.

It allows your users to register and post jobs listing on the websites. They are also allowed to manage their listing on the dashboard with ease.

It has add-ons to allow easy integration with ZipRecruiter, FaceBook, WooCommerce store, and Indeed.

WPJobBoard

It is a paid plugin that allows you to create an excellent job search engine for your website. It comes with a front-ended admin panel for users to upload and submit their listings and resumes.

It comes with a database that stores resume, and employers can easily search for the right candidate.

This plugin integrates well with all Wordpress themes and surprisingly comes with its theme. It allows you to accept payment, offer discounts, coupons, and membership-employer packages.

JobBoard Manager

Job Board Manager is another plugin that easily allows you to add pages and display job listing as it comes with ready shortcodes.

It is also SEO friendly since it uses Schema.org rich Snippets markup for all job listing. Similarly, it comes with additional add-ons to allow you to add to the company profile, widget,t location, or breadcrumbs. It is also possible to use paid WooCommerce listings, application managers, and job alerts.

Apply Online

This a classified ads management plugin that allows users to quickly respond to their listing.

It comes packed with powerful features such as email notifications, filters, application form fields, and more.

The only limitation os that it does not allow paid listing, hence you have to add another plugin to allow subscriptions to create a content form for acceptance of orders.

#3 Create a Micro job Website

Micro-job websites allow you to create jobs and connect freelancers with employees and in the process makemoney. You generate money based on the listing made and the money offered per job listed.

For instance, if you have ever heard of Fiverr, PeoplePerHour, or Upwork, they are perfect examples of micro-job sites on the internet, and they generate millions of dollars per month.

When you start a micro-job site, you act as a middleman between the employer and the freelancer. After the employer credits money for a job, the freelancer takes on the job, and after completion, you deduct their common and you are left with the rest.

How to Create a Micro-Job site with WordPress

It is possible to create a Micro-job site such as Fiverr or Upwork with WordPress. According to research, the majority of US adults seek help from freelancers online for specific services in exchange for a small fee.

Its also proven that more than 36 percent of US workers make money through freelance jobs. This means that 1 in 3 US residents work online as a freelancer.

Sites such as Fiverr helps to connect employers and freelancers for a small fee. There are other sites tailored just like Fiverr to connect freelancers with employers on various niches.

Things to consider to make a Micro-Job site using WordPress.

You will need a few things to start a micro job site.

First, make sure you are using the right platform. Self-host your site with WordPress.org.

But before that:

• Look for a domain name eg, wordp.com, org, or net.
• Create a WordPress hosting account to create files
• Look for an SSL cert. It necessary if you want to receive payment.
• Then you will need a micro job add-on and a theme.

It is a simple process to set up your site as it takes less than an hour to complete.

Steps to complete your micro job site

Set up WordPress – You will need a Wordpress hosting account domain coupled with an SSL certificate.

The cost sums up from $14-99 for a domain, $69 SSL cert, and $7.99 hosting annually.

This sounds like a lot of money for a starter.

The good news is, the Bluehost will charge a small fee of $2.75, a free SSL cert, and a 60% discount of WordPress hosting.

It is one of the largest hosting companies, and its recommended by WordPress.org.

After purchasing the hosting services, head over to the step by step guide on how to set up your site.

Your Wordpress will be automatically installed by Bluehost after you sign up. You can now head over to your dashboard directly from your hosting account.

Set up your Micro-job Website

After installing your WordPress, you can now install the micro-job engine functional to Wordpress using a theme.

Then activate your micro-job site theme. A Micro job Engine is an app with complete front-end and backend functionality.

After activating, you will be prompted to enter the key. It located under the engine’s theme account.

Check at the demo to see what content needs editing. It comes with two types of skin. After importing your demo, you will see which skin type to choose.

Your site is now setup. Visit to see in action how it is.

Select the payment method

The micro engine comes packed with PayPal and Checkout. It is also possible to purchase add-ons which include credit card payments such as PayStack, Stripe, Authorizse.net, or PayU.

Set up your payment option by visiting settings on the theme engine, and then Payment Gateways on your WordPress Admin area.

Change Branding and Web content

Change the content and the branding to your own. Go to the appearance and then customize to change the settings with a live preview.

Change it until you reach a desirable setting.

Testing your site

Test every corner of your site. Try and use your site as a user on a new window r tab. Post something for testing purposes.

Open as an employer and test by posting a listing.

Each user will have their pages, I mean the employer and the freelancer. The freelancer side will show the profile, detailed bio, gigs, and ratings.

Each user will have a way to manage their account on the dashboard.

It's also imperative to ensure every user can get email notifications.

Managing your micro-job site

You will need to manage the entire website on the WordPress dashboard. You can see all the jobs listed on the engine’s setting, you can see finished jobs. At this point, you can verify, approve, keep a job pending, or decline it.

Once the job is approved, a freelance can withdraw their money.

You can see the listy of freelancers who have requested to withdraw their money.

At this point, you can manage all the functions on the admin area of your WordPress site. You can pick conversations between your users.

It makes sure to keep functionality on the employer and freelancer side at bay. If disputes arise, you can easily resolve all of them amicably.

#4 Start a food and recipe blog

Food and recipe blogs are popular on the internet. They are lucrative niches if done right.

There are many techniques to use to monetize a food and recipe blog. For instance, you can display ads, partner with affiliate programs, sell an e-book, or set up an online store.

However, you ought to be passionate about cooking and food. This is a highly competitive niche, hence the need to be creative and think of a way to make your blog stand out.

#5 Become a WordPress developer

WordPress is the most famous website to develop worldwide. It powers more than 30 percent of the websites on the internet.

This is a clear indication that there are millions of people using this platform for their businesses around the globe.

There is a huge demand for this platform and the need for developers too. WordPress is open-source, meaning anyone is open to develop code or a plugin for the platform.

You can join the most reputable companies using WordPress brand name or even start your development agency.

To get started, you will need to be conversant with Java, PHP, CSS, JavaScript, Python, or HTML. There are many free courses available on the internet, YouTube tutorial, or WordPress tutorial available on their website. Get any of them or check them all to help you get started.

Bottom line, we hope you can borrow from the ideas for staring your own business and start making money full-time or part-time.