The world crazier than normal.
BUT NOW is the time to start an online service-based business.
I love being able to work from home because I’m within arm’s reach of my family.
And in these turbulent times, when no one knows what’s going to happen or how quickly violence will erupt, we all can agree that we want to be able to get to your family and make sure they’re safe.
We want our families safe, whether it’s natural disasters, riots, or looting.
We have no idea how safe our families truly are. But if we are in an office building 10, 15, 20 miles away, how quickly do you think you could get to your car and get home to protect your family during a natural disaster, a riot, fires, or any number of things that could put your family’s life in danger?
Online Service Businesses
My wife and I both have online service businesses where we can work from anywhere, and provide our services to our clients.
As a math tutor, geography is no longer a problem. As long as she has a steady internet connection.
I run two businesses which are both internet-based.
The web design and consulting company that I run can be run from anywhere. I also have books and will be launching a membership site for the Christian Jedi that I’m building on the side.
No matter what happens in the economy, locally, I’m no longer tied to that.
My wife is no longer tied to that.
We can help people from around the world. That’s the power of an online business.
You have no storefront, that you need to protect from rioters, looters, and fires.
You don’t have to worry about paying the rent or having someone there to “man” the store.
Setting Your Own Schedule
With an online business, you set your schedule.
For me, I can sleep during the day if I need to, in order to stay up overnight to work with clients around the world.
Or I can schedule my web work and do that in between taking my kids to school or to doctor’s appointments or taking friends to doctor’s appointments because they’re unable to drive.
A service-based business no longer needs to have a local presence, depending upon the service that you’re offering.
The Number #1 Service To Offer
The biggest service, I can think of to give people is help.
Whatever your subject area is, YOU have knowledge that can help others.
You may consider founding a membership site.
This can be done on the side as a “side hustle” while you continue working your corporate job.
A side hustle is just that it is something that, something you hustle to do while you’re on the side because you have limited time to do it.
So you cannot be lackadaisical, you need to hustle, you need to put in the work.
But it doesn’t take that many people to start replacing your income, and with a membership site or something that has reoccurring revenue, you may only need a handful to 30 or 40 people to replace your income.
My recurring income comes through hosting sites for people. Each year that grows to be a larger portion of my total income as I add new hosting clients, because I’ve done a website for them, or I’ve taken over hosting from somebody that was not providing the level of service the client wanted.
My wife has reoccurring income in that while kids are in school and they’re struggling with math they typically need help more than once.
Usaully they stay with her year after year. The student (and parents) are introduced to her through one math class, like Algebra I.
The following school year, the student takes Geometry. When they have trouble, they remember her and call her.
She has worked with families for years, Working with all three of their children. When she started the oldest was a freshman in high school and the youngest was in elementary school. By the time the oldest graduated the middle child was now in high school. By the time that person, graduated the other child was in high school. So in the span of eight years, she was able to help the same family, three or four times a month during the school year.
They then moved off to college but needed help with some math entry for college or SAT work.
So, while she did not have a membership site. She did have people subscribing to her services, and that it was something that they needed to out the school year.
The membership that I’ve created at the Christian Jedi is one of a community where we’re helping each other, learn ways to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with the world through using Star Wars scenes and quotes.
We’re providing training and resources that people need. We’re providing them a welcoming community of people who are like-minded who love Jesus and love Star Wars, and who want to change the world.
You may have a passion for farming, herbs, crafting, cardmaking, photography, or coffee.
Any of these passions that you have could become a membership site.
You can become a guide for a person who is on the journey to get to a higher level.
“Your vocation in life is where your greatest joy meets the world’s greatest need.”
~Frederick Buechner.
Finding and Helping Your Core Audience
On a scale of 1 to 10, one being a complete novice, 10 being a master, you currently may be only a 3, but to all the 1’s and 2’s, you’re an expert. And as a 3, you understand the struggles of 1 and 2 much better than a person who might be at a 7 or 8.
So don’t think that there is too much free information via YouTube or Instagram or Facebook or any other social media platform or website. The more information people have, the more they are paralyzed with analysis paralysis.
They need somebody to guide them through the process and say this is important at this step, and then get to the next step.
We’re not going to overwhelm somebody with trying to understand Calculus when they’re only in Algebra 1.
Calculus is part of math but so is Algebra 1.
The later stages of whatever service area that you’re in, are not needed for steps 1 and 2, for people that are at that level.
They need to know if you’re helping them with weight loss, what are things that they can do today?
It might be to go through your pantry and find all of your foods that are unopened and donate certain foods to food banks so that they’re not in your house so that you can start fresh.
“Okay, that’s day one”, they think. I can do that.
Then on day 2 might you might offer them a menu to get them started.
Day 3 could show them how you perform your shopping.”
You continue to work with them, day by day, to get them to a point where they start seeing the weight loss instead of giving them P90X and telling them, “hey jump right in!”
Telling them to just start a particular exercise routine is not going to be helpful. They need earlier steps prior to going from being 70 pounds overweight to almost having a heart attack trying to do this intense workout.
We know that if you give people that stuff that’s too difficult, they won’t continue.
If you can help them with a lot of easy wins. They’ll stay with you, they’ll build confidence and say “hey look, I did get rid of all of these unopened bags of chips and other things. Okay, I was able to make a healthy meal last night. I found that here’s where they keep the healthy foods in the grocery stores, and I was able to put together a few meals based upon these recipes that this person gave me.”
And they can look at all of these wins over the first few days or weeks even. And then you can get them into some of the more difficult things.
As a reminder, having a service-based business that is online that no longer depends on your local demographics is going to make it a safer business for you.
It’s safer in that you have a larger audience to pull from.
You can be home and be able to take care of your family during a natural disaster that you’ll be able to be there immediately to start preparing either putting things over your window during a hurricane or getting water in place. And the “survival gear” needed to go through a blizzard or hurricane when power might be out for days.
You’re also safer in that you can pivot easier.
If business is good and you have a steady amount of clients, fantastic.
If you lose one or two clients it’s not nearly as devastating as if you were to lose your day job.
Going from one employer (one boss) to having 20, 30, 40, 100 different bosses makes things easier to lose one.
If I get 100% of my income from one source and I lose that source, I’m in big trouble. If I have 100 people paying me for a membership site. And I lose 1,10, 20 of them. It hurts less. I can adjust and move on, and I can try to replace them quickly because it’s a smaller item. As far as income goes, I don’t need to replace a $50,000 or $100,000 job. I need to find somebody that I can serve who finds value in my $50 or $100 a month membership.
Start thinking today about how you can be a person of value and provide a service that can be done online.
