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What are some of the best low risk businesses you can start with $0, $500, $5k, and $10k of startup capital?
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Interested to hear what people think. I know it depends on skill set. What would be involved to start such business, ideation, developoment, and execution wise.
Top Comment: It was mentioned before but service based businesses are low cost to start. I started a carpet cleaning company with around $15k, made about $40k my first year but the sky’s the limit if you’re hustling plus it’s easy to scale
Lower case, capital letters, in crypto wallet address, does it matter?
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Does it matter if my crypto wallet is completely in lower case letters? Because it seems in metamask there is Capital letters and when I copy it in my OpenSea account they disregard the capital letters, maybe it doesn't change a thing but I wanted to make sure.
Thank you for your help
Top Comment: Beep Boop NEVER share your secret seed phrase AKA secret recovery phrase . EVERYONE DMing you to help is a SCAMMER. MetaMask Support will NEVER DM to help you. AVOID scammers by turning off your DMs. Go to: https://new.reddit.com/settings/messaging "Who can send you chat requests" - Nobody "Who can send you private messages" - Nobody MetaMask Support will NEVER DM to help you. 4. NEVER DM or accept DM from ANYONE offering to help. They are SCAMMERS and will steal your money. 5. NEVER enter your secret recovery phrase aka seed phrase into any website online. These are the 12 words given to you when you set up MetaMask. 6. NEVER go to ANY websites sent to you. These are SCAMS and your money WILL be stolen. 7. NEVER SYNC or VALIDATE your wallet to ANY websites. This is a SCAM and your money WILL be stolen. NEVER SYNC in ANY FORM: QR Codes, seed phrases, secret recovery phrase, private key, etc. 8. NEVER call phone numbers, text Whatsapp numbers, DM on Discord or do video chat with people on this subreddit MetaMask DOES NOT offer customer support in this manner. You WILL BE SCAMMED. 9. ONLY get help from Support.MetaMask.io or community.metamask.io We are NOT on Telegram, WhatsApp, WeChat, Instagram, Facebook or any social media platform. DO NOT DM with people on ConsenSys Discord, as they are probably scammers. There is NO exclusive MetaMask Discord. 10. Back up your secret recovery phrase 11. Learn more at MetaMask Learn I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.
Getting started day trading with low capital
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Hello everyone,
I have been watching videos and reading articles about swing and day trading and I wan't to give it a go with some money I won't miss. I know many people believe that it's not worth it to start until there is more starting capital, but I think I'll have fun anyways. Is it possible to start trading with just a 100 bucks? Keep in mind, I'm not looking to get rich just to get to know trading and test strategies. If it is possible are there any platforms you could recommend? There are so many and it would be great to narrow the selection.
Thank you all for the help!
Top Comment:
TD Ameritrade's thinorswim is amazing for active trading. You should know that pattern day trading rules will prevent you from making more than three day trades in a five day period. Swing trading is probably your best bet. Have fun!
Low Capital success stories
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Is it realistic to think it's possible to grow from small amounts of capital? It seems most successes require a lot of capital. Just an engineer who wants to eventually work for myself. Looking for ways to do it
Top Comment: Realistic, no. possible but highly unlikely? yes.
Business Model That Can Start With Little To No Capital (Beginners)
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EDIT: Sorry, I messed up the title.
Before we start, a few assumptions:
You are currently interested in becoming an entrepreneur, and you want to start a business.
The problem you are trying to solve right now is that you want to determine what business to start.
You also may not necessarily have the money, but you do have enough time that you can put into your business. If you don't, I would recommend considering looking into starting a business when you have either time or money/capital. You can't start a business without either of those resources.
BUSINESS MODEL YOU SHOULD CONSIDER
My recommendation is to start an affiliate marketing business. Affiliate marketing business is just like a traditional business except you don't have to deal with manufacturing, shipping, handling, fulfilling the product, customer support, etc.
That will take out most of the costs associated with starting a business. Affiliate marketing is done over the Internet, so you don't need an office or any physical location for your business which is usually an additional expense.
HOW THE BUSINESS MODEL WORKS
Your job as an affiliate marketer is to market and advertise already existing products. Here's how it works in a nutshell.
You select a market you want to be in. Then you find a company that is already selling products that you want to sell and one that also offers an affiliate program which allows others (businesses and individuals) to market and advertise their products in exchange for a commission (percentage of a sale, e.g., 10-50%).
There are probably tens of thousands of such companies, Amazon (sell any physical product), Clickbank (digital products), and many more, etc. (I know some really good companies – that I am affiliated with – that offer USD $1000 in commissions per sale)
Next, you sign up with them as an affiliate and you begin your marketing their products. There are multiple ways to attract customers (drive traffic), some of them include:
- Building a website and ranking it in google
- Building a following/audience on social media like Facebook and Twitter
- Running paid ads on the internet, networking and collaborating with others in order to get in front of each others audiences, etc. (I will be making educational videos on YouTube teaching the aforementioned things in the near future)
Ultimately, when your prospective customers click on your unique link (issued by the affiliate program) that takes them to the company which sells the product, you will be attributed a commission for each sale (typically 10-50%).
All the manufacturing, inventory, shipping and so on, will be taken care of by the company that you are being an affiliate for.
In short, your job is to:
- Select products to market
- Market the products / attract customers
- Receive commissions
- Let the other company do all the leg work, e.g., handling orders, shipping, manufacturing, customer support, etc.
CRITERIA FOR EVALUATING THE BUSINESS MODEL
Regardless of what type of business you want to start, there are certain criteria you have to consider when deciding on the business that you want to start:
- Likelihood of achieving your target revenue goals
- Market demand for the product
- Ability to make a quality product
- Passion for the market, business or industry
- The size of the financial investment required to reach the point of profitability – you don't have a lot of money to burn, so you need to begin generating profit as fast as possible
- The size of the financial investment required to achieve target revenue goals – you don't have a whole lot of money in the first place, you need something to live off of
- Percentage of revenue generated that is profit after all business expenses
- The cost of producing/manufacturing a product
- The size of the financial loss if the business has to be closed pre-maturely, e.g., because it is not working out, not how envisioned, etc.
- Probability of making costly mistakes when starting a business, e.g., making inappropriate purchases, losing money on poor business practices, etc.
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF THE BUSINESS MODEL
Now I'm going to "evaluate" the affiliate marketing business model for you, each criterion at a time. This is so that you would better understand the advantages and disadvantages of the model.
Likelihood of achieving your target revenue goal
For comparison a traditional business requires education on manufacturing, inventory, hiring, handling returns, customer support, etc. As you can imagine there are quite a few moving parts and things that can go wrong that can lead to failure.
When running an affiliate marketing business there's less training and education for you to take on because you're "partnering up" (not literally) with a company that manufactures it's own products, has its own customer support, has its own staff, and holds its own inventory.
The end result is you have fewer things to take care of, fewer moving parts in your business, fewer things that can go wrong that can lead to failure to achieve your revenue goals.
Market demand for the product
A traditional business requires comprehensive market research that you will have to conduct on your own if you are strapped for cash (or pay and hire somebody to do it for you).
In affiliate marketing, you only need to pick an already existing product that has lots of demand already. The company that you are promoting has already done all the research, otherwise they would not be in business.
Ability to make a quality product
Traditional business: proper market research and a thorough understanding of your market's needs is a must if you want to appeal to your market's needs with surgical precision.
Products that deliver exactly what the market wants have a higher perceived value (hint: you can charge more for the product). Moreover, let's not forget that a product has to manufactured using good manufacturing practices in order to achieve high quality.
In contrast, in affiliate marketing, your only concern is researching and selecting a quality product to promote. And this you can figure out by checking how well existing products (ones that you can affiliate market) are received by customers, e.g., reviews, testimonials, popularity, etc.
For example, if you find that a particular pair of Nike shoes are in high demand, maybe you could identify an opportunity reach a particular market as an affiliate for those shoes.
Apparently, Nike has an affiliate program and this means you wouldn't need to deal with opening an expensive physical store, deal with the costs of holding inventory just so you sell those shoes.
Passion for the market, business or industry
An affiliate marketing business you can be started in a fairly large number of industries and markets that you are passionate about, as there are quite a few brands and companies that are willing to have affiliates drive additional sales for them.
The size of the financial investment required to reach the point of profitability
It often takes anywhere from a couple of thousand up to a few hundred thousand US dollars to get a traditional business started, whereas one could start an affiliate marketing anywhere form ZERO (for free) up to a few thousand dollars (if paid advertising is used).
The size of the financial investment required to achieve target revenue goals
Traditional business like stores, restaurants, factories usually operate at a loss for some time incurring hundreds of thousands or in some cases even millions until they turn their first profits let alone achieve their target revenue goals.
As far as affiliate marketing goes, as long as you not using any paid advertising, then it is possible to bring the initial investment down to ZERO. One caveat though, the process of getting to your revenue goals will be slow, it can take many months and years.
Conversely, if you are indeed using paid advertisements then the initial investment could be up to a few thousand US dollars.
Percentage of revenue generated that is profit after all business expenses
As an affiliate, you can be making anywhere from 5%-10% for physical goods, and 10%-75% for digital products like training & education, software, etc.
I have made a video explaining this in greater detail (see PART 2, but you should also watch PART 1 in order to see the "big picture" of what I'm explaining).
I also realize that this post is already running really long (I apologize for that, but this is what happens when I get into the state of flow), so if you are interested in exploring a couple more criteria against which I evaluate affiliate marketing and how it compares to a traditional business see the videos above.
Here are a few examples of criteria that are covered in the videos (there are obviously more):
- The cost of producing/manufacturing a product*
- The financial loss if the business has to be closed pre-maturely, e.g., because it is not working out, not how envisioned, etc.*
- Probability of making costly mistakes when starting a business, e.g., making inappropriate purchases, losing money on poor business practices, etc.*
WHY YOU SHOULD START WITH AFFILIATE MARKETING FIRST
My recommendation is to start with affiliate marketing if you are beginner entrepreneur. Start small and scale big only when you find what products are selling like hot-cakes.
Try selling your competitors products first and see if you even have the skill to sell that type of product. You will have an opportunity gather feedback from your customers by then you will have plenty of information on what's working and what is not and how to improve the product in order to get ahead of the competition.
Begin generating revenue by starting with the affiliate marketing business model. You always later branch out into other markets or replace the affiliate products with your own.
3 IDEAS FOR MARKETS YOU CAN PURSUE WITH AFFILIATE MARKETING
- Learn everything about maintaining good health and weight management and then teach others. The world population does not seem to be getting slimmer and healthier. You could become an affiliate for high-quality online courses, physical products such as blenders (for juicing, making healthy dishes, etc.), as well as nutritional supplements, Omega 3, Vitamin D, etc. (people don't get enough omega 3's and vitamin D).
- Another idea: Learn how to do marketing properly and then teach others to do it as well. Robots and automation are coming, help others develop the necessary skills in order to survive an era of A.I. and automation and you will be rewarded for helping the world make the transition smoother.
- If you are into dogs, start a blog teaching dog owners how to take of their dogs. Dog owners are in need of help and they are willing to try solutions even if they cost money.
CONTINUE LEARNING
If you would like to get an overview (the big picture) of how an affiliate marketing business model works, see
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQoF6gzF8Ts.
I hope you find my answer helpful. Best of luck!
Top Comment: Wheew! Took a while to put this together. Would appreciate if anybody could let me know if they found this useful.
Trading just seems impossible with low capital.
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Right now I've been trading with about 5000$ I typically keep anywhere from 7-10 open positions at one time trying to keep my portfolio diversified. I've made like 250$ this quarter which is pretty decent, but how do people get rich off stocks it just doesn't make any sense to me. It's like you have to have an extreme amount of capital to make any kind of money. I guess if I had 100k in my account in would be a completely different ball game. Anyone have any advice for a 22 year old looking to make decent money off stock trading in the next decade?
Top Comment:
You can trade with 5000$ and build your account up. My advice would be to look for low-priced stocks (maybe $1-$30 range) that vary a lot day-to-day, with high volume. You can input parameters into a stock screener online to find stocks which match your criteria.. If you buy a stock which varies 20% almost every day, and it's cheap enough for you to afford it, you can build your account up relatively quickly. Also, summer is slower from what I've experienced. I'm not sure how long you've been trading, but I think it will pick up a lot in the winter, especially OTC stocks, if you're into trading penny stocks. Keep plugging along and you'll be able to build your account up! Keep researching and learning ways to get the most bang for your bucks :)
Passive income ideas with low capital?
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I have saved up $3,000 and would like to use it to bring in some passive income or even a side project. I'm very young, If i lose it all I will survive.
Does anyone have any ideas? I've thought of lending club, vending machines, and possibly e-commerce. Thanks for reading!
Top Comment:
This was covered today on hacker news, the thread may be interesting to you
What are some low capital, low launch time ventures
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I'm not looking to get rich, just looking for something that can be started up relatively quick with only a small initial investment.
Top Comment:
hot dog stand. $5000-ish investment for the cart and supplies, Find a location, and boom, ready to roll.
$30-$100,000 /year, depending on location, expenses, # of employees, etc.
EDIT: Source: My parents have been in the hot dog stand business since...2008? Might have been even earlier.
The first location was only open Fri-Sun, roughly 30 hours a week. And they brought in $50,000/year. In 2011 they opened a new location which is the real moneymaker, located in an insanely high foot traffic area (A local mall if you're curious). 2 years ago they brought in $100,000+. This year, they made even more, but I haven't seen the numbers yet, since they year's not over.
The business could be even bigger, but they are happy with what they currently have. Right now, it's just the one stand. They closed the less profitable one, but are insanely busy with this one. Currently I think they have 5 employees that work at the stand itself. Unfortunately, as often happens with small businesses, this thing has consumed their lives. A typical day for my parents is 12 hours each, every single day, with maybe a day off once every 2 weeks.
One problem they have is that all the storage for the business is at the house. So they have to do 1-2 runs/day to the stand to restock. Unfortunately, there is very little on site storage at the mall, which makes it very inconvenient.
I think that if I were to run a similar business, I'd get a food truck and use that for food prep and storage. Then when you need to restock, you go out to the parking lot and get what you need.
We get our inventory from local restaurant supply stores, as well as Costco.
For those interested in numbers:
Your typical hot dog, when purchased in bulk, costs $0.42-$0.65, which they then resell for $2-$5. On a slow day (10 am-8pm) you'll sell an average of 200 hotdogs.
For easy math $0.50 X 200 = $100/day. On a typical busy day, it would look more like $0.50 X 800= $400/day. $100/day= $36,500/year. $400/day= $146,000/year
Of course, that's before taxes, payroll, etc, and that's also just from hot dogs. They also sell drinks and chips with similar margins. Different foods would have different margins, as might different locations.
So if you were interested in this business, I'd recommend:
1-go to you local mall office, and ask about becoming a food vendor. They will be more than happy to help you get started.
2-Consider different locations. I've seen hot dog stands in malls, in parking lots. Heck, when I was in college, there was a hot dog stand that was only open between 10pm-2am, and was located right next to all the bars. People are drunk, dehydrated from drinking all night and starving. They made a killing.
3-check out your local restaurant supply stores. Look at the prices. Look at your competition. Find a price point you're happy with. Do the math and see if it adds up.
4-get a separate bank account, used for business only. Same with a credit card. It makes it easier to figure out where the money is going.
5-Not sure where my parents bought there stands. But I do know that there lots of places you can get them.
6-Your costs are going to be higher than you think they are. Do what you can to keep them low. Instead of having employees, do the work yourself. If you can make $200/day during a low period, that'll be enough for the owner, but when you have an employee, it could cut that number in half.
7-Start small, and then scale up if you like business.
8-Working outside in the cold sucks. Dress for the weather.
9-You'll need food handler's permits, business license, etc.
Hope that answered some questions!