4 Business Models to Work From Home

4 Business Models to Work From Home

December 08, 2019

 

For some reason or another, I have been infatuated with the idea of living the RV nomad life and traveling the world. My wife is really not as excited because we have 3 children. That has not stopped me from dreaming and pushing forward in every area of my life to achieve these goals. There is something that really attracts me about being able to not be tied down to a desk. I do not really have the luxury of being able to work a remote job and I'm not independently wealthy so I have had to create multiple business models that would sustain a nomad traveling life. This really fueled my searching for the business models that would work for traveling amongst the elite nomads, or so they seem in my mind. These business models are also great for anyone wanting to stay at home or work from home. Here is my personal list of business models that fit my criteria and that I believe would allow me to reach my goals.

 

1.) Drop-Shipping

It is no surprise that this model reached the top of my list because of its extreme flexibility. Not only are drop shipping business's extremely flexible to run but they also can provide healthy margins because of the nature for them to easily scale. In order to scale a business model in the dropshipping world, it is extremely important to pursue a niche that has healthy margins (Generally over 30% or more).

It is also equally important to choose your platforms and systems wisely. Remember the keywords here are margins and systems that scale. I tend to choose systems that I can easily grow to 1 million dollars in gross revenue per year and be able to handle that amount of work myself. I will be detailing drop shipping basics and systems in entirety in my dropshipping section.

Growing a dropshipping business is not an easy task, however, it can be very rewarding potentially if you do it right. Before I look at starting a dropshipping company I look at a few metrics. First, I do in-depth keyword research to get statistics on keyword volume per month and competition. I also use competitor research tools, more on that later. Finally, to be safe you can also test your product(s) by doing a simple landing page and a small Google Pay Per Click budget to get your landing page out there. With all that being done you should have a good idea of whether or not your dropshipping niche is a good idea or not.

 

2.) Stay at Home Freelancer

If you have skills and abilities that companies and business owners want then why not share those with the world and create a business around it? My background was in digital marketing, Google Pay Per Click, and SEO. So I decided to also launch a digital marketing business where I would be able to work with business owners and help them grow. I also do marketing consulting, personal and business coaching sessions for clients as I have the time. Choosing to be your own freelancer has some great pros and cons as well as great flexibility. Let's discuss some of the pros.

One of the great benefits of being a freelancer is that you are in control of your schedule and free to use your time as your own. However, this can also work against you if you are not disciplined enough to knock out projects as they need to be completed. There are some great freelancer platforms out there that are specifically built for freelancers and businesses looking to hire talent.

Another benefit of being a freelancer is that you are able to set your own pay rate so long as you are staying within what the market will bear. As you grow and gain more business you can rationally charge more per hour because of the supply and demand. This will naturally knock off any business owners that are not worth your time and that are not wanting to pay a premium for your services. Ultimately, the best clients to have are the ones that are willing to pay for your expertise.

Moving on to some of the cons or the hard parts of being a freelancer. One of the hardest things you will find as a freelancer is starting your portfolio and gaining credibility takes time. This should not discourage you from becoming a freelancer because all good things do take time. This is especially true in business. If there is one thing I have learned over the course of being in business and from having run multiple companies, it is this. Persistence in business is crucial and it takes time to build a successful company.

Each business owner has there own pace, systems, and niche so you cannot compare yourselves to others. I must say though, you do need to have done your due diligence and already confirmed your niche market and that there are ample traffic and others already succeeding in the industry. In the end it is about a business that customers want to buy from and not something that you think is just a "great idea."

One of the reasons that I'm focusing more and more on my drop ship and eCommerce platforms is because of its ability to scale without needing to hire employees. My goal is to travel and I do not plan on bringing employees with me in my RV.

In most cases, when you freelance you have a ceiling of time that you run into which can be a blessing or a curse, depending on your overall goals. When you hit this ceiling you will either need to be content with your hours and your wages or you will need to hire other freelancers to help you grow to the next stage in business. For me, I personally want each of my companies to be doing 1 million dollars per year without employees. If I was to focus only on my digital marketing business I would need a dozen employees to get all that work done for over 100 clients.

Now, all that being said, I do know of others that are able to freelance and build million-dollar business models that do not really require employees. So there are cases when freelancing is better than eCommerce and vice versa, as with anything in life. I have seen and heard of this in the selling of information, books, podcasts, teaching a system and lessons. That is a scalable business model because you are selling education and not a physically tangible product. When you sell a digital product like that you are able to scale.

 

3.) Amazon. Get in While it's Hot.

Ah yes. Amazon. We all have seen and heard the success stories I'm sure. Amazon is a powerhouse of business owners right now. The market is getting more and more saturated but there is still plenty of opportunity in the right niches that are not super competitive. The reason Amazon fits my bill is that I'm able to import from China and send my products to Amazon FBA where they can do all the shipping and tracking number updates for me. I personally love this model.

What others may not realize is that I can also integrate my website store to fulfill through Amazon through an API. What is an API? It's just a nerds way of saying you can get the two websites to talk to each other. Here's an example. When an order is placed on my website for product X the product order call is sent to Amazon FBA where it tells them to send out product X to my customer B that just ordered. Then when Amazon ships out product X to my customer B the shipping tracking information will download back into my website and the customer B will be notified of the tracking number and shipping updates.

There are no questions that some are becoming millionaires on Amazon alone selling white labeled products. We will discuss the details of importing more in detail on my blog in different sections so you can learn the tricks of successfully running your Amazon business.

I personally like having my products on Amazon and also on my own website for a few reasons. For one, websites take years to grow so if I start early then one day I will have a website eCommerce business that is not necessarily dependent on Amazon. The second reason is that I prefer to not have all my eggs in one basket. I like the idea of being able to wholesale and retail my products, having my own site allows both to purchase from me.

 

4.) Ecommerce Website

Another great approach to working from home or traveling is to set up your eCommerce business with a partner or employee who can ship your products from your home or warehouse while you are traveling. This can be a highly effective business model if you 100% trust the person that is handling your shipping, returns, and customer service.

When I look for a new hire for one of my businesses in the service repair industry, I look for someone that is honest, loyal, has integrity, and wants to learn and better themselves. Because of this, I have been able to retain employees for a longer period of time in the industry than most other franchise owners. An employee with these responsibilities will be a key employee in your company while you are gone.

I know of plenty of business owners that operate this way and it defiantly can work when you are traveling. Make sure to invest heavily in your employee/s and that they have everything they need to operate without you while you are gone. Make lists that document everything and start at least 6 months or more before your traveling so you can work out all the details. You will find that during this period you will be able to refine your systems and improve them before you leave.

If you would rather not have employees and you choose to not send your items into Amazon for fulfillment you can still utilize a 3rd party fulfillment service that will ship out your products for you. Some business owners even utilize Amazon FBA and a 3rd Party Fulfillment Service because it gives them more control and the ability to ship quickly. Another great benefit of a 3rd Party Fulfillment Service is that you can oftentimes house more products as well. Amazon FBA has some restrictions on how much you can store.

 

So there is my list of 4 possible ways you can work from home or travel in the RV while running a business. It's not a perfect list by any means and I know there are a lot of others out there that have differing opinions. If you have any comments for additions to this list please feel free to leave them in the comments section for others. Also please share this article with anyone you know that may be interested. Thank you and stay tuned for my next article.

 

 

 



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