Can You Start A New Business For Free?

Today, I wanted to share an opinion that goes to the mindset of some people who are looking to start from scratch with an online business.

As you can imagine, I get a lot of people here at the Blog Marketing Academy who are looking to spin up a new online business. They want to start a blog, do it the right way, sell some stuff and make some money.

Problem is, they’re freakin’ cheap. They don’t want to spend any money at all.

They want to start a blog for pennies on the dollar (or even free). They want to use nothing but free content online to learn how to make it all work. They pretty much refuse to spend any money on necessary tools. And then, come to somebody like me and ask…

“How can I start up an online business without spending any money on it?”

And my answer, if I’m being totally honest, is…

You can’t. Go get a job.

Harsh? I don’t think so. I’m just not willing to lie to them.

Truth is, you have pretty much a zero percent chance of being able to successfully build up an online business without any investment in it. Even if you’re able to do it without investing in any training (which I think is unlikely given all the noise and cross-currents out there), you’re still going to have cost of tools, software and, yes, traffic.

Because, in any real world, a business has startup costs. I mean, go out into your town and spot any business anywhere, and that business owner had certain costs that went into starting that thing up and getting to the point they are. Do you somehow expect an online business to be different? If so, why? What would give you that impression?

An online business is quite efficient to start up. Compared to an offline business, you can start up something online for much lower costs. But, not free.

Besides just raw costs, there’s also the issue of mindset. You have to be able to spend money in order to make money. You have to be willing and able to accept a certain degree of risk in order to realize the future reward. Being able to do those things means that you’re closer to the mindset that will be required of you to start an entrepreneurial adventure. Being an entrepreneur requires being able to take responsibility… being able to make decisions. And in the scheme of things, being unable to make a decision to spend a relatively puny amount of money to acquire some software tool to grow your new business means you’re not going to be able to make the bigger decisions, either.

One may think that that all gets easier as your business begins making money. Surely, if you begin to see some income, you can start spending. But, that’s just not how this works. You WILL have to spend some money before you make it. You want to do it smartly and strategically, of course, but you cannot avoid it.

The only way you can make money without any startup costs is…

… having a job.

And perhaps save some money made from that job and put it aside for the startup costs of your online business. I don’t think it is going to require some massive investment. Actions and execution are what matter most here, so your actual startup costs could be limited to a few hundred bucks, potentially. But, you have to be willing to put that money aside for that purpose.

If you are unwilling to do that. then you can start up a free blog somewhere and have at it. But, that will never become something that makes money for you. That’s a hobby and will remain that way until you change your mind and take things more seriously.

– David