Double the Hustle: Profitable Businesses You Can Start for Under $1,000

If you’re trying to start a business without wads of cash from your savings or an angel investor, fret not.

There are many bootstrap business ideas you can turn into profitable enterprises.

In fact, you can get a business off the ground with less than one thousand bucks.

To help, we’ve rounded up 6 ideas if you want to start a business without burning through your wallet.

Read on.

Affiliate Marketing

Initial investment:  $150

Affiliate marketing can be the quickest way to start an online business with little money.

As an affiliate marketer, you’ll be earning commissions for recommending a product or service offered by another business.

Affiliate marketing is a highly profitable venture because you earn money for every referred sale.

The best part?

You don’t need a hefty upfront investment to get started. And you can get started from home.

While starting a full-blown affiliate marketing business can run into thousands of dollars, you can get yours up and running with $100 or less.

First, you’ll need to identify a niche and an affiliate program that offers reasonable commission payouts. 

Since you’re on a budget, you’ll focus on growing the blog organically. This means you’ll generate traffic using strategies such as search engine optimization (SEO), creating high-quality content, and content marketing.

Of course, you can pay for traffic by running pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns later when you start raking in a pretty penny.

Most of the initial investment will go toward setting up a niche website. Think of a niche website as the platform you’ll use to drive sales for the products or services you’re promoting.

Here’s a breakdown of the initial investment:

• Domain name: $12 per year

• Web hosting: $50 to $100 per year

You may choose to hire a web designer for about $200, or you can watch videos on YouTube for some tips. You can also ask your host to do the basic setup for you.

Once everything is set, create high quality to build trust, grow an audience and interact with your readers. Again, you may consider hiring writers to help with content creation once you start generating enough income.

Done right, you could be on your way to building a profitable affiliate marketing business earning a passive income regularly.

You can make $2,000 to 10,000 per month as an affiliate marketer. Some top affiliate marketers take home over $200,000 per month.

Side Note: Planning ahead is vital to increasing your chances of success. You’ll, therefore, want to do solid keyword research and competitor analysis.

Insurance Brokerage

Initial Investment: $700

You can start an insurance brokerage with as low as seven hundred bucks.

That amount covers an online insurance underwriting course, license fee, licensing exam, business card, and generating your first insurance leads.

The key to starting an insurance brokerage firm is to leverage digital marketing instead of traditional direct mail marketing.

The biggest upfront investment is lead generation. Still, with $500, you can generate enough leads to break even.

You must be thinking, can anyone jump in and start a thriving insurance agency or brokerage with $700?

 Yes, but the person with a solid mix of sales acumen, digital marketing skills, tenacity, and mental toughness stands a better chance of making it faster.

As an independent insurance broker, you can make anywhere between $77,000 and $100,000.

Lawn Care Service

Initial Investment: $600 to $800

Consider starting a lawn care service if you’re looking for a low-cost business idea.

Most of the initial investment goes toward buying equipment such as a push mower, hedge clippers, weed eater, a small trailer, and leaf blower.

You can keep costs down by leveraging low-interest-rate financing offered by stores. You can also consider used equipment.

You can use social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram, word-of-mouth marketing, and flyers to win customers.

To help you stay on top of things, you’ll need to invest in systems — most of which can be easily found online — to track equipment maintenance, accounting, and daily scheduling.

As a lawn care operator, you can generate $30 to $50 per hour.

Dog Training

Initial Investment: $300

At times, all it takes to start a business is to capitalize on your skills. If you have experience training your dogs, you can start a dog training business with only a small investment.

You can use Facebook to get the word out about your new venture to get clients. You can also post your services to locals. In addition, create a Facebook page where you can share dog training tips and advice every day.

Other ways to market your dog training business include using Instagram Stories and posting short videos on TikTok.

At first, you’ll want to concentrate on the local market. As your business grows, you offer online dog training classes.

Tip: Figure out what most dog owners struggle with to help you win clients fast. You can, for instance, start by creating videos on dog obedience.

Local training services may include visiting your customer’s homes while they work.

You can earn up to $36,000 per year as a dog trainer. If you’re a professional, trained, and have a special clientele, you can charge as high as $200 per hour.

Podcast Production

Initial Investment: $100

According to Statista, over 100 million people could be listening to podcasts in the United States by 2024. 

With such statistics, there’s high demand for podcast editors. 

The beauty of it is that you can start a podcast production business for less than $1,000. In fact, if you own a computer, you’ll have everything you need to get started. 

Sure, you’ll require editing software, but you can get that for free online. 

How about the skills needed to edit podcasts? You can learn podcast editing and production by watching free tutorials on YouTube. 

You’ll find clients on podcaster forums on Facebook and other social media platforms — also for free. 

Further, you may consider launching a business website to advertise your services to a wider audience. 

According to ZipRecruiter, podcast producers take home between $24,000 and $62,500.

Social Media Management

Initial Investment: $50 to $100

There are many reasons you’d want to venture into social media management.

First, you’ll be paid to use social media, which can be fun if it’s something you already enjoy doing.

On top of that, it requires little upfront investment or equipment, especially if you have a computer and a reliable internet connection. Besides, you can run the business from home or anywhere as long as you have internet access.

Some services you can offer as a social media manager include:

• Developing a social media marketing strategy for your clients based on their goals

• Setting up social media accent

• Keeping with the current social media trends and sharing them with your clients

• Growing the number of your client’s followers

There’s no one-size-fits-all strategy to starting a social media management business. Start with the platform that you know best and learn as you go. Sign up for free online courses to perfect your craft.

Leverage networking to win your first clients as you aim to get referrals and testimonials.

The median pay for social media managers is $52,000 annually, ranging from $35,000 to $80,000 per year.

The Bottom Line

These six businesses are easy to start and don’t require much capital. 

Like any business, however, you must be ready to put in the work to succeed. If you’re passionate and do the needful, you can turn any of these ideas into a full-time, income-generating venture. 

To your success!