Building a business is one of the hardest things to do,
but also one of the most fulfilling things ever.

First of all, there are hundreds of business models and most of them work. Here I give my opinion on 7 popular models. Have fun.

1. YouTube: Building a Personal Brand

YouTube is still the best platform for building a personal brand. It's also the best for connecting deeply with an audience.

I see especially small creators being pushed a lot recently.

Why is a personal brand is a great way to start?

1. Having an audience makes selling any product or service 10x easier

2. People make the most money on YouTube compared to other platforms

3. I see especially small creators being pushed a lot recently

4. It forces you to go out of your comfort zone

How to do it

1. Start sharing your journey, no matter how daunting it might seem.

2. Create content that's true to you, even if it's just with your smartphone.

3. Focus on building a community you can later offer products or services.

4. Build relationships with your viewers through direct interaction.

2. High Ticket Sales

High ticket sales means closing leads for other businesses. It’s not really an own business, but usually you work on commission only. Which sets you in the right mindset of being dependent on your own.

Sales is the number one skill you can learn in life, period.
If you’re able to sell you are unstoppable. You will also always get a job.

Why is a high ticket sales a great way to start?

1. A skill for life. Whether it is business or life in general. Nearly everything can be translated into sales, negotiation and persuasion.

2. You’re always in demand.

3. You’ll 100% need it when you found a business.

How to do it

1. Learn by doing—make calls, set appointments, and close deals.

2. You’ll probably learn fastest by joining a company

3. Software

So I own 2 software businesses. Jinni AI and Setter AI.

Even without coding skills, you can start a successful software business. You do it by solving real problems.

Is a software a great way to start?

You can’t be a beginner. Software is hard.

From my experience the best is to have a 2 person founder team.

A business guy and a technical co-founder.

And both need to be fairly well skilled in what they are doing.

BUT if you hit it right - software is the best business model out there.

IMAGINE - 1,000 little robots working for you day and night.

They never get tired or want sick leave

How to do it

1. Find an actual problem to solve: How do you find problems to solve? Look at your own environment first. If you have a job, think about what could be automated in the company processes.

2. Sell first: Spin up a landing page with a Stripe payment link. Try to get people to commit to your product or service BEFORE you build it.
   This way you validate your idea.
   Because building software takes time. And there’s nothing worse than building on something for 6 months, only to find out that nobody wants it.

3. Don’t try to be revolutionary. Revolutionary ideas usually fail. The most successful software startups are quite boring problem solver businesses. And they focus on one small niche problem.

4. Agency

The agency model is proven but boring. And it has very little leverage. Social media gurus like Iman Gadzhi who preach this model closed their agency. They now focus on brand building.

Why an Agency is good to start with

1. No cost: You can reach out to businesses for free and offer them your services

2. Steep learning curve: Clients pay you to solve their problems. You learn how to become problem solver. A valuable skill.

3. Easy to start with: You probably have a skill (video editing, web design, etc) that you can offer to clients right now. If not go on YouTube and learn one in a few months.

How to do it

1. Define your skill. What are you good in?

2. If you have no skill: Learn one on YouTube.

3. Watch some SMMA YouTube videos. They’ll explain the process.

4. Reach out to potential clients. Remember: You are a sales company first. Your job is to sell and then figure out how you can do it

5. Get a first case study. The first client is the hardest as nobody trusts you. After your first case study things get smoother.

5. Dropshipping

Dropshipping is not dead.

Just yesterday I met a 7-figure / month dropshipper in Bali.

It offers a low-entry barrier to e-commerce. This makes it an attractive option for beginners with $5000+ starting capital.

Is dropshipping good to start with?

1. You should be experienced in marketing

2. If you are total beginner you will burn through a lot of money

3. Ecommerce, especially on TikTok (TikTok Shop) is a growing market

How to do it

1. Open a Shopify store

2. Have a general store where you can test a lot of products

3. Test 20 products each month

4. Kill the products that do not perform

5. Focus on the ones that make sales

6. Make your ads better and repeat the process

7. Focus on brand building. Dropshipping itself is a dead end. You have no repeat customers.

It's a practical way to learn e-commerce with minimal upfront investment.

6. Skool Community

Alex Hormozi named it the best business model to get from $0 - $10k / month.

Building an online community can foster engagement and loyalty, making it a powerful business model.

Why a Skool Community is good to start with

1. No inventory

2. No upfront cost

3. AI proof business model

4. Get monthly revenue

How to get started

1. Build an audience: This seems like a recurring theme, right?

2. Figure out the purpose for your community

3. Watch Alex Hormozis video on it

7. TikTok Clipper

Using TikTok for repurposing content can offer quick wins. Plus you learn about audience growth and virality.

Is TikTok Clipping is good to start with?

1. Not really, it may give you quick wins. However it’s very short lived.

2. Videos on TikTok are not digital real estate like they are on YouTube

3. The TikTok Creativity program is only available in the US and UK

How to get started?

1. Focus on Viral Content: Use trending and popular content as inspiration.

2. Get monetized by TikTok

Conclusion

What ALL of these have in common is that it makes it 100x, 1000x times easier of you have an audience.

So, whatever business you are starting.
Building an audience makes everything easier.

BONUS

The following ideas are from Greg Isenberg.
I love this guy. His newsletter has tons of value.
He explains this entire drawing here.

Bonus: AI Agents

I really like this, as I’m building one myself right now.

It’s called Setter AI. Check it out.

Why AI Agents are good to start with

AI Agents are bots that perform tasks.

There’s about to be an influx of them in every category you can think of. Wherever there is a junior staff, repeatable work, there is an opportunity for an agent.

It may feel like the agents are kinda dumb now, and some of them are, but they are getting smart quickly.

How to do it

1. Pick a B2B niche

2. Organize different repeatable tasks by job function

Where could AI agents systematize?

3. Leverage existing technology to build agent minimum viable product

4. Build a brand around it