Are you unemployed or looking for a way to make money without using money as startup capital? This article will take you through five possible hustles you could dive into without investing a dime. All you need is your phone or laptop, a stable supply of internet and a skill you are willing to learn. If you already have that skill, then you are on the right track and starting your business will be very easy.
Graphics Design
The world is quickly evolving and everyone is in need of posters, logos and banners for their new businesses. Every time you walk and see a large poster of a popular brand, there is a graphics designer who sat behind his laptop for less than two hours and earned a good amount of income from the product/service.
Graphics design is a business niche that has not really been tapped into by most Kenyans and it, therefore, provides a market gap for you to fill. To get into this, you will have to learn one of the following sub-classes of design;
- Logo and Poster Design with adobe illustrator
- Image editing with Photoshop
- UI/UX design with Adobe XD or Figma
- Magazine or book design with adobe InDesign etc.
There are many avenues of graphics design and picking the right one will enable you to attract a good loyal stream of customers.
What do you need to start graphics design?
To be a good graphics designer, you will need a laptop to download and install one of the software mentioned above. I recommend Adobe Illustrator or Adobe XD for posters and UI/UX design respectively. You will then need to go to YouTube and learn everything about graphics design. The concept (from experience) is usually very simple and it will take you around 3-7 days to learn most of the things therein.
As soon as you learn, start practising and recording your progress. Use video editing tools to speed up the videos and add some background music. Post the videos on social media, especially on YouTube. Create a professional Twitter and Facebook account where you will be posting your finished projects. Make sure to tag your friends so that they can share and link you up to prospective clients.
If you follow this guide to the latter, customers will start streaming in. Make sure you don’t undercharge your customers. You will need the money to set up a good portfolio website in a few months after starting the venture.
Watch the video below for more context.
Social Media management
Social media management goes well with graphics design. This is because when most companies hire, they expect that the managers will use posters and banners. If you don’t have the skills prior to employment, you will either have to sub-hire or learn from scratch.
With that aside, you should start by building your own social media presence. No one is going to hire you if your social media accounts aren’t big. If you can’t manage your own, how can you manage that of a company?
Take time to understand how different platforms work and their algorithms. With a good understanding of social networks, it will be easy for you to build your brand as a social media manager and get hired by multiple companies.
You will need to get conversant with social media management software such as plannable or buffer that will help you schedule posts. With this software, you can plan an entire month’s worth of content. Note, however, some features are limited to premium subscriptions.
Post useful content on social media
Starting a YouTube channel is one thing. Posing relevant, shareworthy content is another. In this niche, you should create a channel where people learn from you. Beit Facebook or Twitter spaces, your audience should be convinced that you have wealth of information on a particular topic, e.g., real estate, land procurement, survey, etc.
Once you convince your audience by posting informative content on a regular basis, you can then ingeniously create a way of selling your knowledge. You can decide to offer financial advice and charge at an hourly rate r if you are a programmer or web designer, you can offer, through your social media, to create a website for a client at a reduced fee. Since you have a good foundation on social media, it will be easy for people to trust you.
Digital Marketing
How far can your creativity go? Can you convince someone online that you are a master of your art?
Take a look at your favourite social media user and ask yourself what product he sells or markets. Many startup companies usually look for social media accounts with a large audience and market their products through them.
Digital marketing also involves becoming an SEO agent. Search Engine Optimization is a knowledge niche that requires dedication and time to master. With such skills, companies looking to rank online will pay you very well for your services. All you need to learn this is to watch almost every video posted by Neil Patel on YouTube or backlinko. In short, look for established SEO experts online and learn from them. After that, you can now start charging for your services.
Become a tutor
If you are a teacher, lecturer or good student, consider giving tutelage to students online who find it hard to understand concepts that you can explain easily. The 21st century has been described as a period of ‘Knowledge Heist’. Basically, students around the world can pass their exams without studying. Kenya is the leading source of tutors and you can never be too late to join the education caravan.
All you need to do is sign up as a tutor on a respective website. Your credentials will be analyzed and if you qualify, you will have all the time in the world to answer questions from students all over the world. These students will pay you well to teach them new concepts. Once you have been approved as a tutor, consider hiring people to do the work for you and watch your bank account grow.
Note, however, that being a tutor is no easy task. I will be doing an expose article on how to sign up and get approved as a tutor in Kenya in a subsequent article. If you really want to be a tutor, subscribe to my weekly newsletter and I’ll notify you once I post the article.
Conclusion
In this article, you have learnt five ways of earning money without investing the same. If you are looking to invest bigger and earn at a larger scale, here are 15 small profitable business ideas to start as soon as possible.
