What if having a business didn’t mean signing a lease, hiring employees, buying thousands of dollars in inventory, or figuring out complicated technology?
If you’ve been dreaming about becoming your own boss but keep getting stuck on where to start, what to sell, or how much it will cost, there may be a much simpler path.
With a laptop, an internet connection, something you already know how to do, and a few beginner-friendly tools, you can start testing a business idea without turning your life—or your budget—upside down.
In this article, I’ll walk you through a simple exercise that takes you from “I have no idea what my business would look like” to a realistic online business model you can actually picture, research, and begin building—one step at a time.
You might be wondering how should I get started? How would my business look? How can I make the "laptop lifestyle" work for me?
This article will help you transform from wondering what your business would look like to exploring ideas, comparing options and transforming from “maybe someday” to "I have an online business".
When You Think of Starting a Business What Do You Envision?
When thinking of starting a business, many people think of a conventional business set up that includes something like this: a building + employees + inventory + equipment + customers coming to your physical storefront. So when we talk about having a remote business, it can be hard to visualize.
What Many People Envision When They Think of Starting a Business
But what if starting a business didn't require a storefront, physical inventory, or a huge upfront investment?
For the purpose of this article, I want you to envision a different set up that includes: a laptop + internet + your expertise + customers buying from your online storefront.
Workflow: Basic Set up to Work from Any Location
Many People in the U.S. Have the Desire to Be Their Own Boss, But They're Not Sure Where to Start
In addition to being confused about how to start, they also have plenty of concerns. The Shopify-Gallup Entrepreneurship study finds that most Americans share the desire to be their own boss. More than six in 10 U.S. adults (62%) say they would prefer to be their own boss, while 35% would prefer to work as an employee for someone else.
The two most important reasons aspiring entrepreneurs gave for wanting to become a business owner are shown on the circular charts below.
The desire for a more flexible work schedule (45%) and to pursue a passion project (42%) were also popular reasons.
Even though many people want to start a business, they see obstacles to getting started. We've listed a few of the top reasons cited in the survey here.
Top Obstacles to Starting a Business
Identified by the Survey
Here are some of the top obstacles new business owners identified as barriers to getting started.
lack of money
Financial risk
inflation
Learning curve
Would it succeed?
At the same time some of the biggest challenges or obstacles they feel they would face in starting a business includes the (1) lack money needed to start (60%), (2) concerns about the personal financial risks of going into business (50%), (3) inflation (30%), (4) needing to learn more about starting/managing a business (33%), and (5) a lack of confidence that business would succeed (26%).
There's More Than One Way to Run a Business
The two sides of this image show that there is more than one way to build a business—and each comes with tradeoffs.
On the traditional business side, the biggest advantage is visibility and structure. A physical location can make a business feel established, give customers a place to visit, and they work especially well for retail, food, service, or community-based businesses.
If you hire employees right away, you may also have extra people who can help you serve more customers and handle more day-to-day tasks.
The downside is that this model usually comes with more overhead and more moving parts. In addition to expenses for your primary residence you have rent, utilities, payroll, inventory, equipment, maintenance, and staffing.
These extra expenses can create financial pressure before the business is consistently profitable. It can also tie the owner more closely to a location and set schedule.
A brick and mortar business
Here are some of the pros and cons of the traditional business model. This is the model a lot of people think of when starting a business.
Conclusion:
A brick and mortar business has the advantage of visibility and structure. A physical location can make a business feel established, give customers a place to visit where they can see and touch your products and ask questions to a live person. However extra expenses beyond those that you're paying for your residence, like rent, utilities, payroll, inventory, equipment, maintenance, and staffing can create financial pressure before the business is consistently profitable.
For many new and existing business owners, the real goal is not simply to “work from home.” The lure of just having the opportunity to start working from home can be tempting. You can work from home and be just as unhappy as working in a tradition 9 to five with a boss.
While starting an online business offering a service you're already performing on your 9 to 5 is a great transition, the end goal is to build a business that provide more control over your income, time, and future.
The traditional model can be powerful, but the online model makes it possible to pursue the same dream with fewer fixed expenses, less technical overwhelm, and more flexibility.
You can start with what you already know, use simple tools to create products and reach customers, and build toward replacing your 9-to-5 income one step at a time.
work-from-Anywhere business model
Having an online business has pros and cons as well. But the pluses are you can get started with a very low investment and you can start small, and test things out before deciding to invest more money and time. If you can find an idea that works well with your expertise, the benefits are endless.
Conclusion:
Having an online business gives you flexibility and helps you pursue the same dream with fewer fixed expenses, less technical overwhelm, and more flexibility. You can start with what you already know, use simple tools to reach customers, and build toward replacing your 9-to-5 income one step at a time.
How to Get to "I Have a Business" From "I Have an Idea"
In the scenario where you have a laptop + internet connection + your expertise + customers buying from your online storefront.
For many people finding a laptop is not a problem, even if they have to start with a used or refurbished model. Most homes have an internet connection. So we'll skip those elements for now and assume that those are easily obtained if they are not already part of your household budget.
We'll start with the next element in the flow, by substituting "your expertise" with an idea, (a product or service) that fits with your hobbies, skills and expertise.
We'll pretend that your hobby or area of expertise is crafting. If you're not a crafter, you can go through this exercise and fill in the blank with your hobby, skill or experience.
Our pretend flow would build on the original flow, with the highlighted item added. It would look like: a laptop + internet connection + your [crafting] idea/expertise + customers buying from your online storefront.
For this exercise we will use AI to help us come up with some crafting ideas for an online business.
Here's a prompt you can cut and paste into your favorite AI tool to get some ideas. Fill in the highlighted areas with the hobby, skill or area of expertise you want your business to be about.
PROMPT: Please help me come up with some ideas I can use to earn start a business if my hobby is [crafting]. Specifically, I like to [crochet, make jewelry, make pottery, knit or whatever your specialty is]. I envision having a business that gives me [whatever you want from your business, for example flexibility, passive income or the ability work from any location]. I would love to have a business that requires [the amount of time you have to devote each day, or week] that will allow me to the time to enjoy [whatever it is you want to enjoy, spending time with family and friends, relaxing, traveling], making my handmade [name of product] and taking care of my other responsibilities.
AI Results: Products You Can Create
Here are the results from our prompt.
If crafting is your hobby, you already have something valuable: a skill people may pay for, learn from, or use as inspiration. You don't have to limit yourself to simply making items and selling them one at a time.
Here are several business models you can build around crafting:
- Sell finished handmade products. Turn what you already enjoy making—jewelry, crochet items, knitted goods, candles, signs, paper crafts, home décor, personalized gifts, etc.—into a small product line. Start with just 3–5 products rather than trying to create a huge shop.
- Sell at craft fairs and local markets. This is especially helpful when you're new because you can talk directly with shoppers, see which products attract attention, collect email subscribers, and learn what people are willing to buy.
- Create personalized or custom products. Custom names, colors, sizes, gift sets, wedding items, memorial products, teacher gifts, and business gifts can command higher prices than generic products.
- Sell craft kits. Instead of making every finished item yourself, package the materials and instructions so customers can make the project at home. This can work especially well for kids' activities, parties, holidays, beginner crafts, jewelry, knitting, crochet, and painting.
- Sell patterns and instructions. Crochet patterns, knitting patterns, jewelry-making instructions, SVG files, printable templates, sewing patterns, and woodworking plans can become digital products that you create once and sell repeatedly.
- Create printable products for other crafters. Think inventory sheets, craft-fair planners, pricing calculators, order forms, vendor checklists, product tags, care cards, thank-you inserts, booth signs, and packaging templates.
- Teach your craft. You could offer local workshops, Zoom classes, recorded mini-courses, YouTube tutorials, or paid memberships. A beginner class like Make Your First Pair of Earrings or Crochet Your First Market Bag is easier to sell than a broad course about everything you know.
- Create craft content and earn affiliate income. Instead of selling your own products exclusively, create tutorials featuring the supplies and tools you use. You can earn commissions when readers or viewers purchase recommended yarn, tools, machines, storage products, craft-room equipment, displays, packaging, or other supplies.
- Create content for craft brands. If you enjoy photography, video, or graphic design, you can create Pinterest pins, tutorials, short-form videos, product photos, patterns, or demonstrations for craft companies.
- Sell supplies, equipment or curated bundles. You don't necessarily have to manufacture something. You could specialize in bead bundles, yarn combinations, equipment and tools you use to make your products, embellishment kits, packaging bundles, starter kits, or themed craft collections.
- Offer services to other makers. Many talented crafters aren't comfortable with technology or marketing. You could help them create Etsy listings, photograph products, design booth signs, build simple websites, create social media graphics, set up email marketing, or prepare for vendor events.
- Build a subscription business. Once you have an audience, you could offer a monthly craft kit, digital pattern club, seasonal project membership, template library, or members-only tutorial collection.
One of the strongest models is actually a combination business. For example, imagine you crochet handbags. You could sell the finished handbag for $65, the crochet pattern for $9, a beginner video class for $27, and recommend the yarn and crochet hooks through affiliate links.
One craft idea now gives you several ways to make money instead of depending entirely on your ability to keep producing finished products.
For a beginner who wants to keep things simple, the best way to start is with one customer + one craft + one core product.
For example: "I make personalized jewelry for women looking for meaningful gifts." Then add complementary income streams only after you learn what customers actually want.
A particularly low-risk path is to start with one handmade product and one digital product connected to it. That gives you immediate selling experience while you begin building income that doesn't require you to physically make another item every time someone buys.
The Low-Risk Path From “I Have an Idea” to “I Have an Online Business”
Next Let's Look at the Best Online Storefront for You
Next let's substitute "your online storefront". We'll pretend that you decided to build your storefront using Etsy. You can go through this exercise and fill in the blank with your chosen online store platform.
The flow will go from a laptop + internet connection + your [crafting] idea + customers buying from your online storefront [Shopify, WooCommerce, Etsy, Beacons].
Let's use AI to help us find the best beginner platform for your new business, based on the criteria we give it. Here's a prompt you can use:
PROMPT: Please help me select the best beginner friendly platform for an organized storefront that will contain [one product from our first AI results list above. For example, one handmade product and one digital product connected to it]. I want to sell [describe what you want to sell. For example, finished handmade products and complementary digital products (patterns, instructions and printables)]. I'm not techy, but I do have experience [describe your experience, for example I can drag and drop images and uploading them to the internet]. What is the easiest no tech way to sell these products that requires a [describe the investment you want, for example low or no minimum investment]? My platform choices are beacons, Etsy, Thrive Suite + Woocommerce, or Shopify. I want to be able to test things like titles, opt in forms, and products to see which items my audience likes the best. Please provide the best platform from the list that would meet my needs. If there are other options beside the platform choices I've listed, please provide them and let me know why you think they are best.
AI Results: The Best Platform
The results we received from our prompt gave us a platform that was not on the list. After reading the recommendation I agree that Payhip is a great solution for new business owners. Here are the results from ChatGPT.
Payhip is unusually well suited to what you're describing because you can create a real storefront without building a traditional website.
Low Fees. The Free Forever plan is currently $0/month with a 5% Payhip transaction fee, and Payhip says all of its features are available on the free plan. You can have unlimited products and unlimited revenue. Stripe or PayPal processing fees still apply.
More importantly, Payhip specifically supports both physical and digital products. For your handmade product, you can enter the price, photos, description, variations such as color or size, SKU, inventory quantity, weight and shipping information. Inventory automatically decreases as products sell.
A Simple Storefront. Payhip has a Store Builder where you can change fonts and colors, add sections, create additional pages, add images, feature products and build navigation without coding. It can even create custom landing pages for particular products or promotions.
For your complementary product—perhaps a pattern, printable, instructions or project guide—you simply choose Digital Product, upload the file, add the title, image, description and price, and Payhip handles delivery after purchase.
That's important because you said you're comfortable uploading images and dragging and dropping things around.
No Tech Overwhelm. That's about the level of technology you should be dealing with at the beginning stage.
You don't need to learn WordPress, themes, plugins, WooCommerce extensions, hosting, caching, backups, payment gateway settings and everything else while you're trying to learn about potential customers and what actually works to help you earn money. You can always add bells and whistles as your business grows.
Build Your Email List ASAP. When it comes to generating leads, Payhip allows you to put a Newsletter section directly into your store. The subscribers from your store can become subscribers. You can export subscribers to your email marketing system and add automation when you're ready.
Simple Testing and Analytics. Payhip also gives you a surprisingly simple, yet effective way to test what's working. This was one of the biggest reasons it was moved to the top of the list for you. It best fits your needs over the other suggestions.
Payhip's analytics show views → started checkout → completed checkout, including your conversion rate. So instead of only knowing "I didn't get many sales," you can begin diagnosing why.
Wrapping It Up
Going through these simple steps using AI prompts for research and insight that leads you from no business idea to the following example flow: a laptop + internet connection + your [crafting] idea/expertise that starts with [one finished product and one digital product] + customers buying from your [Payhip] online storefront.
Your transformation has taken you from wondering how you could start a business that helps you bring in extra money, that will allow you to have more flexibility and opportunities for growth. You've moved through learning how an online business can save time and help you earn without investing a huge outlay of cash.
You went from no business to having ideas you can use to start a business with products that tie into your hobbies and expertise. Physical and digital products you can sell from a simple storefront while you work a 9 to 5 or handle other responsibilities.
You've also learned how to use simple AI prompts to research, gain insight and weigh options. You aren't tied to these recommendations but they give you clear, logical steps that you can take.
Now that you have the basics, learn how to set everything up with our free course, called The One Page Conversion Lab. Register below and get started!
The One Page Conversion Lab
You don't need to build everything before you can make your first dollar! We'll show you how to build your audience, validate your idea, and start generating leads and sales—right now.
