Yes you can this applies equally to young or old - read on.

However let's say you are new to this, maybe you are over 50 or over 60 or even over 70 it does not matter the internet does not judge or care. In fact, you may have a better chance because you have so much more experience than younger people who may have the advantage of technology knowledge. Do not fear technology and stick with slowly learning it because what I have found is that the internet is full of so much noise and hype - being successful online has some very similar traits to being successful in the bricks and mortar world. Just like anything - you can learn it step by step and with our micro-courses you can easily master what is necessary. Take our micro-courses on areas that you want to study up on and work with us on our private online group and we will help you step by step through the process.

Now back to starting an online business that makes money in 2020 - The best business ideas come from you and your passion. But you need to take stock of your skills and add in a bit of strategic planning also so that you know where you are going. Just like starting a business in the offline world, there is a lot to do to start a business in the online world - it is much easier to start but you do need to get the fundamentals right.

The most important thing at this stage is to remember that you can not fail if you never give up. I say that because if you are here thinking that you can in 6 months make a million dollars then better you leave now and go to one of those flashy sites with cars and jet planes that try to appeal to your emotions.

I can show you how to succeed online but it is a 12-24 month process and you need to consider that before you start. You will see some small wins after 12 months (some people even see some after 6) but it is in the 2 year period that things start to take off. In fact, one of my favorite books says all great human accomplishments have taken 80000 hours!

Remember

Energy and persistence conquer all things. ~ Benjamin Franklin

So now is the time to start read this article and then take our key micro courses - how to find your niche and evaluate it for success.
After doing this you will know where you are going.  For a special time only we are running an introductory offer. See below.

Here is a list of the top best small business ideas to start in 2020.

To set up an online business that can earn job replacement income in 2 years you need to provide value to people and the best way to do this one of three ways:
1.  Coaching and Consulting with a view to the setup of a scaleable business
2.  Your own products through an eCommerce store and setup
3.  Products that you will recommend and promote normally called affiliate marketing. Or even advertising.

By setting up a blog, you can promote and sell all of these from one website and make the lifestyle changing money and without too much startup capital.

For example, I have a number of successful websites - or blogs that are making good money - and in my micro-courses I teach you how I did this - you buy only what you need when you need it to start these low-cost setup business.

So how do you engage and set up an online website business? How do you set up the right foundations?

Some examples would be

--> Choose a web host - what type - how fast - how much - shared hosting or not?
--> Choose software for making a website
--> Choose SEO website tools

I could go on and on the are about 50 key steps - the key here is to follow a blueprint that works and takes you through the whole process one step at a time. We cover this in another post and also in our micro course we give you the step-by-step method, of how to get your site setup correctly in 2 days ready for adding informational content and money generating content.

But I want to reiterate you need to be in it for the long haul - so many people give up just weeks or months before their site takes off - I know because I have purchased some of these site for pennies in the dollar and grown them and now they are producing great monthly revenue and fantastic profits. I do not recommend doing this to start with as you need to know the fundamentals first and this is another micro course we teach how to do this.

So first you need to take a mindset change or a seachange - this is a business - businesses take time to grown and we need to setup our website or blog as a commercial enterprise - a business from the very first day.

Do not follow all those flashy blogging advice - we are building a business.

You will read much advice about how you should follow your passions and write about it - while has some relevance it is no good without a fundamental business setup you will fail to earn money from your site. What we give is step by step - even micro steps to build the foundation of your business so when it takes off and take off it will - you can scale it because you have the right building blocks, tools every thing in place. Standard operating producers all in place. It is then easy for you to outsource to a VA for example. (see our article on finding a Virtual Assistant)

So in summary - treat from day one your online blog or website as a business. I actually do not like the term BLOG - it is old - I like the term Online Business because that is what it is.

Top Best Steps to start a BLOG or Online Business and make money and a job replacement income 2020

Select your area of interest expertise or as it is often called online niche your blog's niche based on primary business factors, not your passions. 

--> Can your Niche easily produce revenue
--> Does you Niche have actual products or are they digital or virtual products
--> What is the competition in you niche like
--> Do you have an interest or passion for it - you see this comes last. 

In our micro course on niche selection we give you a detailed micro step blueprint how to evaluate and select your top 5 niches.  Then we go into a further level of detail so you can select the best one to try.

Also covered in this micro course is

What is the best software to select how to install a simple WordPress theme along with all of the relevant plugins bloggers need?

Getting to know SEO plugins and tools plus performing keyword research to generate traffic to your site.


Another important skill is key building or scaling your guest blogging and link building strategies to build Website Authority.

Then when traffic starts to come to you site, monetizing your website with the right tactics at the right stage of your blog's growth.

Blogging or this website business as I prefer to call it is the ultimate low-risk, high-reward business, and seriously my best top pick starting an online business that can scale.

This business model has a very low cost and barrier-to-entry and the potential for high profits, certainly job replacing income and what is great you can start it while working full-time.

With the latest pandemic, there has been a well-reported move to consumers and even business buying online a whole lot more. Amazon has been hiring hundreds of thousands of staff. 

With e-commerce, there are many different business models you can take up. Amazon FBA (fulfilment by amazon) has received a lot of press - but unless you have a lot of money to keep buying increased stock as your sales rise this can be a drain on finances with quite a high risk. So before you start this you need to do a business plan and ensure you have enough money to fund at least 3-4 months of stock.  Also product is typically imported - a lot form china - what happens if it is faulty or for some reason just stops selling you are left with the stock and amazon charges a lot of money for its fulfilment services.

Drop shipping kind of by passes the risk mentioned above - but has another set of challenges. I think this can serve as a good start to test your ideas and marketing and if you can get this to work you can move into full-fledged manufacturing your own products and selling them on your own website.

Drop shipping is a good option for beginners since you don't have to stock products or even ship them yourself.

Drop shipping is a process by which you become an online retailer and post products for sale from wholesalers, but the drop shipping companies manage all of the backend shipping. You just need to generate online orders and send the shipping information to the wholesaler.


How do you get started in drop shipping . Firstly you first need to do market research and identify products that suit drop shipping and are in high demand . To start many people also research top-selling products on sites like Amazon to get ideas.

The good news is there are many good drop shipping systems out there and you can have good success.

Drop Shipping products online is a simple process:

--> Choose your eCommerce platform.
--> Upload or add product information to your online store and there are even software programs to do this automatically for you.
--> Choose a design for your website and online store pages.
--> Set up your site for taxes and costs of shipping.

Now that is quite a lot of work (and I have simplified the process a bit)  and then many people would say that is the easy part - but then you have to get customers or as we say get traffic to your website. How do you do that?

So while it is straightforward to launch an eCommerce site, the real challenge becomes how to get website traffic.

The good news is we have a micro-course on exactly this - how to get traffic as it has many similarities to the affiliate marketing model I mention in number 1 above. 

The good news also there are many systems that are easy to set up for drop shipping - like Wix.  

We will have shortly full reviews on online e-commerce systems like Wix, Squarespace, etc.

To start a Wix e-commerce site is not too bad at around 15  dollars per month.

I do quite like the drop-shipping model and rate this as my number 2 way to start an online business because it firstly can scale and secondly does not require much capital to start or scale.

Some of the key platform and offerings are Udemy,  Thinkific and Teachable and they will help you to get started quickly.
See our review of these teaching platforms.

The first step is just like a course or any new venture - plan your podcast episodes well in advance as many will require research or interviewing experts.

Of course you will need your software and hardware for pod casting.

Next, you need to decide and sign up for podcast hosting . A podcast host is a platform or service that stores your audio files and then distributes them to the major podcast networks like Spotify, iTunes etc.

Front-end web development is a valued skill and there are thousands of choices for you. Even more people are launching new sites and the demand is expected to be strong for this skill.

If you have the skills or can learn them - this is a future proof area and you can get income almost straight away.

A great way to start is by developing websites for your friends and family to practice your knowledge. I know one guy who did his first site free for his church and now he runs a team of 15 people in a multimillion dollar agency. Again it was not overnight - but he persisted and got there.

You can jumpstart your online web business by offering competitive prices for your services. As you get more of a reputation and word of mouth spreads then you can increase your rates.

To learn new skills or brush up your old ones there are many  free or cheap online courses including Treehouse , Udemy has lots, and Codecademy is also highly thought of.

If you are organized use these talents to earn an extra stream of income as a virtual assistant. Virtual assistants (VAs) are in high demand by many types of organizations including corporations, governments and small business.

Again this is a good online gig to start if you need money quickly as it usually pays weekly.

See our article on the top 10 freelance jobs you can start from home for more detail and pay rates.

You need to work out a system that removes the stress from the process and offers it online at a reasonable cost. 

Did you know that buying or selling a house is one of the most stressful times in people's lives? 

Work out how to solve that and you will be on to a winner.

Working as a virtual real estate agent you will earn 100 % commission on what you sell.

Choose you network carefully as many companies offer 100% commission but often there were strings attached.

Find an online real estate company that has minimal charges. Like charging for a website and errors and commissions insurance

The world of real estate is changing in every way. Today, you don't even have to leave your house to view properties and even buy them. What this means is that the “traditional” real estate agent days are numbered and will soon become antiquated.

So if you have an interest or skills in its area set yourself you and gain complete autonomy. You can work where you want, when you want and with whom you want, and you keep what you earn.

If you know the intricacy of search engines and have some technical skills in platforms like Google Ads and Google Analytics and Search Console, becoming an SEO consultant could be a profitable option for you. Many small business owners don't understand how much of an effect search engine optimization (SEO) can have on their business performance. Start your own online consulting business by marketing to those business owners on the power of SEO to help them to transform their online presence and increase their conversion rates.

You can use your marketing and promotion skills to demonstrate to business owners the benefits of using google analytics data, strategic and long tail keywords plus content structure to gain more organic web traffic. If you are need some help with SEO or want to brush up on SEP you can refer to Moz's Beginner's Guide to SEO.  

If done right this can be a good profession. It also lends you to setting your own sites also, for products or affiliate marketing.