The Best Guides to Starting a Digital Business (Fba, Affiliate, Consulting, Dropshipping, Ecommerce, Etc.)

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This is an excerpt from How To Financially Retire Before You Turn 30 (FIRE) – An Ultimate Guide.

Running your own business is the ultimate freedom but it’s also the most challenging path. Here are the best resources if you’re interested in starting a digital business!

Read our post on how to make money online for a more in-depth breakdown of the different types of digital businesses you can start.

  1. General (Read This First)
    1. Starting An Online Business: The Ultimate Guide for 2020 (from Hustlr)
      1. An epic guide that covers affiliate marketing, private label eCommerce, dropshipping, freelancing/agencies, and online courses
  2. Freelancing, Consulting, or Coaching
    1. The easiest and fastest way to monetize your existing knowledge/skills.
    2. The Complete Guide to Becoming an In-Demand, Well-Paid Consultant, Coach or Freelancer
  3. Online Courses (selling information products)
    1. High margin, scalable way to monetize your knowledge/skills.
    2. The Ultimate Guide on How To Start An Online Course Business
  4. Content/Affiliate Website (starting a blog/website with information)
    1. Lower margin, scalable way to monetize your knowledge/skills.
    2. How To Create A Profitable Affiliate Site (+50 Examples)
    3. How To Start A Niche Website That Can Make $3k/month
  5. Amazon FBA Businesses (selling products on Amazon)
    1. Hyped but competitive and requires capital to scale.
    2. The Best Guide To Selling On Amazon FBA (Written Guide or Video Guide)
  6. eCommerce & Dropshipping (selling your own products or someone else’s products online)
    1. Dropshipping has become increasingly competitive but eCommerce remains a great opportunity and there are still many opportunities to make money within dropshipping.
    2. eCommerce: The Ultimate Guide To Starting And Scaling An Ecommerce Business
    3. Dropshipping: The Ultimate Guide To Dropshipping on Shopify
  7. General Startup Philosophy
    1. How To Start A Startup by Y Combinator
    2. This is more tailored towards high growth, venture-backed businesses (as opposed to the cashflow type businesses we’ve listed above). But there are lots of incredible lessons in here.
    3. Features some of the best founders and investors in the world.

Related: Examples of 250+ businesses started with <$5k that have profited $100k+

I've been building digital businesses, wandering the world, and writing about optimizing life for freedom since early 2017. My mission is to lower the barrier for people who want to live with more freedom: whether that be as an entrepreneur, a digital nomad, an early retiree, or just as someone who wants to live a happiness-driven life.