273. 10 Businesses You Can Start Under $500 – Interview with Diana Frerick

Susan Sly 00:00
Well, hey, what is up Raw and Real entrepreneurs wherever you are in the world, I hope you're having an amazing day. And I want to give some shout out. We have some new countries hitting the top 10. And I just want to say, you know, the usual cast of characters. We got US, we've got Canada, we've got Australia, we've got the UK. And then we have Vietnam now in the top 10. So, you know, shouts out to you. I'm so excited. And today we're going to talk about just given the global economy, economic headwinds, we have our resident expert here with the ideas on how you can start a business for $500 or less.

00:42
Welcome to Raw and Real Entrepreneurship, the show that dares to bring the no nonsense insight to those who have the courage to start, grow and scale a business. Here's your host, entrepreneur, investor, and best selling author, Susan Sly.

Susan Sly 00:58
This woman is an absolute phenom. She is an entrepreneur, she is a multipreneur, she has just been a beacon of light to so many people. She's also the president of Agency 8, which is a full service agency for small business owners. And on top of that, she has been a longtime amazing friend for over 15 years. So Diana Frerick, welcome to Raw and Real Entrepreneurship. I know you always have the best tips for everybody.

Diana Frerick 01:27
Hey Susan, I'm excited. You know, this is one of my favorite topics.

Susan Sly 01:31
Well, Diana, you know, as our resident expert of like, you know, what can you do in a hurry when you are looking to start a business, cash flow is an issue, and I just had this conversation with someone today. They are, they decided to leave their job in big tech, they've only got a small amount of runway at home, they're going, oh my gosh, what can I do to start a business? And this is something that is affecting definitely millions and millions of people here in the United States. But I would say globally, there are hundreds of millions of people who are looking for solutions. And I know you've not only done the research, you've lived it, you are the queen of the side hustle. So I you know, please jump in what is number one on the list?

Diana Frerick 02:15
Well, I don't know if it's number one, but I've got 10 here and they're kind of all across the board, something a little bit of a smorgasbord something for everybody here. The number one that I put down is share your expertise as a tutor. And I know, you and I both know somebody personally. Marcia, Dunn, if you need math, tutoring, Marcia is your, right? I mean, Susan, your son got tutored by Marcia.

Susan Sly 02:39
Absolutely. And with education these days is so different. And Marcia was an engineer. She was retired. She started her tutoring business during COVID. She was looking for something to do, she couldn't leave the house. And she loves math. And I love Diana, that you said tutoring because we all have an inner teacher in us. There's, there's no question and you know, you think tutoring expands to more than just tutoring a subject that kids might be learning in school. It could be coaching someone to make a gourmet meal, it could be doing virtual singing lessons, music lessons. I mean, there's so many things. I love that one, if you were going to recommend that someone started a tutoring business, and they were going to invest less than $500 like, what, how would they get started with that?

Diana Frerick 03:28
You'd be surprised how affordable this is. You can actually partner with a platform, you can go with that company called Tutor Me, Crimson Education, there's really a bunch of them out there. You can actually go on your own, you'll make more money if you do because you're not giving them a cut of it. So you could start on the ones that have everything pre built in and then move on to your own. A couple ideas, if you go on your own is there's a real affordable website creator called zero, or it's kind of Zyro zyro.com. And you get a website for $3 a month, and then pair it with some scheduling software. That's really the most important thing, something you can use to give your students to schedule your time, to remind them of the bookings, and to bill them for the bookings, keep track of what's used and not used. That's really the ultimate key. And one of the best ones I've heard of Susan is Acuity. Acuity does a lot of that. And some of the tutors I know use that software. So those are some key things you need, very affordable, they don't cost a lot of money.

Susan Sly 04:27
And Diana, I love that you mentioned this because we have a new group we've started, a free mentoring group, Raw and Real Entrepreneurship and so you can apply to join, we'll tell you how to do that. It's free. There is a cost of admission, you have to be a good human because I will personally kick you out if you're not. But this is the kind of, these are the kinds of ideas that we're sharing in the group for sure. So Acuity, some kind of payment processing, they could even use Pay Pal, right?

Diana Frerick 04:54
Absolutely. There's really a sky's the limit. I always recommend going on YouTube and watch videos of people who are doing it and look for stuff that's recent in the last year because things are always changing. Another angle that you can go just kind of test the waters a bit and see what you're really feel you gravitate toward in tutoring is a website called studypool.com. This is a site where students post their questions, and then you can answer them for a fee. Like they'll, they'll be willing to pay up $5 up to $90 to get expertise answers to questions they have. People are making some good money on there and you're only hitting over about 20%. So that's just another quick little option you can do.

Susan Sly 05:33
If you're not seeing this on YouTube and you're listening, my face is just like, my mind is blown, the emoji mind. So okay, tutoring. What else doyou have?

Diana Frerick 05:44
Well, another one near and dear to me because we both have a mutual friend who does it very successfully is Etsy. Selling homemade goods or customized things, vintage items. Etsy is really great. I personally have been in a position where I had a company, we had a website we had to maintain, we had to pay all the fees involved. Etsy makes it so easy for the small business owner. I wish it existed years ago, but a friend of ours started out very small. And she's had, she's found niches that she's really good at and then gravitated toward what's trending and she's blown it up and her name is Gina Mote. Little August Ranch on Etsy. Go check her out. She does Do It Yourself kits and they're really popular with people. But she's really blown that site up.

Susan Sly 06:30
Well yeah, if you, if you're listening, you haven't heard Gina's interview, so she, I did an episode with Gina so you can go wherever you're listening to the show. And listen, Gina's sold 8000 units her first year. 8000 units on Etsy and, and you might be saying I'm not crafty. And Gina and I were talking actuallly Diana, offline. And she's like, I'm selling Crafts. I'm not saving lives. And I said, I humbly disagree as your friend because they're gonna be people who listen to this show, and we've already had a ton of positive feedback on that show. And they're in a position where maybe they're retiring into, a lot of people will retire into poverty. Or maybe they're a student going through school and they know how to make mittens. They know how to make something. You know, even if you sell five or six a month, is that enough to put a dent in your rent or your mortgage payment? Absolutely. And so I love it, Etsy store. It's an easy way to go. That's awesome.

Diana Frerick 07:28
Yeah, well the other thing that's fun with, when I'm out with Gina, she's got it on her phone wherever she makes the sale and her Etsy store, her phone goes Chaching. And I've been with her and it goes chaching, five minutes later chaching the whole night, you know, so it's definitely a real thing. People need to pay attention to, especially if you got something unique that you make. So yeah, number three. Okay.

Susan Sly 07:51
Tell me, okay.

Diana Frerick 07:53
I was digging deep for some unique stuff that you don't always hear about. And this one was like, Whoa, I don't even know if I've heard of this before. But right now, especially so many people are working from home, right. And we're sometimes two car families. And I know right now even Kevin and I, I work from home, he goes out a bit but we find one car sits almost all the time. I don't know maybe some of your listeners are experiencing that right now. You still have a car payment. Did you know there's a way to rent your spare car?

Susan Sly 08:24
I didn't know that. I didn't know that

Diana Frerick 08:26
Airbnb of car. And it's really very interesting. It's a website called Turo, t u r o.com. And there's over 14 million pre screened customers using this service. And I'm shocked. Some of the stuff they provide you, a certain amount of liability insurance. You get 24/7 roadside assistance, you can offer to deliver car if you're not close to an airport or have a point of interest. But people are making some serious full time income doing this. And to the point where they start buying additional cars. I'm not even kidding you, Susan, it's crazy.

Susan Sly 09:03
Well, it just makes so much sense because there, I was talking too today to my doctor and her daughter is you know, essentially nomads. She and her partner, they both you know, work from home and he's, I think in tech of some sort. And they're like living in Hawaii for a month, or living, and she's like Susan, she doesn't even own a car. And they're, we're seeing that with especially Gen Z or Gen Zed wherever you are millennials, that Gen Y that there is a whole movement to be as untethered as possible. So being able to essentially Turo a car makes so much sense. And so, Diana, someone doing that, I know you did a lot of research, like how much money are they making?

Diana Frerick 09:48
Well, I was reading on average as much as $1,500 per month. Some people with one car, the average is about 10,000 a year just depends on where you live, what kind of car you have, and I just kind of looked at my car, I just have an average kind of car, and I would be able to rent it out for about $60 a day. So I'm looking at what, how many days would I have to rent it out to make a car payment. And that's for some people, that's a big deal. So and then, not only that. Get this Susan, you turn your car payment into a tax deduction.

Susan Sly 10:23
That's brilliant. And, and, you know, too Diana like, we've worked together for a long time, that one of the things we always talk about in this show, in meetings, is the economy. And the reality is the economy is what the economy is, and everyone should be looking for ways to, you know, supplement their income. Look at what happened even in tech, we see 1000s of layoffs from the biggest companies out there, Mark Zuckerberg just recently said that they're going to cut back on hiring. And the reality is that, you know, job security is not always job security. So if we can have multiple streams of income, and have ways to subsidize our daily expenses outside of our job and doing something like I'm working from home, I don't need my car, I love it.

Diana Frerick 11:11
Yeah, and the other thing people need to know, especially with gas prices, is you don't pay for the gas, you're the person renting pays for what they have to return it filled back up. And the other thing was interesting, the way they've set up their payment structure is you can get, you know, the smallest percentage is 60% of whatever the rate is. And that allows the most coverage, like you'll be 100% covered on damage, no deductible. But if you're willing to assume some of the risk on damage up to like $2,500 deductible, then you can get as much as like I think it was a 90% of whatever the client pays. So I think you know, to get a vetted audience of people looking at what you have to offer in a really great platform. That's a pretty good trade off. So yeah, that's, I think that's a viable option for some people.

Susan Sly 11:59
That's awesome. Okay, what's number four?

Diana Frerick 12:01
Okay, next is rent out an extra space that you may have access to. I'm talking backyards, beautiful patios, unique rooms in your home, and you rent it out for photo shoots, video shoots, baby showers, parties. It just depends. And I was really shocked when I went on this website, I'll give you the website. It is Peerspace.com P E E R space.com. You get to list for free. And then when something rents, you do pay a small percentage, it's not that much. But the thing is, people are renting out the strangest things. A beautiful room in their home. Or how about this, what if you are currently a small business owner, you're not always at the office, you've got a really beautiful office, you can rent it out when you're not using it. And people need these places. They're traveling and MIDI rooms are at a premium these days. So I'm telling you, if it's something you're interested in, go check out the website, kind of look at what's available. Give you some examples. In Phoenix, a mid century modern retro living room rents for $65 an hour, or a serene garden in Scottsdale, 275 an hour, a distressed motel bathroom, interesting. $50 an hour.

Susan Sly 13:13
That's scary. That, I done even, I don't want to know, I don't want to know who's renting that.

Diana Frerick 13:19
But I'm telling you, these are all vetted. And it's really interesting. So if you've got that space, if you've got an Airbnb that's not rented all the time, consider renting it by the hour for photoshoots. For things like this. It's another way to make income.

Susan Sly 13:35
That's fantastic. And there's this trend that I'm hearing and all of these great ideas that I know we're gonna get a ton of listeners and fans writing in. Don't worry, all the websites Diana is sharing will be in the show notes. That there's this trend. That's like sitting back what I'm hearing Diana is like, what is it that I have that I'm not using that I can monetize, and it could be a skill, maybe on my day job, but at night, I'm gonna do tutoring, or I'm gonna do something else. Or it can be my car. It could be my backyard, it could be anything. That's fantastic. And if Hey, everyone, if you start to do these things, Diana and I want to see photos. So make sure you join our free mentorship group because that's where we're going to give you all this love and support and cheer you on. That's awesome. Okay, what's next?

Diana Frerick 14:20
All right, next is a, is sharing a course that you've created. Or maybe you just do a one hour video or 20 minute video of something that you know how to do, maybe you know how to play the ukulele, maybe you know how to make a certain dish, you know, anything you can do that you're really good at. And the website you would use to share your skill is called skillshare.com. They're really big. They're very popular. And what's beautiful about them is that they will do the promotion to the audience that they have. So you don't have to pay for advertising. And people are making ridiculous incomes on this site. They're just sharing what they know. There's anywhere for you know, you could make $200 your first month and you could start making 3000 your next month? I'm hearing as much as, in some cases 100,000 300,000, a year, a million dollars, there are people making that kind of money on this. And obviously, they're really good at it. But I think what's interesting about it is, if this is something that interests you, do a little research upfront, go look at the website, see what courses are popular, just because you make a course doesn't mean it's going to sell. Find out, you know, what's got a lot of students in it. And then the next tip I have is when you see a course with a lot of students that have purchased it or gone into it, what are the reviews. And it's not so much that they purchase the course they purchase a membership, and then they can watch as much as they want. So you as a teacher, you have to bring people in, you know, based on your thumbnail and your title. And then you get rewarded on the amount of minutes that people view what you have to offer. So it's a really interesting site and think about its residual once you shoot it, it just keeps paying you if you put out some really good content.

Susan Sly 16:03
So when are we going to see Kevin on there with Kevin's crosses? Like that was the first thing that came to mind. Like how to for him? Because the How To videos are always interesting for people, right?

Diana Frerick 16:14
Well, you know what he should do. Because he just did this. This is an idea. It's not always about making money but how do you save money. We had a storage garage for years. And I said we gotta get out from the storage garage, they keep raising the rate. And I said, can we build something? So he built something in a couple of days, had it approved, and now, you know, he could do that. Right? So how do you build a storage garage on the side of your house? So yeah, that's absolutely true.

Susan Sly 16:37
Of course, he did it in a couple of days. For those of you who don't know, who are listening, like Kevin is that person, he, he's like the MacGyver of home renovations. And I can see a whole series where you guys could shoot those videos, and he could just make a ton of money because there's so many things he knows how to do that he takes for granted that people would love to pay to learn. Awesome. Okay, so now that we've decided Kevin's side hustle.

Diana Frerick 17:02
He'll love it. So well. Here's another one. And I actually kind of did this years ago, to an extent maybe a little bit more than what you're hearing here. But start a party rental business. You know, you can actually do that for under $500. I watched some videos on it. And really what you need to start off with, you need a garage. You need some kind of van to haul stuff in, if not a van, eventually a trailer if you can afford one, but you can create a basic party package with, the most popular one I read is, is a 20 by 10 canopy, three six foot tables and 18 chairs and you can get all that for under $500 save a little extra money. You can market at your little party package on marketplace. And then as you start making money, you can buy extra things like they recommend yard games like cornhole, Giant Jengas, giant Connect Four systems, you can rent those out, do all your free marketing on marketplace. And as you continue to get bigger, you can buy more stuff. So that is one little side hustle people are making some nice money on and it's pretty easy to start up.

Susan Sly 18:11
A party rental business. I didn't even think of that one. And then one of the things that comes to mind too is when Target or Walmart or any of those stores have big sales, that's a great time to go pick up the you know, the kind of dishes and things like that that people usually got for Party Rentals. That's awesome. Yeah, I love that one.

Diana Frerick 18:31
Okay, number seven

Susan Sly 18:32
You are so good. Like, oh my

Diana Frerick 18:33
Well, they're so different. I think there's something for everybody here. But here's another one that might appeal to some people. It's called a mobile, the key word is mobile notary business. And the key there with mobile is that as a notary, there are standard fees that you are limited to charge, you can't just charge anything with some services. But when you add mobile to it, that means you're creating a convenience, you're going to the person, you could be going at whatever off hours, after hours, whatever charge fees for driving, charge fees for your you know, after hours services, and people are making five to $10,000 a month during the specialized mobile notary services. And what I learned about the cost is it can take two weeks to pass all the classes and get your certification in it. I think they said the classes around 30 bucks and notary commissions depends on state anywhere from 60 to $120. You're gonna need a nice laser printer. You're gonna need a stamp and seal that you're issued. That's about average $50. So the thing here that you need to to understand is people immediately gravitate toward the obvious things like loan closing documents. Right now because of interest rates, that's not the place to gravitate towards. A lot of competition there and, and there's less of that going on. So look for the added services that are a little bit more unique and specialized for notaries to get into and then maybe even add fingerprinting services, things like that. But I have found there's great resources on YouTube to learn the ins and outs of being a mobile notary. And what you can charge and what other services you can add. But that's a good one right there.

Susan Sly 20:20
Oh, mygosh, that is a great one. And as you said, people will pay for convenience, right? This whole notion of, you know, thinking about, like, what is, you know, when you want to sign something, or it has to get done, you're like, oh, my gosh, I have to do this. And I know I've had a mobile notary before. And yeah, you do pay a premium for it for sure. What a great idea. Okay, what else do you have?

Diana Frerick 20:45
Okay, well, here's what we call retail arbitrage. You never say that word. But you know what I mean. Okay, so that is very interesting. And, you know, it's I didn't mean for this to happen. I found something on marketplace, like a year and a half ago that I really liked but I really didn't have room for. I bought it because I thought, Oh, this is really an incredible deal. It's so antique furniture. I bought it for $350. And a couple of weeks ago, I sold it for 2500 on eBay, because it was so special. So this is something you could do. A lot of people are buying things on marketplace, they're getting free stuff on marketplace, they're reselling it. It just depends like sometimes it makes more sense to sell things. On eBay, if it's a collectible, it's easy to ship. Or you can sell it on marketplace, resell it on marketplace, because some people are just dumping stuff on marketplace, they don't have time to sell it. Right. So another thing that's really taking off right now is buying what they call Amazon pallets, or going to an Amazon pallet store. And Susan, if you've never been to a pallet store, oh my gosh, if you're a bargain queen, I am. Not everybody's built for this because it's dig in. And you can find treasures. But you can go to these Amazon pallet stores and find brand new merchandise that was returned for whatever reason, not even opened, still in the in the shipping box. And you can then resell it. So that's another thing and the deals you can find at these pallet stores. The key is almost all these pallet stores, i you look them up, they're usually referred to not as an Amazon pallet store but they're called bin, BIN stores. And if you go to a bin store, they usually have their day when they get all the new stuff in and they just dump it and you're talking, there could be things worth 100 bucks, and everything in the place sells for maybe $10 on opening day. The next day, it drops down to a certain amount like then maybe the third day down to five, by the end of the week, it's $1. And then they start over again. So there's a trick to it, you find out where your bin stores are. And then you can start reselling all that stuff that you dig, dig for. That's, that's definitely a way to make money.

Susan Sly 22:57
That's phenomenal. And it really is that you know what springs to mind when you share that idea is there, you know, the stay at home mom or the person maybe you've got some kind of mobility challenge or whatever. And you can literally do this from the comfort of your own home. Now there might be a fee associated with going to pick something up or whatever. But this is so conducive when you maybe have a life at home where you you know you need to be at home for whatever reason. I love that one. How fun is that?

Diana Frerick 23:29
Well, I can add to that for people with mobility issues. Some of these bin stores do have online auctions for what they call the higher ticket items. And also there's a website called shopgoodwill.com where all the goodwill locations, if they've got something really special, they put it up for auction there. A lot of the people I know that resell go there and buy their stuff for resale there too.

Susan Sly 23:52
Yeah, I do know someone who does go on there and then they resell it on a oh my gosh, a Poshmark store.

Diana Frerick 23:59
Yeah, well, I'm telling you there's things on there for $30,000 They have priceless jewelry on their estate jewelry. It's crazy. You have to check it out. It's fun.

Susan Sly 24:11
Recently, we moved and we have sent a lot of good things to Goodwill. So I'm kind of scared, just in case something accidentally, because I'm missing a necklace ended up.

Diana Frerick 24:20
Oh no. Oh, no.

Susan Sly 24:22
Anyway, okay, what's the next one?

Diana Frerick 24:24
Well, I think this is kind of like tutoring but a little different. Start a consulting business. And this is something you can make seven figures in if you're really good at something, you know, ask your friends and family. You know, what would you come to me for advice about or what are they coming to advice about? That's how you can identify what that skill is. That's very valuable. Do some market research, find out what people are asking about that topic that people are asking you advice on. You can go to wit places like answerthepublic.com You can actually go to YouTube and at the top in the search bar start typing in the subject and then YouTube will kind of finish it and kind of show a drop down, that'll show you other things that people are searching on that topic. So once you figure that out, just get a domain name, get a business email from that, create a business entity and LLC, you know, get a CRM system so you can start collecting emails. And I think the best way to start a consulting business is to provide some value to the public on whatever it is you want to serve. So create a, you know, some kind of freebie that you can offer people that are interested, that would be your target audience, and then have someone create a landing page for if you don't know how to do that, hire someone on Fiverr, offer that freebie in return for their email address, you know, set up a little CRM, and you know, start booking with Acuity, some, you know, free consultations, whatever. So then determine what your hourly rate is and go from there. And like I said, people are making some really crazy money being consultants.

Susan Sly 25:53
Yes, I have a friend Patrick, and he was in the tech world. Then he went into consulting, and then he started his own analyst firm, because all an analyst is, is essentially someone with a ton of industry experience, who knows how to analyze business opportunities and use cases. He's making so much money, he has a private plane, he has a fleet of cars like and he's the nicest guy. But I can tell you right away that if I lost everything tomorrow, I would go into consulting and it doesn't, and people might be thinking if you had a failure you're not going to make a good consultant. That's actually not true. Because as as long as you can identify what led to that, there's a market for that. Absolutely. So fantastic. All right, Diana, these are some amazing ideas.

Diana Frerick 26:42
All right, well, final idea here. Kind of, I think is a nice tag along with everything I've already mentioned, because this is a way to create traffic, and create income at the same time on whatever you choose to do. And that is to start a YouTube channel. And, you know, realistically, they say if you want to monetize a YouTube channel, it could take you a year, because you have to get up to 1000 subscribers and 4000 watch hours in a 12 month period. And that can take a year. But if you use some strategy, there are people doing it in 90 days. But it's about creating targeted, very specific niche information. And they say the best way to do this is to ask 50 questions, what are the 50 questions your ideal client are asking and create a video for every one of those questions. And then you do some SEO on the title, do a great thumbnail, have Fiverr people do sub thumbnails, and that will help drive traffic to whatever your new businesses but in addition, as this channel builds, you will start making some really crazy income. I'll give you some real numbers like somebody who's getting maybe, let's say in a 30 day period maybe three watch hours, 15,000 subscribers making 1200 a month residual on that. And you and I both know somebody who's got a pretty nice YouTube channel after maybe a couple years making 10 grand in monetization from ads on that channel. So it's really about creating a niche, answering questions. That's why people go to YouTube. It's one of the biggest search engines right? And then you can drive people to your website.

Susan Sly 28:22
Diana these are great ideas. I have two pages, the nose and again, the everything will be in the show notes. And then my big message to everyone who's listening whether you, and I know like, some of our, some of our staff members listen to the show, you know, whatever it is that you're doing full time, these are great ideas and not, and some of them don't even have to be like a full on side hustle. Like if you're working from home, why wouldn't you rent your car? Like seriously, think about those ways, or those ways that you could make money, doing what you're already doing. They don't even have to be time consuming. That's what I love about these, Diana, like, they're a lot of fun. They're very easily accessible to people. You always bring the best ideas. Okay, super quick. The agency, there are more managed services coming. So super quick, like what is happening at the agency in terms of managed services and who should reach out to you?

Diana Frerick 29:20
Well, if you've got a business and you're trying to get exposure and traffic and all that, we have a lot of creative ways. We can do a geo targeting on a very specific niche. If you want to see all the people that have walked in your store, have the cell phone traffic in the last year, we can target that. If you've got desire to do display ads, you don't know how to do those creative display ads, we know, we all know the ins and outs of that. We can actually create the graphics for you. There's so many ways. I mean, Facebook ads, whatever you want to do to get the word out there about what you do. That's what we can help you with at the agency. And well if you're a service based business with a local, you know, clientele, we can help you get noticed more locally with some of the stuff we do with Google My Business.

Susan Sly 30:03
And that's awesome. And I love the, like the SEO audit. And really, if you have a business, and you have a website, you should go to agency8.com You should book a website SEO audit, because it is very revealing because you think you're doing something or you think you're doing something well, you're not getting the result you want, and it's almost like going to the doctor and having a bunch of blood tests done and can like, all these tests done in order to diagnose what is really going on. So yeah, great service.

Diana Frerick 30:33
I'll get the link for the comments below here on where to get that free SEO audit because it is a really powerful thing to see.

Susan Sly 30:41
Awesome well, and go to agency8.com Find out about the services. So Diana, thank you for bringing the goods today. You're absolutely awesome. And for wherever you are in the world, I just want to send you just amazing positive energy. You've got this! Being an entrepreneur is absolutely worth it. If this episode has been helpful, please give us a five star review. And by all means, tag me on social. I'd love to hear your takeaways from this episode. And with that, my friends, this has been another episode of Raw and Real Entrepreneurship. God bless and I will see you in the next episode.