2 of My Favorite Side Businesses to Start in Pakistan

There are at least 6 profitable ways you can start an online business, especially in Pakistan.

Unfortunately, 99% of the people I meet, don’t know this.

I am blessed to live a project based lifestyle for a majority of my working career. Out of the 6 business models, I have tried them all. These 2 are my favorite.

Let us see which one may suit you and how to quickly go about them:

(If you want the complete 6 ways, I have created a guide for you that you can access for free here)

As you see in the matrix, the two business models are high on profitability and low on initial costs.

The best, most profitable ways of starting an online business are:

Start a services business (from freelancing all the way to high-ticket consulting)
Start a digital education business (selling courses and coaching)

Business model: Services business

Providing a service is the quickest way to start your side business. This is how I started back in 1999.

If you play it right, you can become a premium consultant in your field.

A services business can be anything as it depends on your skillsets. It can be

running Facebook and Google ads for clients
training people on specific tools or departments
become a copywriter on Fiverr (God forbid ;-))

… and the list goes on.

How to start your services business

Make a list of skills you already have (or skills you can learn via courses, books, teachers etc).

And then follow the “Instant Consultant” method.

You just fill in the blanks:

I will help my clients __________ (what will you help them do, achieve, figure out etc? this is the main problem that you’ll be solving)
After clients pay, they will get: _____________ (this is the offer and this is different than the problem you’ll be solving in step 1. see example below to clearly know the difference between these two things)

The above can be applied to any service idea you have.

▶️Related resource >The above template is a short form version of my Instant Consultant worksheet, that you can check out (for free) here.

Thinking about Fiverr etc? I Interviewed a Fiverr freelancer who has 6,000+ clients, and it only confirmed this opinion. Don’t rely on marketplaces and don’t call yourself a freelancer when talking to clients!

How much to charge for your services?

This depends on the size of the problem you’re solving.

I have sold website design for 12,000 rupees. Later I was charging 1.1 million rupees for my digital marketing service. Alhumdulillah.

You get to charge high prices if you are solving bigger problems. It’s that simple. So train yourself to see the bigger picture.

Tools to get started:

I recommend you get a website. This acts as a digital brochure of your services, and also as your content creation hub. You can get a free one from this new service I found carrd.

With this type of business, you are always bound for time.

That’s why this business model works best with the Online Courses model.

Business Model: Online Courses

This is another of my personal favorites.

An online course is where you teach others via video, text or audio.

This is very different than online tuition.

How are online courses different from online tuition

You are taking advantage of the Internet. You are recording your course once and then selling it to many students.

In a tuition, you have to be present for each class. This is a “services business” if you think about it, right? Why? Because you are selling your time.

I recommend that you record a course once, and then promote it using social media.

For example, my low-priced course (called Structure of Success) is about setting up goals. My mid-tier course ProHobbyist 5 Week Challenge teaches people how to start their online business.

How to get ideas for your online course

Here are some of the ways you can finalize your course topic:

List down your skills that people have paid you for. This includes your current job if you are employed. That can be a great source of online course ideas.
What is something that you are always talking about? Your interest in that topic will help you find topics to create a course around.
What questions people ask you on a regular basis? This means people already consider you an authority in that topic.

The above questions are guidelines to get you thinking.

You can check out my Find Your Business course where I show the exact steps you need to take to arrive at your topic. It is at an afforable price right now. Don’t miss this window if you are serious about your work.

For a limited time: I am including the 300 Ideas for an Online Course spreadsheet with every purchase of the Find Your Business course.

Once you have the idea, you need to take this to the market. And for that, we need a simple set of tools.

Tools to get started with online courses

Get your own platform:

If you’re just getting started, I recommend getting at least a one-pager website for your course. You can use carrd for free (paid is only $19/yr).

Hosting your online courses:

I now use Vimeo paid version to host my course videos, but I started by using the unlisted feature on YouTube.

You upload your course videos as “unlisted” on YouTube. You then share those videos with your paying students only.

Get payments:

Keep it simple. Once students sign up on your website, you can share your bank account with them. This also covers the popular mobile wallets like Jazzcash or Easypaisa.

They transfer the money, and then you give them the access to your course.

How to get clients for your services and online course business

I recommend you keep it simple especially in the beginning and especially if you are doing it alone.

You will be posting content regularly related to your topic. This is your publishing schedule (45mins every day).
You will be doing sales (another 30 to 45mins daily). You can follow a simpler version of our famed 554 method (see my sales training videos here)

So in less than 2 hours every day, you can make salary-replacing income!

Math magic

Let us do some of that math magic, shall we?

You price the service at 10,000 rupees, and you price the course at Rs 3,000. Note, these are just random price points given the Pakistani market.

Here’s how the math works:

2 sales of the course per day = Rs 6,000 per day. Rs 180,000 in a month.
2 sales of your services per week = Rs 20,000 per week. Rs 80,000 in a month.

After 30 days, you earn 260,000 rupees. In about 2 hours per day.

Salary-replacer side business? Bismilla!