If you're looking for a step by step guide on how to start an online business for free, you've come to the right place.
We're talking about a legitimate and honest online business that has a good feel factor – not a spammy, scammy one.
Believe it or not, not everything online is a scam. Hidden beneath all the nonsense is a real way to make money online.
How do I know?
Because I've now earning over $6,000 a month and growing since I started my online business over two years ago with Wealthy Affiliate.
IT IS POSSIBLE to start a legitimate, successful and profitable business online for free.
I'm going to show you how.
Most people vastly overestimate the cost of starting an online business but, unlike a traditional brick built business, you can start an online for free. Well, perhaps you'll need $8 for your website domain name. Here's where I show you how to start a blog.
Yeah that's about it.
No shipping costs, to postage costs, to renting of premises, no rates bills to worry about.
That's just one of the great things about the information age we're in now – anyone can start an online business with nothing more than an internet connection.
No more working long hours in cubicles, no more answering to nonsensical bosses or asking for a measly couple of days off.
Why am I showing you how to start an online business? Because I want you to be able to take control of your life. That's what it comes down to. I don't even care about the money, it's nice but it's about me having the freedom to live the life I choose.
[alert-note]”Think big and don't listen to people who tell you it can't be done. Life's too short to think small.”
– Tim Ferriss[/alert-note]
In this article, I will show you step by step how you can use Wealthy Affiliate to build a six figure online business for free. But first, let’s me explain what Wealthy Affiliate is all about and how exactly you can start an online business for free with it.
What is Wealthy Affiliate?
In a nutshell, Wealthy Affiliate is an online community membership site that teaches you how to create and grow a successful online business.
The platform teaches beginners proven ways of launching and growing their own niche marketing websites.
It's a training centre, it's an online community of entrepreneurs, it's got all the tools you need to start an online business.
Best of all it's free to join
Recommended reading:
How To Start An Online Business (For Free) With Wealthy Affiliate – The Step By Step Guide
1. Create Your Free Starter Account
Wealthy Affiliate comes with two membership accounts: Starter and Premium.
The Starter membership is the one that is free for anybody who is interested in learning the basics of internet marketing.
You'll get full access to the best online entrepreneurship training available on the web, the expert community and all the tools you need to build a successful online business.
Step 2: Complete The Free Training
As soon as you're in the members area, check out the green ‘Get Started Here' Tab and start Course 1, lesson 1.
You'll love the video lessons, tutorials and question and answers and assigned daily tasks within each lesson.
Always ask for help if you feel stuck – take advantage of the friendly and knowledgeable Wealthy Affiliate community.
During the first day, forget about the live chat or posting on the forums of the dashboard. Dedicate your time to complete the training.
Step 3: Choose An Interest
The best thing about starting an online business with Wealthy Affiliate is that it can be based on any topic, interest or hobby you have.
Your business will come from you and your passion so it's important to choose what gets you motivated or excited. The possibilities are endless.
Recommended reading:
Blogging 101: What To Start A Blog About?
Ten Hot Money Making Website Niche Picks for 2017
4. Choose A Free Domain
The next step is to choose and register your free Site Rubix domain through Wealthy Affiliate or go for your own domain (recommended).
You absolutely need a website – it's your piece of virtual real estate that you're going to be building on going ahead.
Don't worry though, with Wealthy Affiliate this process couldn't be simpler. Here' a quick run through but the training will take you through it all step by step.
5. Create Your Website (Takes 30 Seconds)
Once you've chosen your domain, now it's time to choose a beautiful template theme for your new site. It's all very simple and straightforward.
Your free starter account includes 2 free websites along with free hosting and a free website builder. Here's a video showing how you can build a website in 30 seconds:
6. Attracting Potential Customers
The Wealthy Affiliate course you'll be going through will take you through the different ways to get traffic to your site.
This is the really fun bit and pivotal in the success of your online business. Put simply – if you've got no footfall you've got no business.
Website => Traffic => SUCCESS ($$$)
Here are just of the traffic generating techniques at Wealthy Affiliate:
a) Google rankings – Search engine optimisation is sending surges of people to your site via Google, Bing and Yahoo search engines.
It's the free and most targeted way to make your site stand out on the top of search results and send surges of potential customers to your online business platform.
You do this through using free keyword research tools and techniques all covered in the starter course.
b) Social – There's a right a wrong way to use social media to increase traffic to your website and Wealthy Affiliate will be taking you through the steps of mastering social engagement.
Facebook. Google Plus. Twitter. Pinterest.
As you build your business you'll be learning how to leverage the power and popularty of social media to your advantage.
If you have a sound social engagement plan in place, you do not have to rely on any single source of traffic.
Wealthy Affiliate also teaches you how to become a master of video marketing, email marketing and any other kind of marketing you can think of : )
7. Earn Revenue
Once you have traffic, you are sure that a good number of them will purchase your products and services.
You'll get familiar with this term: affiliate marketing.
You can promote anything on your site without creating the product yourself. This business model is simple. You send the traffic to the product’s official website. If they purchase that product, you can get attractive commissions of up to 75%.
8. Take Action On The Daily Assignments
The beauty of the start an online business training is that you'll be building your business as you go through the course.
The key thing here is to take action on what you've learned at each and every level.
Use the live chat, question and answer areas, ask the experts for help if you're not sure.
The Wealthy Affiliate community are always on hand to help you succeed at every stage.
Message me, I'm always around the member's area. I will do everything I can to make sure you have a growing, money generating online business.
Are you ready to get started?
I joined Wealthy Affiliate in 2014 and it was one of the best decisions I’ve made. I login every single day to help others just like you to grow their online businesses. Now it’s your turn.
I’ll be available every step of the way.
It’s up to you now to take action and get started.
To your online blogging success!
Do you have a burning question before you get started? Drop me a comment and I’ll respond ASAP!
Simon Crowe is on a mission to help as many people as possible kiss their bosses goodbye.
Take the free Wealthy Affiliate test drive to discover how to smash your online income goals and make your dream business a reality.
Hey, I love your step by step guide to build an online business. Those steps are really crucial and is the basic of building a sustainable long term business. I am a member too at wealthy affiliate and I found out that writing content is my struggle and I took really long to write up a blogpost. Do you have any tips to overcome this?
Hey Matthew, thanks for popping by : )
I plan on writing a full article about writing good blog posts and content creation shortly, but for now, I’d say you get better with time (same with just about anything right?)
With practice you’ll find your flow and it’ll get easier and quicker. It also helps if you’re knowledgeable about your subject matter which is why choosing the right website niche is so crucially important.
As a last resort and if you have the money to invest, you could outsource your content creation with sites like iWriter.com. Though I’d only recommend Elite or Elite Plus writers (writers with 4.6 stars out of 5 or above), so it’s worth doing your research.
Hope this helps!
Hey Simon.
I must say that I completely agree, wealthy affiliate is the way forward!
I have found many scam money making schemes online which claim to make you rich without any work involved.
Wealthy Affiliate make it clear when signing up that your success is entirely down to yourself.
What they offer is a large network of like minded people who help each other out.
With these tools and your own dedication you really cant go wrong!
Yup, with the tools, training and support at your disposal you have everything you need to make it happen!
Cheers Craig
Hey Simon,
The information you have presented here is spot on. I am personally an WA member and I couldn’t agree member. The best thing is that’s its initially free and so its a win-win situation. I love your website design by the way – just simple. How long should one expect to invest in time before starting to make a consistent income?
Thanks,
Omar
Hey Omar, I made my first sale after two weeks – I sold a Black & Decker juicer on Amazon. Despite making just over $1 I remember I was super excited because I knew this thing worked – I just needed to repeat and scale.
Many people talk about their blogs reaching the breakthrough point at the 3 months or 50 posts mark. For me, after 12 months my first blog replaced my full-time income and that’s when I made the move to Thailand.
The timescale can vary according to your niche and how much work you put in (Iworked all the hours God gave in that first year!) but now my sites need very little work and I live off of the passive income they provide.
I hope this helps, all the best!
Simon,
First of all, I have to say… love your blog design, very simple and easy to read!
As a member of Wealthy Affiliate myself, I have to say that this is one of the best platform to learn to make money online. They don’t offer you any hacks, just the most efficient way to use affiliate marketing and SEO to build a sustainable income stream.
What I love the most about it is the super awesome community. I wouldn’t be able to achieve what I have without them. 🙂
Thanks for sharing!
Cheers,
Anh
Thanks Anh, great to hear about your experience at Wealthy Affiliate and I couldn’t agree more.
What a great article you have here about wealthy affiliate. Being a member myself I have to say there is so much to learn here.
I was always curious about affiliate marketing, but once I came here, it seems to have explained itself.
The only question I have is how would I as a newbie have free hosting?
Hi Jagi, within the members area you should be able to see a blue “SiteRubix – Build Your Websites Here“. It’s here you can access your two free sites.
The training will help you decide on what niche is the best for you and you can ask for feedback within live chat for possible domain names.
Hope this helps, let me know how you get on!