How to start a business as a kid with no money

How to start a business as a kid with no money?

A kid can start a business when they turn 18 years old. However, you can start earlier by partnering with an adult or building an audience and monetizing at 18. Use social media consistently to build an audience and use ads, sponsors, and products to monetize.

Imagine, building a successful business by the time you turn 18. You might just make more money than your parents!

Building a successful business as a young kid is possible!

Luckily for you, I’m going to show you how to start a business as a kid. I’ll show you how to choose your business and monetize it when you’re older. With enough consistency, you’ll have a good earning business in no time!

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What is the youngest age to start a business?

Typically, you must be 18 years old to start a business and open a business bank account or enter into an agreement. You can start a business earlier by partnering with an adult. Alternatively, you can start building your business without earning, monetizing at 18.

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How to start a business as a kid

Start a business as a kid by selecting your business, planning, and taking consistent effort towards building. Focus on building an audience that you can sell products to or advertisements when you turn 18. 

Choose your business

The first step is to choose your desired business. Your business should be something you’re interested in. You should also consider designing your business around your ideal lifestyle.

Having an interest in the topic of your business is critical if you want to be successful. Building a business takes a long time, so you’ve got to have passion. Helping people lose weight might be profitable, but you’re unlikely to stick with it without interest.

Instead, if you’re passionate about something and there’s monetization potential then go for it! Not only does having passion let you stick with it, but it improves the quality of your work. You’ll write better articles or produce better videos because you love talking about it.

Create a list of your interests. Do any of these interests have monetization available?

You also need to consider the ‘design’ of your business. What is your lifestyle going to look like when you’ve reached success?

For example, a YouTuber will need to produce consistent videos because their audience expects it. Therefore, you will always need to be available to produce content on a regular schedule.

Starting your own yard care business will require you to constantly be working in the heat.

List the pros and cons of your business. Can you maintain the schedule and the demands of your business?

Plan your business

Don’t spend too much time planning your business because doing it is the best teacher. However, spend some time learning your chosen business. Understand how you are going to make your first dollar and how you are going to scale to your first $1,000.

Once you’ve decided on a business, you need to have a plan in place. The first step to developing a plan is to understand the ins and outs of your business.

Start researching by reading books, listening to podcasts, and watching YouTube videos. Pay specific attention to the individuals who are most successful in your desired business. What makes them successful and what separates them from everyone else?

Personally, I like to keep myself educated on my desired business of blogging. I watch YouTube videos everyday or read articles in my spare time. I’m always learning and always looking for the next tip to enhance my success.

Some people decide to take paid courses to speed up the education process. When you purchase a course, you’re learning from experts who’ve already succeeded. These experts can help you avoid common mistakes and lead you to success faster.

Most new entrepreneurs make the mistake of staying in constant learning mode. Yes, you always want to be learning, but eventually you need to start your business. Keep learning, but getting started is the only way to success.

Identify the tasks that bring results. What are the tasks that bring in your income and which tasks are just a waste of time? Spend the majority of time doing the tasks that bring in results and ignore everything else!

Put forth consistent effort towards building a business

The only thing that is going to build your business is taking consistent action on the right tasks. Most people fail at starting their business because they want success today, but it’s a long-term game.

Bloggers will need to produce articles. YouTubers will need to create video content. Freelance writers will need to write content for clients. These are the tasks that make money for the respective businesses.

However, most people start a blog, write 10 articles, and think they should be successful. Unfortunately, writing 10 articles is barely anything in the grand scheme of things.

Instead, content creators need to keep producing content. Identify a schedule that works for you and keep producing content. You need to find the right balance of producing content that doesn’t result in burnout, but still moves the needle forward.

The more consistent you are with your business, the better chance you’ll be successful. Showing up every day is the only way to start a business.

Focus on building an audience

Building an audience is one of the best ways to build money. The more people that follow you, the more people you can sell a product or show an advertisement. You can build an audience on social media, email, podcast, or any other media.

As a kid, you can focus on building an audience since you’re unable to monetize at this point. Now is the time to build an audience, so that you can monetize when you turn 18.

Building an audience is all about providing value. People watch TV because of the awesome shows, not to watch advertisements. Most influencers start out having their twitter feed look like an advertisement feed, not a TV show.

The more value you provide, the faster your following will grow. Having a large following will allow you to monetize better when you’re ready.

Monetize at age 18

You should be able to monetize your content and audience when you turn 18 years old. As a business, you’ll want to have your own business bank account. You will also need a business license if you start to make decent money.

Starting at an early age, you should be able to build your audience up significantly by 18 years old. Now you can enter into agreements, like ad networks or sponsorships, and promote deals to your audience.

For example, a beauty Instagramer might have started building an audience at the age of 16 years old. Now that they’re 18, they have 100k followers and receive a sponsorship to promote lipstick to Instagram. They charge the business $1k to take one picture with the lipstick and post it to IG.

Just make sure the deal is relevant to your audience’s interest. Don’t promote lipstick to your audience if they follow you for stock tips – it doesn’t work.

You’ll want to make sure your business income stays separate from your personal finances. A business bank account will be beneficial, especially if you plan on hiring a bookkeeper or CPA. You should consider getting a business license if you start making over $400 per year.

Pay Taxes

Unfortunately, you’re going to have to pay state and federal taxes on all of your earnings. Personally, I feel this task is best outsourced to a qualified CPA because it allows you to grow your business.

Good business ideas for kids

The best business ideas for kids are online influencers or service providers. It’s easier than ever to start a successful business blogging, YouTubing, social media managing, etc. Kids can also stick to traditional business ideas like lawn care.

Content creation is one of my favorite ways for anyone to make money. You can talk about your passion via podcasts, YouTube, blogging, Tik Tok, Twitter, and other social media. Monetize your content through ads, sponsored posts, affiliate marketing, and creating your own product.

Kids who have initial startup money can flip products for profit. You can buy products on clearance and sell them on Amazon or Ebay.

Traditional business ideas include mowing lawns or selling lemonade. You wont make nearly as much money, but it’s perfect for kids to develop entrepreneurial skills. 

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Summary: How to start a business as a kid with no money

As you can see, it is possible to start a business as a kid with no money. The easiest way to start a business is by building an audience on social media. You can then monetize your content when you turn 18 by ads or selling products.

The first step is to choose your business and create a plan. Start researching your desired business and understand how it’s going to make money. Put forth consistent effort into growing your business and you’ll be amazed at how quickly it can grow.

Having an audience is a business hack. A social media following of 100k people is 100k chances to sell a product and is valuable to advertisers. 

Eventually, you will have to get a business bank account, business license, and pay taxes. A good CPA and bookkeeper can help your business run smoothly.

My personal recommendation is that kids create a business as an online influencer. Online influencers have the opportunity to scale their business beyond a typical 9-5 income.