The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt. – Bertrand Russell

Introduction to Imposter Syndrome

Imposter Syndrome is said to affect about 70% of the population at some point in their lives, according to a study in the International Journal of Behavioral Science. The term was first coined in the ’70s by psychologists Dr. Suzanne Imes and Dr. Pauline Rose Clance and “Refers to high-achieving individuals marked by an inability to internalize their accomplishments and a persistent fear of being exposed as a “fraud”, despite external evidence of their competence.” (Source) People who exhibit Imposter Syndrome remain convinced that their own success and achievements are attributed to luck, timing, or because they were able to fool others into thinking that they are smarter and more competent than they actually themselves believe they are.

Even though Imposter Syndrome isn’t listed as an official diagnosis in any of the manuals about mental disorders, psychologists and healthcare professionals do acknowledge it as a crippling form of intellectual self-doubt. What’s interesting is that even though the syndrome isn’t an official diagnosis in itself, the feelings associated with it usually go hand in hand with other recognized mental health issues such as anxiety and depression.

It’s so important to understand that statistically, 7 out of the 10 people around you may actually be facing emotions of Imposter Syndrome, or at least are likely to at some point in their lives, just like you. Even though it was initially believed that women were more affected by Imposter Syndrome than men, recent studies have shown that this is not a gendered experience.

Oftentimes, the root of these fraudulent feelings can be traced back to our childhood. Growing up in a family where parents or other influential role models oscillate between over-criticism and over-praise—wherein success and achievements are of the utmost importance—can prompt the child into becoming a highly ambitious over-achiever who is at risk of experiencing Imposter Syndrome as they mature. Of course, society’s standards of success and the pressure that accompanies them, only adds fuel to the fire.

Other factors that lead to fuelling this sense of being a fraud are the way we differ from the majority of our peers, be it our appearance, gender, sexual orientation, race, or other defining characteristics. Millennials are also at a higher risk of facing feelings of Imposter Syndrome, as their time of entering the workforce is occurring during some remarkable technological and socio-economic developments that require constant learning and adaptability due to the rate that mankind is excelling at.

While some people may see adaptability as a good trait to possess, it can also make others feel like they aren’t equipped with the expertise they should have to begin with, rather than learning and adapting to situations. Perfectly curated social media feeds don’t help either—in many cases, people base their self worth on another’s Facebook or LinkedIn page and are severely critical about the way they perceive themselves in comparison. At this point, their perceptions are often not aligned with the reality of things.

One attribute that commonly occurs in high-achieving people and often accompanies Imposter Syndrome is perfectionism. Perfectionism typically leads a person to take one of two routes: Procrastination or over-preparation. Someone dealing with imposter-like feelings is very likely to put off tasks until the very last minute due to a sometimes irrational fear that they may not complete the task at high enough standards, or on the flip side, they may spend way too much time on the task when it isn’t required.

Criticism, failure, and mistakes seem to be the only thing that people with Imposter Syndrome dwell upon. This trait often translates into a deep-running fear of the person’s failures being exposed and can limit the chance to explore and take a leap of faith.

Although it is possible to ease the feelings related to imposter syndrome, the best way to deal with it is to address it while it’s taking root. Transparency about such feelings with someone you look up to, or in a safe environment, can really help. However, this method of management works best when there is two-way communication; When mentors open up about their experiences with imposter syndrome, it brings light to the fact that others also face the same feelings of inadequacy. This may help others from victimizing themselves as it no longer feels like a negative experience that is limited to only them.

Another great reflective tool that many people use includes making lists of their own successes, accomplishments, and positive experiences where they stood out or felt like they truly deserved the accolades they received. This helps to reiterate the fact that one may not be an “imposter” after all. Of course, having a strong support system that is open to discussing these feelings while providing feedback regularly, is one of the best ways to cope with the syndrome.

You Aren’t Facing Imposter Syndrome Alone

In the name of cutting out the isolation that comes with the infamous Imposter Syndrome, here is a list of 10 highly successful individuals in their respective fields who at some point have or still experience these crippling insecurities.

Albert Einstein

Even a man of Einstein’s caliber and genius was not immune to feeling like a fraud. Perhaps one of the most influential scientists of the last 5 centuries, Albert Einstein was known to have faced Imposter Syndrome later in life. He was once quoted saying to a close confidant:

The exaggerated esteem in which my lifework is held makes me very ill at ease. I feel compelled to think of myself as an involuntary swindler. – Albert Einstein

It’s extremely surprising and a little hard to understand how someone as brilliant as him may have had insecurities about his own achievements, but it only goes to show that it’s all a part of being human.

Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou’s list of achievements is one that can hardly be replicated by someone else. She was a poet, civil rights activist, memoirist, actor, director, producer, and author who published 7 autobiographies, 3 books of essays, countless books on poetry, has an extremely impressive literary career wherein she is credited with writing a long list of plays, screenplays for movies and television—over the span of 5 decades—and has over 50 honorary degrees along with several other impressive awards and accolades—all while facing her own personal hardships. A woman of such substance and grit, yet Angelou was once quoted saying:

I have written eleven books, but each time I think, “Uh oh, they’re going to find out now. I’ve run a game on everybody, and they’re going to find me out.” – Maya Angelou

John Steinbeck

Another brilliant author, Steinbeck was the winner of two of the most prestigious awards in the world: The 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature and the Pulitzer Prize for his famous work, The Grapes of Wrath. Not only are his literary works inspiring generations even after his death, his books are also being adapted to movies, namely the 2016 film, In Dubious Battle, which starred James Franco and Selena Gomez. Contrary to how successful others thought he was, Steinbeck wrote in his journal:

I am not a writer. I’ve been fooling myself and other people. – John Steinbeck

He also famously admired the characters in his works for being “So much stronger and purer and braver,” than he was.

Sheryl Sandberg

The first woman to serve on Facebook’s board of directors, Sandberg is currently the company’s Chief Operating Officer (COO), however, even before Facebook, she has been linked to an impressive number of organizations. In the past, she has also been the Vice President of Global Online Sales and Operations at Google and had an active role in launching Google.org, which is the company’s philanthropic vertical. Her long list of achievements further include serving as the United States Secretary of Treasury’s Chief of Staff, being named in the Time’s 100 Most Influential People in the World list, and, more recently, establishing the Lean In Foundation and becoming an author. Sandberg is said to be worth over 1 Billion US Dollars, thanks to her stocks in Facebook and several other profitable companies. Even after achieving what would seem like the epitome of success to many career-oriented people, she states:

There are still days when I wake up feeling like a fraud, not sure I should be where I am. – Sheryl Sandberg

Meryl Streep

Often hailed as the best actress of her generation, Meryl Streep is hugely famous for her ability to adapt to different accents and for the versatility of the roles she plays. Streep is said to be one of the only six actors who have won 3+ competitive Oscars for acting and 20 nominations, has had 30 Golden Globe Nominations, of which she won 8, which is more nominations or competitive wins than any other actor. She was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 2010 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2014 by President Obama and has managed to secure accolades and fame internationally too, wherein even the Government of France made her the Commander of the Orders of Arts and Letters in 2003. Even after smashing records and winning the highest and most prestigious awards possible across the globe, Meryl Streep still has been quoted as saying:

You think, “Why would anyone want to see me again in a movie? And I don’t know how to act anyway, so why am I doing this?” – Meryl Streep

Tina Fey

Given how remarkably tough it is for female comedians to make it an industry renowned for sexism, Tina Fey has truly carved a niche for herself, all while silencing naysayers. She is an actor, comedian, writer, and producer, has won 9 Primetime Emmy Awards, 2 Golden Globe Awards, 5 Screen Actors Guild Awards, 4 Writers Guild of America Awards throughout her career so far and has also been awarded the Associated Press Entertainer of the Year Award in 2008. Furthermore, she surpassed any remaining glass ceilings when she was awarded the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor in 2010, making her the youngest ever recipient of the award. She talks candidly about her encounter with Imposter Syndrome:

The beauty of the imposter syndrome is you vacillate between extreme egomania and a complete feeling of: “I’m a fraud! Oh God, they’re on to me! I’m a fraud!” So you just try to ride the egomania when it comes and enjoy it, and then slide through the idea of fraud. – Tina Fey

Cheryl Strayed

Anyone who knows of Cheryl Strayed can tell you that the woman is the definition of grit and determination. She has had a tumultuous past ever since her mother died of lung cancer and she took to heroin to deal with the grief. This eventually led to the end of her first marriage. Strayed’s journey to healing and self-discovery led her to hike solo along the 1,100 mile-long Pacific Crest Trail without any prior knowledge or experience of hiking at the age of 26. She was able to beautifully capture the parallel narratives of the experiences during the hike and her personal challenges in life, in the book. She is a memoirist, essayist, podcast host, and the author of 5 bestselling books. Even though she was triumphant in the face of adversity and difficult situations that she got through all by herself, she has also dealt with Imposter Syndrome in some ways:

Writing is always full of self-doubt, but the first book [Torch] is really full of self-doubt, and it was much more of a struggle to keep the faith. By the time I wrote Wild, I was familiar with that feeling of doubt and self-loathing, so I just thought, “Okay, this is how it feels to write a book.” – Cheryl Strayed

Emma Watson

Emma Watson is an actor, model, and activist with an estimated net worth of 70 Million US Dollars—all at her current age of 27. Her accomplishments include graduating from Brown University with a Bachelor’s Degree in English Literature, all the while handling a professional acting career as well. The British Academy of Film and Television Arts honored Watson with the British Artist of the Year title in 2014 and in the same year she was also appointed as a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador. With her role at the UN, Watson launched the HeForShe Campaign that actively encourages men to take up the role of gender-equality advocates. Reaching such heights of success at a young age sometimes made her feel like an imposter. She once said:

When I was younger, I just did it. I just acted. It was just there. So now when I receive recognition for my acting, I feel incredibly uncomfortable. I tend to turn in on myself. I feel like an imposter. It was just something I did. – Emma Watson

Natalie Portman

While most people know of Natalie Portman as a brilliant actress, her genius isn’t just limited to the arts. She is well known for her affinity towards foreign languages since childhood and has thus subsequently studied Hebrew, French, Japanese, German, and Arabic. A lesser-known fact about her is that she co-authored two research papers that were published in scientific journals—”A Simple Method to Demonstrate the Enzymatic Production of Hydrogen from Sugar” which she co-wrote in high school and was entered into the Intel Science Talent Search, and worked on the “Frontal Lobe Activation During Object Permanence: Data From Near-Infrared Spectroscopy” paper, during her time studying Psychology at Harvard. Yet she stated:

When I got to Harvard just after the release of Star Wars: Episode 1, I feared people would assume I had gotten in just for being famous, and not worthy of the intellectual rigor here. – Natalie Portman

Lady Gaga

Gaga is known to be one of the best selling musicians of all times, with over 27 million albums and 146 million singles sold. Her talent and hard work have paid off in the form of 3 Brit Awards, 6 Grammy Awards, awards from the Songwriter’s Hall of Fame, and even several Guinness World Records. She was voted to be one of VH1’s Top 5 Greatest Women in Music, Time’s Most Influential People of the past decade (2011), and has also been on Forbes’s Power and Earning Rankings. Her efforts towards LGBTQ rights and social activism has led her to start the Born This Way Foundation in order to combat bullying and empowering LGBTQ youth. Lady Gaga’s philanthropic work stems from her own experiences as a young person and sometimes those feeling do resurface. She once was quoted saying:

I still sometimes feel like a loser kid in high school and I just have to pick myself up and tell myself that I’m a superstar every morning so that I can get through this day and be for my fans what they need for me to be. – Lady Gaga

This list of prominent personalities opens up a small window into the minds of some well known successful people and helps cement the fact that no matter how alone you think you are when it comes to Imposter Syndrome, the reality is that you aren’t. Celebrities can feel like imposters, successful people can feel like imposters, and anyone else can as well. It’s important to remember that the feeling of being a fraud doesn’t actually make you one.

How Do I Know if it’s Imposter Syndrome?

People who experience Imposter Syndrome lose out on some great opportunities because of their lack of faith in themselves and the feeling that they may not be qualified. Here are some situations that arise or pointers that can be noticed that can become detrimental to a person’s mental health over a long period of time:

• Having a marginally higher level of stress.
• Anxiety about even the smallest of tasks.
• Procrastination that leads to more anxiety.
• Constantly living in the fear of someone finding out about their lack of experience or skills.
• Feeling like they don’t belong.
• Always either understating or completely disclaiming their achievements and experiences.
• Shying away from asking for a raise because they feel that someone else may deserve it more than them, thus implying that their own worth isn’t as much.
• Not applying for jobs or promotions, even when it’s an appropriate position for them.
• Extreme nervousness and sometimes even anxiety when they have to talk to someone in their own field due to the fear of being “found out.” Can hamper some great networking opportunities.
• Over-preparing for tasks.
• Looking for perfectionism in everything and everyone and when expectations aren’t met, it causes anxiety.
• Even going to the extent of becoming a people-pleaser to keep up the “perfect” image thus never being able to say a firm “No” to anybody.

I Think I Know Someone Who May Have Imposter Syndrome

Firstly, kudos to you for recognizing this pattern in someone else. Unfortunately, the chances are that they may not even be aware that Imposter Syndrome is a real thing. So, what are the steps that you could take to support them?

• Have an open line of communication with the person before you delve into the nitty-gritty details of what they are going through.
• Share your own experience of having these fraudulent feelings if you have been through them, too.
• Maybe start a blog and help even more people connect to a community of supporters.
• Encourage the people that you care about to apply for a job, raise, or promotion that you know they deserve, but back it up with why you think they qualify for the position.
• Don’t let the people around you underplay or misrepresent their success or experience as any less than it is. Empower them by letting them know that it’s okay to own it!
• Maybe even write a LinkedIn recommendation for someone you know who deserves it.
• Ask questions about them and drop little compliments that aren’t superficial, but actually relate to what they are insecure about. It may help them see themselves in a different light.

I Think I May Be the One Dealing With Imposter Syndrome

The fact that you recognize that you might be experiencing Imposter Syndrome is a big plus. It is understandable that you may want to prove yourself but feel that you aren’t equipped with reputable skills or abilities, but oscillating between the fear of failure and fear of success can be self-sabotaging. This constant internal struggle can prevent you from reaching your full potential. Here are a few tips and tricks to deal with Imposter Syndrome when you notice its effects:

Own Your Achievements

Humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less. – C.S. Lewis

Learn to take a compliment. When someone says that you did a good job, instead of being modest and rejecting what they said, say a simple “Thank you,” or “I appreciate you noticing the effort I put in, thanks!” Not only is it good manners and makes others feel like you know how to graciously accept a compliment, but it also makes you feel good about yourself. Being humble is a good thing but while you may think you are being modest by not accepting accolades, it may actually come off as insulting to the person who gave you the compliment as it makes them feel like you don’t value their opinion.

You have to realize that even if you were given an opportunity that others didn’t get a shot at, you may have done something to actually deserve it. Our inability to internalize our success may sometimes make us feel like we don’t deserve it but in reality, there are other factors than just luck and timing: The way you present yourself, your personality, your ability to pick up skills fast, or communication skills can all play a role. It could be the smallest thing, or a combination of things, that landed you the opportunity, but it was all you. Own it.

Stop Comparing Yourself to Everyone Around You

So you log into Facebook and you see that one individual who is traveling the world and living the good life. You log onto LinkedIn and you see that person from your high school who is now the CEO of a successful start-up. You check your Instagram feed and you see that friend who is now getting their third Graduate Degree.

Here’s the thing: Just as you’re thinking about how you wish you were one of them, they, and probably several others, are probably wishing they were you. Think about it: Do you post a selfie of your 3 am mental breakdown on your bathroom floor, or do you post about the marathon you ran last week and the fun Saturday night out? The perfectly curated and filtered out feeds on social media are only the best version of the life that others want you to see. In the kind of connected world that we live in, it’s too easy to fall down the comparison rabbit hole. As Emerson once wrote:

Envy is ignorance. – Waldo Emerson

There will always be someone doing what you do or what you want to do, but that doesn’t make your unique skills and abilities lesser than theirs. Respect your own experiences and just be you. Stop focusing on your neighbor’s grass and water your own.

Make a physical note of every nice thing that someone says about you

A visual reminder can be very reaffirming. Make a note of the compliments you receive on a daily basis, no matter how small it is. When someone compliments you, it gives you a glimpse into how others perceive you. It can be easy to forget all the positives about yourself because you live with it every day, so turn to these notes whenever you feel like a fraud and they will help lift your spirits.

Remind yourself of the value that you provide

Instead of asking yourself “Why me?” ask yourself “Why not me?” In a professional environment, it can be easy to doubt your skills and experiences, and that may cause anxiety. However, you belong in the position you do, because your boss or someone at another senior-level hired you, as they think you have what it takes. The value you add can be anything from doing the actual work or even just keeping the team morale up.

Remember, everyone is just as clueless as you are

Honestly, no one knows what they are doing. Everyone is just putting their best foot forward, trying as hard as they can, and hoping things work out. The future is uncertain for everyone, not just you. Most success stories you hear about only actually happened after multiple failures such as inventions that didn’t work, millions of dollars that got lost, or start-ups that didn’t make it. Thomas Edison famously said:

I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work. – Thomas Edison

The point is that if Edison had given up the first time, or even the hundredth time, that something didn’t work, he wouldn’t ever have come to be known as one of modern-day America’s best inventors. It took a lot of bravery and constant failure, but also perseverance in the face of the unknown, which led to his success. One wouldn’t call him an imposter for trying to add value to the world and the same logic also applies to everyone else, including you.

Stop giving yourself so much importance

Perfectionism may be the cause, or the unfortunate side effect, of Imposter Syndrome. The truth behind perfectionism is the stress we put on self-importance and perfection that may have never been there. To be human is to err. When you constantly try to put forth the image of being the poster child of success and achievements, you risk doing things that make you feel less like you and more like a fraud. Take yourself off that pedestal and watch a bit of the stress evaporate.

Be Vulnerable

Vulnerability can be liberating. What fuels Imposter Syndrome is our misconception that others may not be able to deal with the “real us”. This again relates to putting yourself on a pedestal. Not only is it self-inflicted intellectual torture, but it stops you from connecting to others. Our vulnerabilities are part of what allows us to form true human connections, so be open to being vulnerable so you can share your “real” personality with others.

Being vulnerable can also be achieved by just writing down your deepest, darkest thoughts and fears, no matter how taboo they are. This process helps you push these thoughts and feelings out and externalizes them—you may then be able to see them from a more organized and sane perspective. If you feel that you’re able to express yourself through some other art form better, do that instead. The more you write or create the more you’ll be connected to yourself and eventually, you’ll be able to be your most vulnerable self around others as well.

Find Your Confidant

Finding someone with who you can openly discuss your feelings of Imposter Syndrome can be so therapeutic. Being able to tell them that, “Hey, I feel like a total fraud and don’t deserve any of this,” can help relieve you of the emotional and mental burden that you carry. Your confidant may be able to talk you through your feelings and help point out why they think you deserve your success, even when you can’t see it yourself.

Say it out loud

Acknowledging a problem is usually the first step towards dealing with it. If you are in denial, the problem will only fester and the eventual consequences may be worse. So say it out loud and accept the responsibility of addressing the issue.

Realize how it affects those around you

When you let Imposter Syndrome take over your life, it not only affects you but also the people around you. When you hold yourself back it can make you emotionally stunted and unavailable for those who actually need you. Those who have always supported you and/or look up to you may feel disappointed in the fact that you don’t see yourself the way they see you. Not only that but on a daily basis, even your mood can rub off on others and create a negative environment around you, which is harmful to yourself and the others around you, too.

Messing up does not make you a fraud

Why would you glorify your failures if you don’t also glorify your successes? Making a mistake or being wrong about something that you think you know well does not make you an imposter. Everybody is wrong about stuff all the time. Big deal. Just look at the number of goof-ups that people on your social media platforms have made: Celebrities say stuff that they shouldn’t have, people make mistakes about technical stuff, and even famous writers have typos and grammatical errors. Heck, even we started from the bottom here on A Better Lemonade Stand, eventually improved our website, and built a dedicated audience of entrepreneurs eager to build, launch and grow their own ecommerce businesses.

Look at the sports team that you support or your favorite athlete. I can guarantee that they won’t have a 100% track record. They are bound to lose some games and it’s absolutely normal, in fact, if they won every time, what would be the fun in watching them play? Losing does not make them any less of an athlete, it’s just part of the game. The same goes for you—making a mistake does not make you a fraud. Learn from your mistake and move on.

Fake it Until you make it

It works more often than you think. The term “neuroplasticity” means that you can shape and train your brain by pretending. That’s how babies learn to walk and talk and also why sometimes smiling when you’re upset, can actually make you feel better. So even if you feel like you’re fake right now, that may not be true forever.

The point here is that most of the people who have made it big have definitely imitated others and picked up on different skills and mannerisms by faking it. There’s nothing wrong with it and it also doesn’t mean that you are an impostor for doing so.

The “Real You” is subjective

Think of who you were two years back and think of who you are today. Are these two versions of yourself EXACTLY the same? No? That’s because you are constantly growing, changing, learning, and shaping into a better version of yourself. The experiences you have, the hardships you face, the people you meet, all have a lasting impact on your life thus changing you bit by bit. So when you say that you want to be yourself, what does that even mean? Is it a solid and attainable version of you that will never change, no matter what? That actually sounds scary as it takes away the zest for learning and prevents you from opening up your mind to new ideas.

You will also never be the same with any two people. Your interactions will be based on the kind of relationship you share, the situation you are in, and the experiences you have had with them individually. Everyone gets a different version of you and that’s alright. It doesn’t make you fake, just a normal human being.

Your title and credentials DO NOT define you

Focusing on the titles you’ve earned instead of the good you’ve done is a fast track way of driving yourself crazy. No matter how many credentials you obtain, you may not feel like you’ve achieved enough if you are dealing with Imposter Syndrome. However, focusing on the minute details of all the good things that you have done may help ease the feeling of not being good enough. Truth be told, even the “experts” are people who are constantly learning new things and may very well be proved wrong in the near future. That doesn’t make them an imposter and also goes to show that titles can often be just empty shells.

You Won’t Live Forever

As morbid as it sounds, it’s true. Essentially, everyone is going to die. Just because Shakespeare created beautiful literature and Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, did not excuse them from eventually meeting their fate. Success doesn’t guarantee anything. So instead of wasting all your time worrying about the fact that people will find out about your apparent “fakeness”, just do your best and move on. At the end of it all, you don’t want to be left with regrets; “I should have applied for that job!” “I shouldn’t have wasted my time trying to be perfect!” Accept yourself just as you accept and recognize the efforts and achievements of others.

Conclusion

In conclusion to this article, I’m going to leave this excerpt from a blog post by the bestselling author Neil Gaiman, in response to a fan reaching out for help to beat Imposter Syndrome:

“The best help I can offer is to point you to Amy Cuddy’s book, Presence. She talks about Imposter Syndrome (and interviews me in it) and offers helpful insight.

The second best help might be in the form of an anecdote. Some years ago, I was lucky enough to be invited to a gathering of great and good people: artists and scientists, writers and discoverers of things. And I felt that at any moment they would realize that I didn’t qualify to be there, among these people who had really done things.

On my second or third night there, I was standing at the back of the hall, while a musical entertainment happened, and I started talking to a very nice, polite, elderly gentleman about several things, including our shared first name. And then he pointed to the hall of people, and said words to the effect of, “I just look at all these people, and I think, what the heck am I doing here? They’ve made amazing things. I just went where I was sent.”

And I said, “Yes. But you were the first man on the moon. I think that counts for something.”

And I felt a bit better. Because if Neil Armstrong felt like an imposter, maybe everyone did. Maybe there weren’t any grown-ups, only people who had worked hard and also got lucky and were slightly out of their depth, all of us doing the best job we could, which is all we can really hope for.”

The post Imposter Syndrome: Am I Actually Successful or Just a Fraud? appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.

However, when I look back at some of the most challenging times in my life, I’ve always found myself gravitating towards inspirational content to help me power through those times or to provide a bump of courage needed to make hard decisions.

I thought it was about time I did a roundup of some of my favorite quotes and inspirational videos that have helped me throughout my life. The quotes and videos below all have an important message in them that has motivated me to make an important decision in my life. We all have different things that motivate us, but I hope that maybe some of these quotes or videos will speak to you the way they have to me.

Attitude

Attitude is everything. It took me a long time to realize that but you can dramatically and instantly change any situation you find yourself in just by changing your attitude. While you won’t have control over every situation every time, you will have control of your attitude, every time. The following quote was introduced to me in my final year of college by a professor and it helped transform the way I see situations:

The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company…a church….a home.

The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past…we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude…

I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you…we are in charge of our attitudes. ― Charles R. Swindoll

No More Zero Days

Back in college, in just one summer, I added over 25lbs of muscle to my 150lbs frame. My secret? Every single day I worked out. Without fail. There was nothing that would hold me back. Sometimes, I would be sick, exhausted or hungover but I forced myself to drive to the gym. Many times I would be so tired or sick that I would do one pull-up and leave the gym and drive all the way home. It was kinda silly but it worked. It forced me to keep moving forward and never lose momentum.

This method was summarized really well by the user “Ryans01” on Reddit when he was giving advice to a fellow entrepreneur. He listed several rules but the most important one, and the one that blew up on Reddit, was called “No More Zero Days.” It has become so popular it now has a subreddit dedicated to it and a cult-like following.

Here’s Ryans01 rule:

Rule numero uno – There are no more zero days. What’s a zero day? A zero day is when you don’t do a single fucking thing towards whatever dream or goal or want or whatever that you got going on. No more zeros.

I’m not saying you gotta bust an essay out everyday, that’s not the point. The point I’m trying to make is that you have to make yourself, promise yourself, that the new SYSTEM you live in is a NON-ZERO system.

Didn’t do anything all fucking day and it’s 11:58 PM? Write one sentence. One pushup. Read one page of that chapter. One. Because one is non zero. You feel me? When you’re in the super vortex of being bummed your pattern of behavior is keeping the vortex goin, that’s what you’re used to.

Turning into productivity ultimate master of the universe doesn’t happen from the vortex. It happens from a massive string of CONSISTENT NON ZEROS. That’s rule number one. Do not forget. ― Ryans01

I hope you live a life you’re proud of, and if you find that you’re not. I hope you have the strength to start all over again.

Rise & Grind

Next up is a motivational video from Nike and it’s pure poetry. There are a few quotes in this monologue that I feel are pretty powerful and re-energize me every time I start to feel lazy.

Never forget that momentum is a cruel mistress, 
She can turn on a dime with the smallest mistake.
 She is ever searching for that weak place in your armor
, that one tiny thing you forgot to prepare for
.

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You’re a lion in a field of lions, all hunting the same elusive prey with a desperate starvation that says VICTORY is the only thing that can keep you alive
.

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Luck is the last dying wish of those who wanna believe that winning can happen by accident, sweat on the other hand is for those who know it’s a choice.

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Talent vs. Greatness

In the next video, Will Smith talks about talent vs. skill and his thoughts on them. Again, the theme is really about working hard and hustling. He explains how talent — while great and all — can fail you. It’s hard work and never giving up that will stand the test of time and make you truly great at your craft.

The only thing that I see that is distinctly different about me is I’m not afraid to die on a treadmill. I will not be out-worked, period. You might have more talent than me, you might be smarter than me, you might be sexier than me, you might be all of those things, you got it on me in nine categories. But if we get on the treadmill together, there’s two things: You’re getting off first, or I’m going to die. It’s really that simple.

I Am a Champion

This is a popular speech a coach gave to his football team before a big game that has made its rounds on the internet. The intensity and word choices he uses are powerful and there are several really great quotes in this video that I feel stand out.

Some of my favorites are:

No one will deny me. No one will defy me. And no one will tell me who and what I am and what I can be. Belief will change my world. It has moved continents, it has moved countries. It has put man on the moon.

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My heart and my mind will carry my body when my limbs are too weak.

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History will remember me. I will not have to worry about him being kind. I will define myself. I will write my own praises.

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Who Do You Want To Be In Life?

There’s no denying Arnold Schwarzenegger’s success. The guy moved from Austria to America with nothing, became one of the most famous bodybuilders of all time, ran several successful businesses, went on to become one of the most successful movie stars of all time with one of the most successful quotes in movie history (“I’ll be back”), went on to become the Governor of California and married a Kennedy. Like he says in the video below, “If I had listened to the naysayers, I’d still be in the Austrian Alps yodeling.”

Here are some of the quotes from the video below, which I believe originally came from a University commencement speech):

Don’t be afraid to fail. Anything I ever attempted I was always willing to fail. Don’t be afraid of making decisions. You can’t be paralyzed by fear of failure or you will never push yourself.

Too many people are afraid to start their first ecommerce business because they aren’t sure if they have chosen the right product or niche or they don’t know which ecommerce platform to use. I searched for months for my first ecommerce product. When I felt like I was going to give up on the dream of starting my own ecommerce business I randomly choose a product to sell just so I could keep going instead of letting the dream die. I wasn’t afraid to fail, in fact, I was sure I probably would fail but I knew I had to take a shot.

You keep pushing because you believe in yourself and in your vision. And you know it’s the right thing to do. Success will come.

Your vision may change over time but you should always have a vision of where you want to be and your path to get there. Stay steadfast on that path and every day take one step forward.

You never want to fail because you didn’t work hard enough.

I don’t work a 4-hour workweek. My weeks are closer to 80-100 hours. When I take trips and vacations I work. In fact, I am writing this post from Paris right now. At the end of the day even if I fail, no one — but most importantly, me — will be able to say I didn’t work hard enough.

Arnold also breaks down his 6 rules for success which are noteworthy:

1. Trust yourself
2. Break some rules
3. Don’t be afraid to fail
4. Ignore the naysayers
5. Work like hell
6. Give something back

Rocky’s Speech

I use to blame other people for not being where I wanted to be in life. It sounds weird, right? Well, growing up — and working part-time jobs and, right up until a few years ago, working corporate — I would blame the company for not paying me more. I’d blame my manager for not recognizing my talents, abilities, and efforts and rewarding me more. It was always their fault.

The next quote from the Rocky movie is a popular one but hit me especially hard (no pun intended).

You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done! Now, if you know what you’re worth then go out and get what you’re worth. But ya gotta be willing to take the hits, and not pointing fingers saying you ain’t where you wanna be because of him, or her, or anybody! Cowards do that and that ain’t you! You’re better than that!

The key line here that impacted me was, “If you know what you’re worth, then go out and get what you’re worth.” You can’t blame anyone else for not being where you want or expected to be in life. If you are worth more money or respect, then go and get it.

Conclusion

There you have it: My favorite quotes that have all—at some point in time—inspired or motivated me to make a big decision or take action. Do any of these inspirational quotes speak to you?

The post Quotes and Videos that Will Inspire & Motivate You to Take Major Action appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.

If this sounds appealing, you might want to focus your travels on places that attract communities of like-minded digital nomads who are also working as they travel the world.

So, this raises some questions: Where are the best places to enjoy life as an ecommerce digital nomad and what are the best remote working locations in the world?

We’ve rounded up 20 of some of the best worldwide locations for working remotely. To be honest, no one destination is our top pick, so in the interests of fairness, we’re going to take an alphabetical approach.

As we’ve put together this roundup, we’ve taken the following into account:

• Popular spots for travelers
• The cost of accommodation
• The price of food
• Access to co-working hubs (Like the ones we mentioned in our Top 10 Best Co-Working & Co-Living Spaces Around the World article)

However, we haven’t excluded popular destinations just because they’re more expensive. After all, it’s up to you where you and your laptop go, and where you choose to work.

With all that being said, here are the destinations we’re going to cover:

• Auckland, New Zealand
• Bengaluru, India
• Budapest, Hungary
• Buenos Aires, Argentina
• Chiang Mai, Thailand
• Dubrovnik, Croatia
• Hanoi, Vietnam
• Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam
• Krakow, Poland
• Lisbon, Portugal
• Marrakesh, Morocco
• Medellin, Colombia
• Phnom Penh, Cambodia
• Portland, Oregon
• Prague, Czech Republic
• Santa Fe, New Mexico
• Sanur, Bali
• Seville, Spain
• Taipei, Taiwan
• Thessaloniki, Greece

So, let’s look at each one in a little more detail…

Best Remote Working Locations #1: Auckland, New Zealand

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If you’re traveling around the world and you’re determined to see the dramatic scenery New Zealand has to offer, Auckland is an excellent starting point.

It’s an exciting city—in fact, it’s New Zealand’s largest—but despite that, it’s safe and easy to walk around.

There’s also plenty to do there in your downtime like visiting Waiheke Island, the Bay of Islands, hiking in the Waitakere Ranges, touring Shakespear Regional Park or even visiting spectacular coastlines and quirky local art galleries. Wherever your passions lie, you won’t be short of things to do.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: With an average speed of 28 MBPS and plenty of free Wi-Fi spots across the city—including libraries and cafes—getting online shouldn’t be a problem
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, it’s $1.55 New Zealand Dollars (NZD) to $1 USD
• Weather: The warmest months range from November to April when temperatures average between 22-26°C. Between May to October, it’s colder, with temperatures sitting between 15-19°C
• Accommodation: Airbnb prices vary depending on the time of year but for a private room you’re looking at spending around $50-60 USD per night. A basic hotel, however, will cost you roughly $80 per night. If you think you’ll base yourself in Auckland for a while, it may be cheaper to rent a studio for a month which costs roughly $760 per month
• Food: The typical cost of a basic dinner per person is about $13 and a beer will set you back around $6 USD
• Coworking Spaces: There are a fair few coworking spaces dotted around the city which are definitely worth checking out. For example, Generator, SharedSpace, Think Space, and The Workshop—just to name a few

Auckland’s Roundup

Auckland has lots going for it, as does New Zealand in general, however, it’s worth pointing out that the cost of living is pretty high so it may not be suited to every digital nomad’s budget. If you’re already making good money, however, and aren’t worried about living costs, it’s definitely worth going. Especially if you plan on using Auckland as a base for visiting other areas of New Zealand.

Best Remote Working Locations #2: Bengaluru, India

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If you plan on traveling around parts of India while you’re working, then Bengaluru—also known as Bangalore—is an excellent place to stay. Not least since it’s the tech center (or “Silicon Valley”) of India but it’s also home to beautiful temples, gardens, and old palaces. It’s truly a feast for the eyes! It’s also a curious mix of old and new, and worth exploring for those reasons alone.

So, if you want a well-connected base from where you can visit nearby hills, forests, and coffee estates, then look no further.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Fast—an average of 14 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, the exchange is 70.57 Indian Rupee (INR) to $1 USD
• Weather: Bengaluru has a moderate climate and avoids some of the more extreme temperatures experienced by other parts of India. With an average of 30°C, April is the hottest month of the year whereas December is coldest, with an average of 23°C
• Accommodation: While Airbnbs average around $27 per night, hotels, hostels, and guesthouses are also cheap. You can get away with as little (or less than) $30 per night, or if you plan on staying longer and want to rent a studio, it’ll cost you about $223 per month
• Food: Prices are really cheap, with the average dinner costing as little as $1.40 per person, and $0.70 for 0.5L of beer
• Coworking Spaces: There are literally dozens of coworking spaces in this city. It’s hardly surprising given its pedigree for tech. Hubs like Cowrks, Innov8 CoWorking, WeWork, and Commune Coworks are some of the more notable coworking spaces

Bengaluru’s Roundup

Here’s a city that isn’t necessarily on the tip of every digital nomad’s tongue, but if you’re adventurous, tech and opportunity curious, and happen to be traveling India, Bengaluru’s worth a visit. It’s cheap, it’s busy, and it’s full of possibilities but it’s also noisy, has fewer things to do for travelers, and the air quality can be poor. However, English is commonly spoken, it’s also a safe and cosmopolitan city, and has fast Wi-Fi—so there are plenty of advantages, too.

Best Remote Working Locations #3: Budapest, Hungary

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This grand Hungarian city has it all: There’s culture, historic spas, pretty parks, warm summers, and it boasts a low cost of living.

The city is split into two: Buda and Pest, which are intersected by the River Danube. Buda is full of history—it’s the older part of the city—whereas Pest is more contemporary, where all the nightlife happens.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: The average internet speed is 41 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, 307 Hungarian Forint (HUF) to $1 USD
• Weather: Budapest has a varied climate, with January and December experiencing temperatures as low as 2°C and June, July and August hitting 30°C
• Accommodation: The closer to the center, the higher the prices. Airbnb is the most popular apartment rental provider for shorter stays. You can find prices as low as $26 per night, although taking into account the busier summer periods, those prices will go up. Hotels are also a cheap option (especially out of season), with an average price of $514 per month. Or if you rent a studio inside the city center, it’ll set you back roughly $500 per month
• Food: There are plenty of cheap places to eat in Budapest. The average dinner for one person will cost you just under $5 per person, adding in just over a dollar for a 0.5L of beer! Don’t forget to visit Budapest’s Karaván food-truck court—there’s no better place to dine on a warm summer evening
• Coworking Spaces: There are plenty. Some of the most central ones are Colabs, Forrás Jóllét Stúdió, UrbanFood Cafe & Coworking, and Impact Hub

Budapest’s Roundup

Overall, Budapest is a cheap and beautiful city to live and work in, with a friendly vibe. There are plenty of different nationalities in Budapest, and tons of exciting and fun things to do in your downtime, from visiting historic buildings and museums to hanging out in the ruin bars at night.

Best Remote Working Locations #4: Buenos Aires, Argentina

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The Argentinian capital is hard to miss off your South American travel wish list. It’s a lively city with a population of 15 million boasting an exciting mix of South American and European influences. It’s a vibrant, creative, and noisy city that never sleeps with tango at its heart. There are parks and palaces to visit, an inspiring art and music scene, and of course, tango to learn in your spare time.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Average speeds are around 20 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, 61.78 Argentine Peso (ARS) equals $1 USD
• Weather: October to April are the hottest months, with temperatures reaching 30°C in January. May to September are the colder months, with temperatures ranging from 14-19°C
• Accommodation: The average price of a nightly Airbnb is around $25, and if you want to rent a studio for a month, it’ll cost you about $140 per month. A hotel will cost an average of $30 per night, although prices go up during high season and holidays
• Food: Argentina is, of course, famous for its beef. The average cost of a basic meal for one person is $4, and beer costs about $1.20 for 0.5L
• Coworking Spaces: There are plenty to choose from, including Cespedes, Central Coworking, Urban Station, WeWork, and Loop Coworking

Buenos Aires’ Roundup

Although there are tons of amazing things about Buenos Aires, it doesn’t have a reputation for being overly safe, and pickpocketing is rife.

It is, however, cheap to live and work there, and there’s plenty of great fun to be had. Internet speeds are good, and there are tons of digital nomads which is hardly surprising when you consider that coworking spaces are smart and plentiful.

Another plus is that Buenos Aires is home to Start-Up Buenos Aires. For those who don’t know, this a free startup community where you can access classes, resources, events, and support for your ecommerce endeavors. How cool is that?!

Best Remote Working Locations #5: Chiang Mai, Thailand

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Chiang Mai is a must on any working nomad’s travel list. It’s easy to get around this vibrant UNESCO World Heritage site and it’s cheap. There’s plenty of veggie and vegan food and, of course, tons of stunning temples.

It’s also a great base if you want to take day-trips to one of the elephant camps, the Tiger Kingdom, or the Golden Triangle.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Average Wi-Fi speed of 23 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing it is 31.20 Thai Baht to $1 USD
• Weather: It’s hot and humid, with average temperatures at around 30°C, rising to 38°C. Because of the humidity, it often feels as high as the 40s. The rainy season starts from May and runs through to October, with the highest rainfall in June with an average of 153mm. As Chiang Mai is located at a higher altitude than most Thai cities, it feels a little less humid than other parts of the country
• Accommodation: It’s pretty cheap to stay in Chiang Mai. If you plan on locating yourself there for longer than a few days, then a rental studio will cost you just over $300 per month. Airbnb costs an average of $37 per night, while a month in a hotel (assuming you haggle a long-stay discount) will come in at about $500 per month.
• Food: As with most south-east Asian spots, the food is cheap. There are high-end places, but an average meal will cost you around $1.90 per person with an extra $1.90 for 0.5L of beer.
• Coworking Spaces: We found lots of coworking spaces in Chiang Mai including Punspace, Hub53, Starworks, In The City Coliving and Coworking, and The Brick Start-Up Space

Chiang Mai’s Roundup

The main downside is the humidity but if you find a coworking space with air conditioning, it’s bearable. Outside, however, the air quality is inferior, as there’s lots of traffic. You’ll notice that as with other south-east Asian cities, locals often wear masks to protect themselves from pollution.

On the plus side, it’s a great location to work from because the Wi-Fi speeds are decent. Not to mention, it’s cheap, and there are lots to do. Not only that, as Chiang Mai is on the traveler trail, you’re sure to find other like-minded nomads to chat with—win-win!

Best Remote Working Locations #6: Dubrovnik, Croatia

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This Adriatic stonewalled city is a popular stop-off point for tourists and travelers of all ages. Its UNESCO sites alone are reason enough to spend time there, as well as all its museums, including the Museum of Modern & Contemporary Art or War Photo Limited, a chronicle of the city’s siege in the 1990s during the Balkan war.

You’ll also find markets, bars, and beautiful buildings just about everywhere you look. There are also fun places to visit outside the city like Lokrum island. That’s in addition to loads of festivals during the summer months, beaches to visit, and sites featured in Game of Thrones.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Internet speed there is an average of 18 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: Currently, 6.75 Croatian Kuna (HRK) equals $1 USD
• Weather: The summer months are scorching, with average temperatures hitting between 23-31°C. The winters are colder, with temperatures around 9-19°C between November and April
• Accommodation: It’s cheaper to stay in a basic hotel, with rates of around $44 per night whereas Airbnb prices are higher, presumably because the city has many weekend visitors. Prices for a private Airbnb room come in around $70 per night
• Food: It’s cheap enough to eat there, with a basic dinner costing around $11, and beer just $1 for 0.5L
• Coworking Spaces: While coworking places are popping up in Split and Zagreb, we couldn’t find many there. That said, there are plenty of cafes with free Wi-Fi, and if you’re in an Airbnb, you’re likely to have access to your host’s internet connection

Dubrovnik’s Roundup

Dubrovnik is undoubtedly beautiful, cultured, and full of life. The downside is that the city is full of tourists, and even more so when the cruise ships dock. However, if hot weather isn’t high on your must-have list, then visit Dubrovnik out of season, when things are a tad cooler and calmer.

Compared to other Croatian spots, Dubrovnik isn’t cheap, prices aren’t aimed at locals or working nomads but well-heeled tourists and cruise ship visitors. That said, it’s pretty much one of the most beautiful cities in Europe and hard to miss.

Best Remote Working Locations #7: Hanoi, Vietnam

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The Vietnamese capital city is like no other place on earth. It’s bustling, vibrant, and never seems to sleep. There’s much to do and see in this famous city, not least the tomb of Ho Chi Minh himself, where the former Communist leader lies embalmed.

There’s also Hanoi’s Old Quarter, museums, markets, the Mekong River, hill tribes, day-trips to Halong Bay, and street food you’ll never forget. If you land in Hanoi from another country and plan to work your way south to Ho Chi Minh City, then work and rest awhile in Hanoi first. The city is full of tourists and travelers, including digital nomads, so you’ll be in good company.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Average speeds are around 9 MBPS, slower than many cities on this list, but workable nonetheless. But, one thing to bear in mind is that internet censorship exists in Vietnam. So, any news sites critical of the government or anything the Vietnamese government doesn’t agree with, are banned
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, 23,247 Vietnamese Dong (VND) equals $1 USD
• Weather: It’s humid. The hottest months are April to October, with temperatures ranging from 31°C-33°C and the colder months being November, December, and January, with temperatures around 24°C
• Accommodation: Prices are cheap with central Hanoi studio rentals costing around $400 per month, and the average nightly Airbnb about $40. You can also haggle for lower hotel rates if you’re there out of season or planning to stay longer, with average nightly prices around $28 for a basic hotel
• Food: It’s really cheap to eat out—and like many Asian and south-east Asian countries, many travelers and nomads eat out every night. An average dinner will cost you about $2 per person, and an extra $1 for 0.5L of beer
• Coworking Spaces: We found plenty of coworking opportunities including Hanoi Hub, Up Coworking, Toong, Moonwork, Hatch Nest, and The Click

Hanoi’s Roundup

Hanoi is an exciting city to be a part of, even for a short while. It’s home to 7.6 million people, who all seem to be on the go at the same time! Its air quality is poor, it’s noisy, and it’s in your face. It’s also cheap, friendly, young, full of life and a great base to work, live and travel.

Best Remote Working Locations #8: Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

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Also known as Saigon, Ho Chi Minh was named after its communist leader after the fall of Saigon in 1975. It’s a city full of rich history and memories. The city is a mix of pagodas, skyscrapers, temples, and reminders of its communist past and present, including the Vietnam War.

There’s plenty to do there, including visits to its war museums, historical sites, tunnels, French colonial architecture, and of course, its dynamic markets.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: The average internet speed is around 17 MBPS but it’s often faster, with lots of free Wi-Fi spots dotted around the city
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, 23,247 Vietnamese Dong (VND) equals $1 USD
• Weather: It’s humid and hot! The year-round average temperature is around 33°C. Still, because of the humidity, the temperature often feels like it’s in the high 40s. The rainy season runs from May all the way through to October, with monthly rainfall averages between 122mm in October to 366mm in August
• Accommodation: You’re going to want somewhere with air conditioning! Otherwise, it may be tough to get a good night’s sleep. An Airbnb monthly rental will cost a nightly average of $32. In contrast, a month in a hotel will be around $500. However, rates are often negotiable and cheaper during the low (rainy) season
• Food: It’s really cheap—you shouldn’t have to pay more than $3 for dinner for one, and it can be even less expensive if you eat street food. Beer is around $1 for 0.5L
• Coworking Spaces: Ho Chi Minh seems pretty tuned into the digital nomad spirit. There are tons of coworking spaces, including Spiced, The Hive, Dreamplex Nguyen, Saigon Coworking, Circo Hoang Dieu, and Workyos

Ho Chi Minh’s Roundup

Be prepared for the traffic—there’s lots of it and its accompanying noise. It’s also expensive compared to other Vietnamese cities and towns, although you can pick up bargains at Ben Thanh and Bin Tay markets.

If you like the heat, Ho Chi Minh delivers, but beware of the humidity which can feel stifling. However, compared to Western nomad spots, it is still cheap, and there’s plenty of beautiful and exciting things to see and do.

Best Remote Working Locations #9: Krakow, Poland

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This Polish gem hits the spot with its beautiful old town center, small cobbled streets, infamous history, its proximity to the mountains for skiing and hiking, friendly locals, and the cool Jewish Quarter brimming with trendy popup bars and galleries.

With a population of 762,500, it’s a small city that’s easy to walk around, or you can travel by bus or tram pretty cheaply. It’s a university city as well as a popular place for traditional tourists—which accounts for its energetic and young vibe, despite some of its traumatic histories.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Its average internet speed comes in at 25 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, 3.91 Polish Zloty (PLN) to $1 USD
• Weather: Krakow is cold in the winter, with average daily temperatures in January and December at around 1-3°C, but it can feel much colder. In the summer months, we’re looking at average temperatures between 25-27°C in June, July, and August
• Accommodation: There are plenty of Airbnbs to be had for shorter or longer-term stays, with an average nightly rental of around $40. Or, you can rent a studio, for example, via Gumtree, for about $500-$600 per month. But, the hotels are more expensive, catering mainly to the tourist market. A month in a hotel will average around $800
• Food: There are plenty of cheap eateries across the city with dinner costing you around $5 per person, and beer prices about $1.80 for 0.5L
• Coworking Spaces: There are lots of coworking spaces across the city. One popular haunt is CoLabs. We also came across Project People, Kalafiornia, OffOffice Virtual Office, and Cluster CoWork

Krakow’s Roundup

Here’s a city that’s cheap to work in, making it a viable base for many a digital nomad for longer than just a few days. It’s affordable, has fast wifi, it’s easy to get around, and the locals are friendly. Less significant is that the winter months can be super cold, and the language can be tough to get around. However, many people speak English, especially the younger generation, so you shouldn’t have too many problems communicating.

Best Remote Working Locations #10: Lisbon, Portugal

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This sunny capital has a great deal to offer digital nomads, despite not being the cheapest place to be. Built upon seven hills, Lisbon is beautiful, coastal, and green, with an abundance of terrific cafes and quirky yellow trams.

Lisbon’s buildings are every traveler’s dream photo opportunity, with colorful tiles and boldly painted properties everywhere you turn. Not just that, but there’s art and culture abound, and importantly, an active and plentiful digital nomad community so you won’t be alone.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Speeds are an average of 32 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: 0.91 Euro (EUR) for $1 USD
• Weather: May to October are the warmest and sunniest, with temperatures ranging between 24-27°C. November to April are cooler with some rain and temperatures between 15-19°C
• Accommodation: There’s plenty of choices, but it doesn’t always come cheap. The average nightly cost of an Airbnb room is around $50 and the same for a basic hotel room. If you plan on staying for a bit, a typical studio in the city center will cost about $700 per month
• Food: An average meal will cost you around $6-7, and a 0.5L beer roughly $2 USD
• Coworking Spaces: There are plenty. We found Cowork Lisboa, Avila, Cowork Central, and Rocket Hub

Lisbon’s Roundup

Rent is expensive, but the cost of living is low. You’ll find your biggest expense is accommodation, especially in the summer months. The city is definitely a tourist destination, and you’ll find that this inevitably pushes prices and availability of affordable rooms right up.

However, Lisbon is an excellent base for exploring nearby coastal locations or taking off for a long weekend, either north or south Portugal, and of course, there’s plenty to do in the city itself.

It may be warm in the summer, but it’s definitely cold in the winter and not all accommodation offers heating, so be prepared! However, you’ll get a warm welcome from the locals at any time of the year—the Portuguese are famous for their friendly hospitality.

Best Remote Working Locations #11: Marrakesh, Morocco

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We’ve listed Marrakesh here because although there are other amazing places to visit in this North African country (Essaouira, Fes, and the Atlas Mountains, just for starters), this former Imperial city is the perfect stopping point before traveling further.

It has grown and developed in recent decades and is the perfect spot for a week or longer. It has decent enough Wi-Fi, and there’s plenty to see and do during your free time. Whether it’s visiting the famous souks, the Jardin Majorelle, Bahia Palace, Maison de la Photographie, or hanging out in rooftop bars and riads across the city—there’s something for everyone.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Although Wi-Fi is slower than most of the places we’ve listed, it has an average of 9 MBPS, which is sufficient for basic needs
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, it’s 9.47 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) to $1 USD
• Weather: It’s pretty hot there, and from May to October, temperatures remain between 30-35°C. The colder months aren’t exactly frosty, with average temperatures between November and April in the low to mid-20s. It tends to rain in December and early spring
• Accommodation: Prices vary—there are lots of upmarket hotels popping up, and they’re expensive. However, you can get an Airbnb private room for around $90, which is costly compared to other locations. There are, however, cheap hotel rooms to be had for approximately $40 per night. Marrakesh, like many cities, is popular with weekenders, and this inevitably drives accommodation prices up
• Food: It’s cheap to eat out there with average meal prices around $4 and beer around $2 for 0.5L
• Coworking Spaces: Creative Lab, Cowork in Marrakesh, The Spot, and The Emerging Business Factory are all popular co-working hubs

Marrakesh’s Roundup

Here’s a fabulous spot to base yourself for a few days or a week or two. There’s nothing better than soaking up the vibrant and colorful Moroccan atmosphere. Marrakesh is a city that feels alive both day and night. Plus, it’s easy to get around and great for accessing other parts of the country; the transport links are second to none.

Best Remote Working Locations #12: Medellin, Colombia

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Medellin is fast becoming a popular destination for digital nomads and with good reason. Not only does it have fantastic scenery and plenty of lovely places to visit in and around the city, but it also has fantastic nightlife. Think festivals, music, bars and nightclubs, Medellin is an incredibly friendly place to be.

Two fantastic places to visit if you get a chance are the Parque Arvi and Botanical Gardens. The city’s metro cable and Medellin Metro gets you to many of the city’s neighborhoods.

Medellin, known as “The City of Eternal Spring,” with a climate that’s never cold, it seems perfect. But, don’t be fooled—it does rain and quite a bit! Located in a bowl within the Andes mountains, you’ll enjoy breathtaking views wherever you are in Medellin, so rest assured, there are photo opportunities galore!

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: An average speed of 15 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing the exchange is 3,430 Colombian Peso to $1 USD
• Weather: The temperature there is consistent throughout the year at a steady 27-28°C. It does rain, and the most torrential rainfall is during May, June, October, and November. However, you should expect rain all year round
• Accommodation: A private Airbnb room will cost you around $19 per night and a basic hotel room the same. For a studio, you’ll pay about $450 per month
• Food: A simple meal will cost you around $4, and 0.5L of beer is about $1.50
• Coworking Spaces: Some of the more popular spots include Espacio, FrendaColectivo, WeWork, Selina Cowork, and Tinkko

Medellin’s Roundup

Colombia is fast becoming a go-to digital nomad destination and, at its heart, is Medellin. It boasts a beautiful landscape, warm climate, friendly locals, a thriving digital nomad community, and a cheap cost of living.

These are all great reasons to base yourself and your ecommerce business there. Do your research thoroughly before heading there and find a neighborhood that’s popular with other nomads or travelers.

Best Remote Working Locations #13: Phnom Penh, Cambodia

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When most people think of Cambodia, they imagine the Angkor Wat temples in Siem Riep but there are several reasons why you should add Phnom Penh to your digital nomad list. Aside from it sitting on the banks of the Mekong River, the city is full of history, culture, street life, and noise.

Just outside the city, you’ll find beautiful countryside, fishing villages, luminous green rice fields, and floating houses. Plus, you can’t go to Phnom Penh without visiting the Foreign Correspondents’ Club for happy hour cocktails.

That, as well as the National Museum of Cambodia, the Royal Palace, and rest assured, there’s no shortage of temples to explore. As for new culture, check out Factory Phnom Penh, a former Levi’s factory turned creative hub that includes galleries, workspaces, a craft brewery, and cinema.

Sobering visits have to include Tuol Sleng, a former school in the city center formerly used as a torture camp and Cheoung Ek, also known as The Killing Fields.

You’ll also find authentic southeast Asian street food and markets in this city. There’s plenty of places to grab a delicious yet cheap dish.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: This is slow in comparison to other destinations on our list with an average speed of 7 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, 4,082 Cambodia Riel (KHR) equaled $1 USD
• Weather: It’s hot all year round, with temperatures averaging 32-34°C. It’s also very humid, especially during the rainy season between May and October
• Accommodation: The cheapest places to stay are hotels, with average prices for a basic room as low as $15-18 per night. Airbnb’s are more expensive, averaging $50 per night, and studios about $460 per month
• Food: It’s certainly cheap to eat out with the average price of dinner between $3-4 and beer around $1.90 for 0.5L
• Coworking Spaces: Yes, there are a few coworking hubs, including Co-lab Cambodia, Workspace 1, and My Khmer Coworking

Phnom Penh’s Roundup

Yes, the Wi-Fi is slow there, but if you’re traveling and working, a few days there likely won’t slow you down workwise. That’s providing all you have to do is write and answer emails or catch up with customers.

This city is more than its grim Khmer Rouge past. Today, you’ll still find reminders of its bloody history, nevertheless, you’ll also find a thriving city, new buildings alongside old, the beautiful Russian market, and an emerging digital community… despite the Wi-Fi restrictions.

Best Remote Working Locations #14: Portland, Oregon

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Much is written about this city and its alternative take on life, and we all know about the Netflix series Portlandia, right? It has a reputation for being a chilled, hipster haven and offers a very accepting vibe as it embraces all walks of life.

It’s easy to walk around the city, it’s full of great bars and cafes (that can easily double up as a workspace), and there are plenty of places to visit. Don’t forget it’s home to 70+ breweries, so if you’re into your craft beer, Portland is a great place to be.

You can also cycle everywhere, eat well, hike in the beauty of Forest Park, take a trip to Mount Hood Volcano, and just absorb the laid-back atmosphere.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Fast Wi-Fi with average speeds of 42 MBPS
• Weather: It can get pretty humid there, and it rains nine months out of the year
• Accommodation: An average night in an Airbnb will cost you about $70, and a hotel more around $80, with monthly studio rentals about $1,650
• Food: An average dinner will cost you around $10, and beer around $5 for 0.5L. Be sure to check out Portland’s abundance of pop up food carts and food trucks around the city
• Coworking Spaces: There are plenty of cafes and bars for you to occupy but if you’re after an actual coworking space, we found plenty including WeWork, and Hatch Labs

Portland’s Roundup

There are plenty of reasons to work on your ecommerce business from Portland but be prepared for the rain—it’s part of Portland life. However, the city’s cafe culture and all-round friendly atmosphere will surely compensate. It isn’t the cheapest place to be, still, it’s certainly exciting and if you can cut your costs with shared living and working spaces that offer Wi-Fi included, then all the better.

Best Remote Working Locations #15: Prague, Czech Republic

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If you’re in Europe and touring around Eastern Europe, then Prague or the “City of a Hundred Spires,” as it’s also known, will inevitably be on your list to visit. It’s a popular tourist destination and can get crowded, but it’s also steeped in history, art, culture, and boasts a lively nightlife.

The Czech Republic capital has much to offer, such as its Baroque architecture, Prague Castle, the old town and its famous astronomical clock, plus plenty of gorgeous places to eat and drink. It’s also a convenient base for exploring nearby locations in your free time, such as the spa town of Carlsbad.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Speeds average around 28 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, 22.90 Czech Koruna (CZK) to $1 USD
• Weather: The warmest months are June to September, with temperatures ranging between 21-29°C, although it often feels like it’s hotter. The winters, in contrast, can be chilly, with average temperatures for January and December as chilly as 2°C or lower
• Accommodation: The average cost of a private Airbnb room is $55, with hotels coming in cheaper at about $42 per night. If you plan on staying for a month or more, a monthly studio rental will cost you about $685 in the city center
• Food: Food is plentiful and cheap, with the average cost of a dinner at $6, and 0.5L of Czech beer costing $1.70
• Coworking Spaces: There are many coworking spaces as well as welcoming cafes with free Wi-Fi. We like the look of the following co-working hubs: Impact Hub, Locus, K10, Opero, and Paper Hub

Prague’s Roundup

Prague parades a low cost of living and is, therefore, an excellent base for digital nomad life. It has a great social life, plenty of culture, and a heritage that goes way past just a few old buildings. There are also lots of expats and foreign visitors in the city and English is spoken widely. The city is also effortless to walk around or you can just hop on a tram or bus—travel is very cheap. The downsides are that Prague can get pretty cold in the winter and the city can sometimes be overrun with weekend visitors from all around the world.

Best Remote Working Locations #16: Santa Fe, New Mexico

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In the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, at 7,000 feet sits the creative and artistic city of Santa Fe. The city has an eclectic mix of Native American, Hispanic, and Anglo heritage. Santa Fe is the oldest capital in the United States and America’s second oldest city, having been founded between 1607 and 1610.

Interestingly, UNESCO awarded it Creative City status in 2005, making it the first US city to achieve such an accolade. If you’re traveling around New Mexico, or if you’re on your way to Mexico, then Santa Fe is certainly a great getaway if you love art, nature, and culture.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Average speeds are 29 MBPS
• Weather: June, July, and August are the sunniest months, with temperatures around 28-30°C. November, December, January, and February are the coldest months, with temperatures ranging between 6-11°C. But, it can be as cold as -4
• Accommodation: Accommodation is always cheap, with an average Airbnb private room costing $66 per night and a hotel room around $77. If you plan on staying for longer, then a city center studio will cost you an average of $1,265 per month
• Food: The average price of a basic meal costs around $13 and beer $4 for 0.5L
• Coworking Spaces: Co-Fe and Liquid Space are both hubs worth checking out

Santa Fe’s Roundup

It’s a beautiful and creative place with an excellent quality of life, fantastic scenery, and lots to do. But, it’s also expensive and not necessarily a typical nomad destination. That said, Wi-Fi speeds are reasonable, and there are tons of things to immerse yourself in during your free time.

Best Remote Working Locations #17: Sanur, Bali

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If your travels take you to Indonesia and Bali in particular, we think Sanur is a great spot to sit down and do some work while you enjoy the sunsets.

It’s less popular than some of the busier places—such as Kuta, Jimbaran, and Ubud. That said, Sanur has plenty of attractions, including museums, temples, and beachside walks. It’s less touristy with fewer resorts, with a reasonably quiet pace of life.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: An average speed of 11 MBPS, which is still fast, although not as quick as some of our other listings
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, the exchange is 13,960 Indonesian Rupiah (Rp) to $1 USD
• Weather: It’s hot and humid! Average temperatures remain at a near-constant 30°C. Still, because of the humidity, it can feel as if the temperature is in the high 40s. It’s worth noting, January and February receive the highest amount of rainfall
• Accommodation: The average nightly Airbnb rental is around $15, although there are way cheaper hostels. You can rent a studio for about $200 per month, or if you fancy hotel life, it’ll cost you an average of $433 per month. Bear in mind, you can always haggle for a cheaper rate if you’re staying longer
• Food: Eating out is incredibly cheap, with an average dinner price of $1.45 per person, plus $1.40 for 0.5L for a beer
• Coworking Spaces: If you don’t want to work in noisy cafes, then there are a few coworking spaces available. We found CoHive, Livit Hub, and The Sanur Space

Sanur’s Roundup

If you fancy a quiet spot to chill and work, then Sanur hits the spot. It’ll be kind on your nomad budget too. Of course, the humidity can be severe, still, if you find an airconditioned living and working space, you won’t suffer much.

Its biggest advantage is that it’s incredibly cheap, and while its Wi-Fi speed isn’t the highest, it’s good enough. If, however, you’re looking for something lively to do in your downtime, you may be disappointed. There are fewer digital nomad communities there, so if you’re after like-minded company, you may not find it in abundance.

Best Remote Working Locations #18: Seville, Spain

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This Andalucian gem is Spain’s fourth-largest city and is full of history, great food, flamenco, sunshine, and warmth. If you’re working your way around Spain, we think Seville is a fantastic stopping point for a week or even longer.

There are loads of places to visit in your free time, such as the Alcázar of Seville, the cathedral, the historic narrow streets of the old quarter, and of course, the tapas bars. You can also quickly get to Granada from there and the Sierra Nevada mountains—which is a fab place to be if you fancy skiing or hiking.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Speeds average around 25 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing, it’s 0.90 Euro (EUR) to $1 USD
• Weather: Seville is one of Spain’s warmest cities, and even in December and January, the temperature averages at around 17-19°C. The sunnier months, especially from June to September can be sweltering, with temperatures ranging between 31-33°C
• Accommodation: The average cost of a night in a private Airbnb room is around $57, whereas a basic hotel is cheaper at $33 per night. If you’re planning on staying longer, then a studio rental in the city center will cost you around $600 per month
• Food: The average cost of dinner is around $11, with beer priced at $2.17—although prices can be lower than this if you shop around
• Coworking Spaces: We found WorkINcompany, Arcadia, and Thinking Company, and there are plenty of cafes that offer free W-Fi which perfect for digital nomads on a budget

Seville’s Roundup

Because Seville is on the tourist trail, there are times when it does feel crowded. Still, if you’re there for longer than a few days, you’ll have plenty of time to link up with other digital nomads and find a working space that fits your needs.

Seville is a cultured city where much of life is spent outdoors, eating, drinking, and meeting friends. The food is excellent, you can hop from tapas bar to tapas bar as the locals do. Or just sit back and people watch, absorb the Spanish culture, and marvel at its rich language… and of course, find the time to run your ecommerce business in between.

Best Remote Working Locations #19: Taipei, Taiwan

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It’s easy to get to, effortless to get around, it’s cheap, and it’s a safe place to be, especially if you’re traveling alone. Taipei is a perfect spot if you’re a food lover and love street food and night markets. There are tons of hiking opportunities there, most notably at Tiger Mountain or Qixing Mountain. Or you can take a gentle walk in the city’s Daan Forest Park.

If hiking isn’t your thing, you can just chill at the Wulai Hot Springs before heading to any one of the city’s many night markets for a taste of delicious street food. Popular night markets include Ningxia, Shilin, Raohe, and Tonghua.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: An average speed of 19 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: 29.59 Taiwanese New Dollar (TWD) is equivalent to $1 USD
• Weather: It’s hot and sticky, with April to September reaching between 29 to 34°C, but it often feels as high as 50°C or higher. October to March is more refreshing, with temperatures between 20-28°C, but humidity is high all year round
• Accommodation: Airbnb and hotel prices are around the same, costing an average of $50 per night. You can also find rental groups on Taipei Facebook pages that may be a bit cheaper
• Food: Street food is the cheapest way to eat and will cost you around $3-$4, and 0.5L beer is around the same price
• Coworking Spaces: There are masses of areas for you to work in if you decide not to operate from your accommodation. Most reputably, CLBC, The Hive, Makerbar, and Hun

Taipei’s Roundup

While Taipei is cheap in terms of food, accommodation there isn’t the most affordable. However, if you’re planning on spending just a few days in the city before moving on, it’s not going to bust your budget, and it’s really easy to get around.

Temperatures are scorching there, which can be somewhat of a disadvantage. Still, it’s definitely on the traveler and nomad trail so you’re sure to bump into other like-minded digital nomads, especially if you plan on spending a week or two there.

Best Remote Working Locations #20: Thessaloniki, Greece

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No review on digital nomad working locations is complete without featuring at least one place in Greece. There are so many areas and islands to choose from, however, we decided to go with Thessaloniki because it’s accessible, affordable, full of history, and even has its own International Film Festival!

It’s also a port city, so there are plenty of ferries to facilitate island hopping during your free time. It’s Greece’s second-largest city and a university location, so there are plenty of young people and trendy places to hang out. The nearby Meteora Monasteries, Halkidiki, and free walking tours of the city are all fabulous things to visit and do while you’re there.

So, what are the practicalities?

• Wi-Fi: Speeds are fine at an average of 12 MBPS
• Currency Exchange: At the time of writing the exchange was 0.91 Euro (EUR) to $1 USD
• Weather: As with much of Greece, you’ll find heat during the summer months, May to September, with temperatures ranging between 25-32°C. But, it’s still lovely in October, with an average warmth of 21°C. The cooler weather is between November and April, with December, January, and February being the coldest, with temperatures around 9-11°C. Those same months are when Thessaloniki gets most of its rain, with an average of 4-5 days rain a month, although in common with much of Greece, there’s never a lot of rain!
• Accommodation: A private Airbnb will cost you around $36 per night, and a hotel room averages at $60
• Food: Food there is really cheap, you can eat dinner for just under $6 per night and beer costs $4 for 0.5L
• Coworking Spaces: There’s Coho, i4GPro, and plenty of cafes with free Wi-Fi, which should meet all your basic internet needs

Thessaloniki’s Roundup

While Thessaloniki may not be the most beautiful Greek island, it’s practical if you’re planning on island hopping and moving around. It’s also cheap, so you can spend plenty of time there without breaking your budget.

The weather can’t be faulted, and although it’s not a traditional digital nomad hot spot, it’s a great location to access more of Greece including Chois, Crete, Samos, Lesvos, or, if you’re heading to Athens, the port of Piraeus.

Ready to Kickstart Your Adventure as a Digital Nomad?

So there you have it, our suggested top 20 remote working locations to visit while traveling and working as a digital nomad. While the list is entirely subjective, we hope it gives you a little sense of just how big the digital nomad community actually is.

Traveling while you’re working isn’t always easy, it can be lonely and feel unstructured if you don’t plan your time well, but there are ways of making it work for you. There will be places you stay just a couple of days and others where you think, “Oh, I really want to live here for a while.”

For example, you could base yourself in a European city for a month and travel from there to other European remote working locations just for a few days. This especially feasible since train connections are so fast and often really cheap!

There’s no reason why you can’t combine your love of travel with your need to earn a living. If this intrigues you, being a digital nomad could be the perfect way to go. You don’t need to get the travel bug out of your system; instead, make it part of who you actually are and get paid while you’re doing it—win-win!

The post 20 Best Remote Working Locations Around the World for Digital Nomads appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.

Remote ecommerce jobs are changing the job landscape by giving employees the chance to find work that suits their skills, talents, interests, and experience more easily. With remote jobs, employees have access to job opportunities they may not otherwise have where they are located. This opens them up to a greater range of employment options and ideally, can help them work in job positions they’re more interested in.

In this article, we discuss remote ecommerce jobs in-depth and the kind of remote ecommerce jobs that currently exist on the market. We discuss the most common categories of remote jobs and have listed real-life examples of job positions that exist in each of the categories. We’ve also included resources to help you find remote ecommerce jobs whether through job sites or other places on the internet, so you know all the options that exist in order to find a remote ecommerce job for yourself.

If you’re not sure what kind of remote ecommerce job is best for you, jump down to the final section titled, “Breakdown of Remote Ecommerce Jobs Based on Skill Level.” There, we identify the best remote ecommerce job positions for low, mid and high-level skilled workers so you can find remote jobs that are the best fit for your knowledge and experience.

Ready to find remote ecommerce jobs? Let’s jump into it.

Ecommerce by the Numbers

First of all, what is ecommerce? In the broadest sense of the word, ecommerce is basically the term used to describe the exchange of currency for goods or services online. To conduct ecommerce transactions you can use different ecommerce platforms (which we’ve thoroughly discussed, rated and reviewed in our Ecommerce Platforms: Choosing the Best Ecommerce Software for Your Business article), such as Shopify, Amazon, Etsy, Kickstarter, or even Facebook to promote and directly sell your products to your intended demographic or customers.

Ecommerce businesses are often run by their founders and a small team, if there’s a team at all, and they can often be run with fewer employees than most physical retail stores because they don’t require an employee presence throughout the business’ opening hours.

For those looking for ecommerce jobs, however, there’s good news after all. The supply of ecommerce jobs—including creating one’s own—hasn’t been fully satiated yet by the demand.

The numbers are clear: In 2016 alone, ecommerce accounted for at least $3.34 billion (including $1 billion from mobile) in sales in the US, plus more than £1 billion in the UK as well.

This marks ecommerce retailers at a staggering 21.6% growth from the year before, urging even more startups, solopreneurs, and entrepreneurs to join the ecommerce industry and fill the gap for consumer demand. Because of this major growth, there’s a countless number of ecommerce stores going strong, and new ones being launched every day, which means even more ecommerce jobs for the rest of us.

Future Predictions for Ecommerce

Most industry experts predict an even brighter future for ecommerce, including the re-emergence of novel trends such as buyable Instagram posts (we’ve already witnessed the creation of buyable Pinterest pins, which we discussed in our Pinterest Marketing for Ecommerce Businesses article) and online retailer’s focus shift from customer acquisition to the more fruitful strategy of customer retention. All of this is without accounting for the possibility of an even bigger explosion in sales through mobile devices and mobile stores in general.

As the world of ecommerce constantly evolves, a huge variety of different skills and competencies will be needed to stay ahead of the competition at any given point in time. In light of this, building or starting an ecommerce job can be rewarding now, even if it may seem daunting at first. Any apprehension will likely fade away once you get the gist of how things work in the industry.

Get a glimpse into the ecommerce jobs available now, and the ecommerce jobs expected to gain momentum as the industry grows, in this article. We discuss in detail the best ecommerce jobs on the market, the skills and experience required to get them, and probably some ecommerce jobs you’ve never even heard of before!

If you’re interested in learning more about the different ecommerce jobs and want to check out some remote ecommerce jobs for yourself, then keep reading this article.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs

Remote Ecommerce Internships

One of the fastest ways of getting into ecommerce jobs is through internships. These can either be paid or unpaid internships, but the main purpose of either type of ecommerce internship is to soak up knowledge that will give you an edge over your competition later. If unpaid internships are the only thing you can find, don’t despair: These are usually an excellent opportunity to show a potential employer that you’re willing to work hard—for free.

If you want to play your cards right in regards to proactively finding yourself an ecommerce internship, then a local internet search is a great place to start. Search for local ecommerce companies, startups, or businesses near you that feature an ecommerce division. Don’t wait to see if they have an ecommerce internship position available, be proactive and send them a copy of your resume and a cover letter of why you’d be a good fit for their company, instead.

Start with companies you’d be interested in working for and go from there. If you aren’t sure if the company has an ecommerce division, ask them when you reach out to them! In this day and age, most companies are online so if they aren’t already started in ecommerce they might be planning to in the near future.

Anytime you decide to make a so-called “cold outreach” attempt to a company in this manner, you have to research the ins and outs of that company so that you know what you’re getting yourself into. Show them your knowledge of their business, their customer base, their mission as a business, and always try to address whomever you reach out to by name. Using a company member’s name, whether it’s the CEO, hiring manager, human resources director, etc. shows that you’ve done your research and that you’ve put thought and care into your outreach attempt.

On the other hand, applying for a posted internship—especially at a well-recognized company—will bring you into a fiercely competitive environment where every detail counts. If this is the case for the ecommerce internship you apply for, make sure to highlight your strengths. How are you different from everyone else that submitted their resume for the position? Are you self-motivated, energetic, know 2 languages besides your mother tongue and autonomous? Listing your past experience—or even better, showcasing your skills through a neatly packed portfolio (which you can easily and inexpensively create using a service like Carrd)—will help you differentiate yourself from the bunch. This can give you a slight edge over your competition which is sometimes all that it takes for a recruiter to make a split-second decision in your favor.

Skills

You generally don’t need to have any specific skills to apply for an internship, only a passion to do the job and to do it well.

Experience

For most ecommerce internships, you generally won’t have to have any experience, either. Getting an internship will be the experience you gain that can help open doors for acquiring an entry-level job later.

Types of Remote Ecommerce Internships

• Social Media Intern
• Social Marketing & Growth Intern
• Content Writer
• Communications Assistant
• Administrative Assistants
• Events & Marketing Intern
• Video & Media Intern
• Digital Marketing Intern
• Software Engineer Intern
• Marketing Intern
• Graphic Design Intern
• Research Associate
• Human Resources Intern
• Tech Support Intern

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Internships

• Internships.com
• RemoteOk Internships
• ZipRecruiter Internships

Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Customer Service

Customer service is one of the most important aspects of running an ecommerce business. The skills and duties of successful customer service associates typically include providing phone support, live chat messaging, answering emails, closing support tickets, reaching out to unsatisfied customers, and generally just managing the customer experiences and interactions with the company. Some businesses even handle customer service inquiries on their various social media channels such as in their Instagram comments and direct messages, Facebook comments, and direct messages, Twitter replies, and direct messages, and much more.

In addition, store owners are typically more than happy to screen, recruit, and train the right person for these kinds of ecommerce jobs because a customer service representative is usually an entry-level position which takes very little training to get adjusted to.

One of the viable skills of this ecommerce job, in order to be a successful remote customer service representative, is to have a past job in a related field. For example, if you worked in a retail store as a sales associate or as a host at a restaurant, these, and many other jobs, are part of the customer service industry and can help you easily transition to remote ecommerce jobs in customer service.

For those who don’t have experience in the customer service industry, there’s a shortcut. And that shortcut is basically to be a highly personable and communicative person who knows their way around interacting with people online.

Before you apply to any ecommerce jobs in the customer service field, however, consider your past experiences when you had to be a mediator or even when you were in the direct line of communication between a customer in difficult times. This is important because it may pop up somewhere during your interview for the ecommerce job. Think about it well in advance, take notes if you must, and come with a prepared and thoughtful answer for your recruiter as to how you successfully handle difficult situations with customers.

Ecommerce jobs in customer service are also excellent options if you’re looking for flexible working hours. If you still happen to be in school, or otherwise have a committed schedule, consider applying for the “third shift”. Many businesses are constantly on the lookout for reliable individuals willing to work the “graveyard shift” in order to cover hours when the rest of the world is going about their day. Being able to cover late-night or early-morning shifts can help earn you an advantage over other applicants.

Skills

This job will require you to be personable, meaning that you have to be able to engage naturally with others and calmly mediate situations during conflict.

Customer service also requires great attention to detail. If you’re good at closely following processes and systems, be sure to mention that in your application or during your interview.

Experience

Any work experience where you had the chance to directly engage with customers is a big plus.

Types of Remotes Ecommerce Jobs in Customer Service

• General Customer Service Support
• Customer Service Email Support
• Customer Service Phone Support
• Customer Service Live Chat Support

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Customer Service

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Administration & Virtual Assistant Jobs

Every once in awhile, there will be an opening that will allow you to work with some of the best talent and top executives in the ecommerce industry. If you’re willing to take a stab at some administrative duties in order to see how a leader runs their company, apply for an executive assistant ecommerce job or ecommerce jobs with administrative duties.

Surrounding yourself with top executives is a foolproof way of gaining valuable ecommerce industry skills immediately. If you can, vouch to be the right-hand person of someone at or near the top of management within a company. In order to get this job, highlight any previous experience you have in a related role where you were an assistant or completed administrative tasks for an individual or team of people.

When the interview comes, don’t forget to mention that they’re looking for someone to make their job easier and keep them on track and that someone just happens to be you. Share any past experiences where you’ve crushed it at being responsible, reliable, and right on cue every time.

Skills

To succeed in this job, you absolutely need to have a sharp eye for attention to detail and the ability to act autonomously while also being able to follow directions. Daily tasks may include things like ordering office supplies, managing calendars, creating documents, researching and compiling information or even coming up with your own ways to help support your supervisors as best you can.

It should go without saying but administrative work requires the individual to be ultra-organized. Your boss will rely on you to keep things on track at all times so you must be steps ahead at all times. If you’re the type of person who plans everything from top to bottom, you’ll probably be a perfect fit for these kinds of ecommerce jobs.

Experience

Any experience in handling organizational tasks like calendar planning, organizing working days, scheduling, email outreach and more, will be an asset to this ecommerce job.

Types of Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Administration & Virtual Assistant Jobs

• Executive Assistant
• Freelance Personal Assistant
• Virtual Assistant
• Human Resources
• Talent Acquisition
• Recruiter

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Administration & Virtual Assistant Jobs

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Writers, Designers, Artists & Creatives

For those of you with any kind of creative talent, there’s plenty of opportunities to find remote ecommerce jobs online.

Although there may be a misconception that artists and creatives can’t make a living simply by pursuing their craft, there are so many different aspects to running ecommerce businesses that require artists and creatives, and so it is possible to make a living with a remote creative job online.

Creatives and artists help bring businesses and brands to life, whether that’s through designing the look and feel of products, illustrating product packaging, writing product descriptions, creating online content, designing websites, developing apps, creating logos, making videos, developing marketing campaigns, and so much more. There are a plethora of different types of remote ecommerce jobs that are available for creatives, which we list in more detail down below, so no matter what your area of specialization is, there’s some kind of way you can contribute to an ecommerce business.

Skills

Artists and creatives obviously need to be good at their craft in order to get a remote ecommerce job in their respective fields. There are so many different types of artistic and creative roles, whether it’s content writing, creative writing, illustration, graphic design, video creation, music producing, audio mixing, animation, etc. so focus on your main area of expertise or interest and find a remote ecommerce job where those skills are needed. Don’t worry about trying to do everything—artists and creatives do well in ecommerce businesses by specializing in a certain craft because it’s often a difficult or time-consuming skill to learn.

Experience

The more experience you have in a particular craft, the more hireable you’ll become for ecommerce jobs. There are many remote job roles available for artists and creatives at all skill levels, but the more you have to contribute the more you’ll stand out from the crowd.

Some crafts within the artistic and creative fields can be quite saturated, which means there’s more competition when it comes to applying for and maintaining ecommerce jobs, so the more experience you have the less competition you’ll be running against to get remote job positions.

Types of Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Writers, Designers, Artists & Creatives

• Creative Writer
• Content Writer
• Product Description Writer
• Copywriter
• Copy Editor
• Content Creator
• Blogger
• Translation Services
• Social Media Management
• Social Media Consulting
• Social Media Manager
• Graphic Designer
• Product Packaging Designer
• Shipping Packaging Designer
• Video Campaign Design & Development
• Audio Producing & Recording
• Music Producing & Recording
• Video Editor
• Animation
• Computer Aided Designer (CAD)
• Product Designer
• Website Designer
• Marketing Campaign Creative
• Product Creation & Development
• Mobile Product Designer
• User Experience Designer

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Writers, Designers, Artists & Creatives

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• StackOverflow: Remote jobs board for developers.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• iWriter: Online content and article writing service.
• Writer Access: Online marketplace for freelance writers, content strategists, translators and more.
• Article Writing Co.: Online content and article writing service.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.
• WordGeeks: Online content and article writing service.
• Content Fly: Online content and article writing service.
• Dribbble: Social network for creatives to show and tell, promote, discover, and explore designs.
• Behance: Showcase & discover creative work in the graphic design, photography & illustration fields.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Marketing

The term marketing is a very broad term and can cover everything from online marketing, social media outreach, email marketing, to even content writing, of all things. The good news about this being a broad career field is that you’ve probably already engaged in some type of work that has skills you can easily transfer into this ecommerce job field. In fact, marketing and ecommerce can almost be considered to be synonymous with one another since both of them have a common end goal: Selling products to customers.

Entry-level ecommerce jobs in marketing require a lot of different skills and responsibilities. To get a good grip on what a marketer does, take a look at a brand you love: How are they timing their email marketing campaigns? What’s in those emails? Which brands do they collaborate with? How are they using social media? What’s their approach to launching a new product? By answering these questions, you’ll get one step closer to understanding what someone working in the ecommerce marketing field does.

Having the ability to plan (with great attention to detail) is a determining factor if you want to perform well in a marketing ecommerce job. All successful product marketing campaigns come with analytics, target demographic spreadsheets, and additional data that got the brand to the point of selling its products well. Use this knowledge to your advantage by finding past examples of where you’ve successfully combined your creative side with your analytical side to solve a problem and how you can use that same process to help ecommerce marketing teams make more sales.

Skills

Most marketing ecommerce jobs will require you to be good with analytics. If you can handle yourself among large amounts of data (and make a sense of it), you’re likely to achieve great outcomes in this field.

Secondly, you absolutely must be tech-savvy. You should be prepared to use spreadsheets and comfortable trying out new software and apps. Ecommerce stores usually run on a multitude of different platforms, social media channels, sales funnels, etc, and you’ll usually have to be able to extract data from all these sources. Acknowledging your aptitude beforehand in regards to your adaptability to different software is crucial.

Finally, those striving to become good marketers should be creative. Being able to generate ideas on a daily basis is an absolute must in this field. Following through on these ideas will earn you a sure spot amongst some of the best marketers in the industry.

Experience

Having experience working with data, analyzing data, and creating marketing campaigns (whether at the amateur or professional level) is advisable.

Types of Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Marketers

• Project Management
• Campaign Managers
• Marketing Manager
• Content Marketing
• Digital Marketing Instructor
• Marketing Data Analyst
• SEO Manager
• Email Marketing Specialist
• SEM & Paid Acquisition Specialist
• Public Relations Manager
• Growth & Growth Hacking

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Marketing

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• GrowthHackers Jobs Board: Specializes in providing a very curated selection of Growth Talent jobs in fields like marketing, growth, and growth hacking.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Sales Representatives

If sales are your specialty, or you’re looking for a beginner-friendly remote ecommerce job, this could be a great option to pursue.

Sales representatives are a valuable role in almost all ecommerce businesses, and it’s job roles like this that works well as a remote position because so much communication can be done online or over the phone. This means that there are often many sales representative ecommerce jobs available, from beginner to senior-level positions.

Skills

To work as a remote sales representative, you should be an excellent communicator and someone who is self-motivated and loves to work with others and be in constant connection with clients or customers. You’re a people-person and you’re driven to meet sales targets and exceed sales goals.

Experience

There’s a broad range of experience levels that are acceptable for remote sales representative positions. Either you can be a completely experienced veteran of the trade in order to work more senior-level positions like sales managers, sales development, and account executives or you could be a complete beginner who has the skills we outlined above and you could work as a telemarketer, sales agent or sales associate.

To work in a remote ecommerce job as a sales representative, it’s more about your skills than your experience and you can definitely use your on-shift training to help you work up the ranks.

Types of Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Sales Representatives

• Sales Development
• Sales Agent
• Telemarketer
• Sales Manager
• Account Executive
• Sales Representative
• Sales Associate

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Sales Representatives

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs for SEO Content Writers

Learning Search Engine Optimization (SEO) in 2018 is comparable to learning how to read in the early 20th century—everyone needs to know it. SEO, in a nutshell, includes strategies with which you can optimize your online business or website in a way that helps it rank on the first page of search engine results. By successfully optimizing your online store or website for SEO, you help your website become more discoverable by searchers which brings your website more organic traffic.

The term “optimizing” refers to various techniques you can use (including on-page and off-page SEO techniques) such as improving your web page speed load time, minimizing JavaScript, adding alt tags to your images, utilizing keywords (which we discussed thoroughly in our Ecommerce Keyword Research Guide) and much more.

The general knowledge is that the higher you rank in Google Search Engine Ranking Positions (SERPs), the more traffic your store will get and therefore, the more money you’ll make. This is maybe true in theory but there are countless other factors that will determine your success in increasing your business’ revenue besides ranking higher in search engines. Click-through rates and time spent on-site by your customers being other important factors.

With all of that being said, what works in this industry is changing by the minute, usually with every big Google algorithm update. Writing good SEO content can take years to become good at, so keep pushing if you’re interested in pursuing this path.

If you’re interested in SEO writing as an ecommerce job, understanding of the best SEO practices is an absolute must. It’s also important to understand that SEO writing isn’t always fun and that it can be very repetitive. It can be very different from creative writing in that the intention isn’t necessarily only to engage the reader but to appeal to search engine “crawlers” which are essentially robots that scan web pages for information. Since this is the case, SEO content writing is often structured in a certain way and specific tactics must be used in order to achieve successful results.

Because of this, do your research into SEO content writing and the SEO industry in general before you consider applying for any ecommerce jobs as an SEO content writer.

Skills

It goes without saying, but ecommerce jobs in SEO writing require a good grasp of the written word.

Additionally, those who want to build a career in SEO writing should also be interested in market research as well. If you like dabbling in Google Analytics, search tools such as Ahrefs and SEMrush and other software, this is the industry you need to be in.

Experience

Writing should be your bread and butter and you should be pretty awesome at it. You should also understand the basics of SEO and how to execute it into written content.

Types of Remote Ecommerce Jobs for SEO Content Writers

• SEO Content Writer
• Content Creator
• Content Writer
• Content Editor
• Creative Writer
• Product Description Writer
• Copywriter
• Copy Editor
• SEO Consulting
• Content Consulting

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs for SEO Content Writers

• iWriter: Online content and article writing service.
• Content Fly: Online content and article writing service.
• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• WordGeeks: Online content and article writing service.
• Writer Access: Online marketplace for freelance writers, content strategists, translators and more.
• Article Writing Co.: Online content and article writing service.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Developers

Working as a developer requires a much more niche set of knowledge and experience, but if it’s something you’re interested in and knowledgeable in, it can be a great remote ecommerce job to acquire.

Since it is a bit more of a specialized skill, and because there are so many specialized skills within the field itself, there are so many different types of developer-related remote ecommerce jobs on the market and it can be a less competitive market to work in as well.

In addition, developers are in high demand because their skills are what’s needed to create websites, software, programs, apps and more, which is a booming industry and something that every online business needs.

Skills

To get a remote ecommerce job as a developer, it should go without saying that you’ll need knowledge and experience in the field. You can certainly specialize in a certain kind of development—for example, blockchain engineering, front end development, backend development, iOS development, Android development, Ruby on Rails, JavaScript, etc.—and it’s probably likely that development job postings will ask for applicants that specialize in certain kinds of development, anyways.

Experience

The level of experience is totally dependant on the job requirements itself, so it’s worth looking into different remote ecommerce job roles for developers to see what’s currently on the market and what level of experience employers are looking for.

Types of Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Developers

• Blockchain Engineer
• Full Stack Engineers
• Front End Engineers
• Backend Developer
• Software Engineer
• Database Engineer
• User-Experience Developer
• Product Engineer
• Technical Support Engineer
• Content Developer
• Web Developers
• Mobile Developers

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Developers

• StackOverflow: Remote jobs board for developers.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.
• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Accounting, Legal, Finance & Healthcare

While these industries vary widely from one another, we’ve grouped them into one category because they require workers with specific education experience or professional designations in order to be able to practice.

To work in any of these fields as a remote worker, it’s likely that you’ll already have pursued the career in a non-remote position, or you at least have obtained the necessary education and/or professional designations to practice and are now interested in finding a remote role within your area of specialization.

If so, you’ll be glad to know that these roles are in demand remotely, and there are plenty of ways you can search for these remote ecommerce jobs online.

Skills

To work in any of these fields as a remote worker, it’s likely you’ll have to have a specific kind of education and/or a professional designation in order to practice as a remote worker. It’s up to you to understand what qualifications you need to have within your field in order to work remotely, so it may be worth doing some research to find out if any additional criteria must be met.

Experience

To work in any of these remote ecommerce jobs, you’ll likely have to have a significant amount of experience, whether that be on-the-job experience, education experience, or both.

Types of Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Accounting, Legal, Finance & Healthcare

• Financial Advisors
• Fraud Prevention Specialists
• Digital Security Managers
• Contracts & Grants Analysts
• Medical Schedulers
• General Surgery Coders
• Bookkeepers
• Paralegals
• Therapists
• Accountants
• Payroll Support
• Physicians
• Financial Analysts
• Medical Writers
• Business Analysts
• Mortgage Underwriters
• Attorneys

Where to Find Ecommerce Jobs in Accounting, Legal, Finance & Healthcare

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.

Other Ways to Find Remote Jobs

Remote Ecommerce Jobs in Dropshipping

If you’ve always dreamt of being your own boss, then why not hone your entrepreneurial skills by starting a dropshipping business?

Dropshipping is an excellent way of starting your business with limited or no funds. The best thing about it is that you can sell products from proven suppliers without even having to handle inventory or packaging logistics. If this sounds too good to be true and you’d like to learn more about what dropshipping is and how it works, check out our Dropshipping 101: What is Dropshipping? article.

With that being said, probably the biggest obstacle to starting a dropshipping business is deciding what to sell. This requires a good amount of product and market research, including finding a profitable ecommerce idea like the ones we mention in our Trending Products: Find the Perfect Niche Products & Markets to Sell article. Once you do your research, then you can establish a solid foundation to build your dropshipping business.

However, let’s dive a little deeper.

Pick a Niche

It goes without saying, but your selected niche should be something you’re very passionate about. Plus, it needs to be laser-focused as well. A product that is too broad will be very difficult to introduce to your potential customers—and that’s much more difficult to market. And if you’re not passionate about the niche, you’ll be more likely to get discouraged and may possibly give up sooner rather than later.

Here’s how to select a niche:

• Seek Out a Profitable Niche: Running a dropshipping business model means focusing on two main things: Marketing and customer acquisition. What this basically means is that selling a $35 item will require (more or less) the same amount of work as selling a $1,750 item. Therefore, picking a niche with higher-priced products will drive your revenue up more quickly as opposed to selling cheaper items.
• Make Sure Shipping Costs are Sufficiently & Reasonably Low: If the shipping cost is too high, there’s a greater chance of your customers turning elsewhere to buy that same product (at a lower shipping cost). Look for products that are inexpensive to ship, since this will also give you the added benefit of offering free shipping and absorbing that cost as a business expense. Free shipping is an excellent tactic to attract more customers and drive more sales.
• Choose a Product that Interests Buyers with Disposable Income: Most visitors to your website will never return. Therefore, focusing on improving your conversion rate will be crucial for your dropshipping business’ growth. Plus, if you target impulse buyers with greater financial stability, it’s almost guaranteed that you’ll make more sales because of it.
• Make Sure You Have an Audience: This means making sure you have potential customers who are already actively searching for your product. Use tools such as KWFinder (check out our KWFinder Review here to learn about its features & services) and Google Trends to check for keywords usually associated with your niche. If nobody searches for the products you’re thinking of dropshipping, then maybe it’s time to reconsider your niche.
• Create Your Own Unique Brand: Your dropshipping business will become more valuable if you can manage to brand everything as your own unique products and sell it that way. Search for dropshipping products that allow unique branding, with the added flair of exclusive packaging as well.
• Sell a Product that isn’t Already Available Locally: Choose a product your customers can’t buy just by walking down the street. If they’re not as easily available, your items will likely become more attractive to your prospective customers.

Research Your Competitors

Some of the downsides of going the dropshipping route are the fact that you’ll be competing with both retail giants such as Walmart and Amazon, as well as other dropshipping businesses. This is the point where many dropshipping operations go wrong because they’re selling products that have little to no competitive edge at all. There’s no way to be successful at dropshipping if that’s the case.

The reasons why a product might not be competitive are many: High shipping costs, very little variation and selection to choose from as well as lacking any brand affiliation are some of the main reasons. When starting a dropshipping business, try to choose products that you can compete against other retailers with. Compete on price, selection, availability, variation, exclusivity, branding, shipping costs, or anything else big-box retailers can’t do.

Work with a Supplier

Go the extra mile to secure a trustworthy supplier. Partnering with the wrong one can wreck your dropshipping business before you even have the chance to build a customer base.

Many dropshipping suppliers are located overseas (in countries such as China), so good communication is the key to building a long-lasting relationship with your supplier. If you’re not 100% sure about the communication abilities of your potential dropshipping supplier—move on and continue searching for a new dropshipping supplier.

Build Your Ecommerce Website

The fastest (and most foolproof) way of launching your new dropshipping ecommerce business is through already established ecommerce platforms. One of the most popular ecommerce platforms is Shopify. Shopify is the best option because you don’t need a background in tech or coding to get your dropshipping business up and running. Plus, it includes tons of innovative apps and plugins which can track and monitor sales, crunch numbers, and help you run your ecommerce dropshipping business better.

In fact, even if you have the ability to build a website from scratch, it’s probably a wise move to start with an ecommerce platform like Shopify anyways. It’s so easy, secure and inexpensive to set up and means there will be less back-end work to take care of in the long run. Once you’ve developed a constant revenue stream, then you can start tweaking and customizing your store to personalize it even more.

Create a Customer Acquisition Plan

Once you have your dropshipping product and website ready to go, you still don’t have a business until you have customers. Thankfully, there are several ways to attract prospective customers but by far one of the most cost-effective ways to do so is to start a Facebook Ad campaign.

This will enable you to generate sales and revenue right from the get-go, which can lead to laser-quick scaling. Why? Because Facebook is one of the only social platforms that offers highly targeted audience outreach. Their ads can be targeted so precisely down to the smallest details of user’s interests which makes them highly effective.

Analyze, Optimize & Act

Running a business isn’t all about innovation and selling products; there’s also the added responsibility of tracking data and metrics so you can steer the business in the right direction. Some of these metrics include Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel data, email campaign results and more—depending on your main customer acquisition and advertising channels.

When you’re able to track conversions back to their respective sources, you’ll be well-informed as to which acquisition and advertising channels are the most effective.

After you collect the data, you’ll have to put the information to good use so that you can make improvements to your store. Find where the weak areas are and make improvements to them, and find the strong points and double down on them. When methods are working, keep using them and when other methods aren’t, change them up.

Finding Remote Ecommerce Jobs with Reddit

Reddit can be the ultimate unconventional way of finding remote ecommerce jobs—if you know where to look. In fact, this platform is the go-to place for seeking out invaluable tips and tricks from within the ecommerce industry. On top of that, Reddit’s established AMA (Ask Me Anything) format is a great way to get familiar with the most prominent faces in ecommerce and even make some new connections along the way.

If you decide to use Reddit as a resource to find remote ecommerce jobs, look out for their Ecommerce Subreddit to find new opportunities. “Subreddits” are a place on Reddit where people interested in a certain topic or niche can go to discuss that topic or niche with other people that are interested in it, so it’s a great place to find like-minded people.

The Ecommerce Subreddit, in particular, is a subreddit where online entrepreneurs gather to untangle the industry’s most pressing issues. Some of these issues include website optimization, advice on conversion and sales, shipping strategies, industry complexities, and more. In addition to that, sometimes there can be ecommerce job postings, or ecommerce business owners looking to hire remote employees. These opportunities usually can just be found randomly throughout the subreddit, whether in individual posts or in the comments of posts as well. It’s worth the time and effort to be active and engaged in the subreddit as you can begin to build connections with the other entrepreneurs there.

There are also other subreddits that can be valuable places to search for ecommerce jobs and remote jobs. Some subreddits are specifically designed to help people looking for remote jobs, while in other subreddits you’ll have to be actively commenting, participating and reading to find job opportunities.

Our advice: If there’s a specific area of ecommerce you’re interested in getting a remote job in, then see if there’s a dedicated subreddit for that area and begin to participate in that subreddit. Signing up and using Reddit is free, so it costs you nothing but time and effort.

We recommend that you don’t just post to the subreddit saying that you’re looking for a job in the industry. Instead, we suggest that you participate in the comments section of posts and try to give value back to the community. The more you participate and the more value you give, the more likely you are to be noticed on that subreddit.

If you notice any other comments on the subreddit where people express needing a certain service, or that they’re looking for employees, or that they need help building, launching or growing their business but they don’t know where to hire great help, then comment back and offer your help. Tell them what you’re good at or what you have to offer and see if they’re interested.

If you do this and the first person says no, then don’t be discouraged. Try again if another opportunity arises. The key here is to not be too aggressive or forward with your pitch and just casually mention that you have some time on your hands and some skills to offer, and see if they bite. If not, move on.

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs on Reddit

• Telecommuting Subreddit
• Digital Nomad Subreddit
• Work Online Subreddit
• Travel Jobs Subreddit
• Remote Jobs Subreddit
• For Hire Subreddit
• Freelance Subreddit
• Jobs Subreddit

Finding Remote Ecommerce Jobs by Cold Emailing

Ah, good old fashioned cold emailing. Well, if we want to get truly old-fashioned, cold calling would be more appropriate, but in today’s world, email is the better option of the two.

If there’s a particular remote ecommerce job you want, or a particular business you want to work for, then try reaching out to them by cold emailing them.

Cold emailing refers to simply sending an outreach email to a hiring manager, CEO, human resources office or founder—whoever handles the hiring process at the company—without ever having contacted the email recipient before. The email is a “cold” email because it’s the first point of contact you’ve made with the recipient, and it’s a bit of a gamble as to whether they’re even interested in reading or replying to your email.

Cold emails can be risky because you’ll never know if they’ll amount to anything but the general consensus around them seems to be: High risk, high reward. Sending a cold email is a high-risk action because you don’t know if it will be successful at all, but it has the potential to be very successful which could mean you get a high reward.

To reach out via cold email with the intention of securing a remote ecommerce job, you need to be upfront with the recipient about what you’re looking for and what you can offer them. Make the email about them and how you can provide value to them, and less about you and what you want. They don’t care what you want, they want to make their business better so tell them how you can help them do that.

In your email, be short and concise. Briefly introduce yourself, tell them what your purpose of contact is and then tell them how you’ll add value to their business. Ask them if there are any remote ecommerce jobs available at their company because you are very interested in working for their company specifically. If you have relevant job experience, let them know that as well or link to your resume, CV or portfolio.

Cold emails don’t have to be complicated, they have to be effective. The more effort you put into them the more likely you are to get out of them, so don’t just copy and paste a generic template and then use it for the same ten cold emails you send. If you’re serious about getting a remote ecommerce job from one of these cold emails, then put the work in.

Using LinkedIn to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs

LinkedIn is a great tool for those looking to break into the ecommerce industry. There are a few ways to explore LinkedIn for ecommerce jobs, each as effective as the next.

Firstly, take advantage of your professional network that you’ve built over the course of your career. Tweak your LinkedIn profile to let prospective employers know that you’re looking for new opportunities and make sure to emphasize the skills you have to thrive in the ecommerce environment.

Secondly, did you know that LinkedIn offers discussion groups relevant to certain niches? Join several ecommerce discussion groups to get an inside look at the industry. Being active and contributing to conversations in these groups can also help you build a good reputation with others in the group.

Thirdly, tap into the power of LinkedIn by connecting with ecommerce recruiters. This will help you to stay on top of new job opportunities as you’ll be one of the first to hear about them as they’re posted.

Use Facebook Groups to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs

Just like LinkedIn discussion groups, Facebook groups are a gateway to connecting with entrepreneurs and like-minded individuals. Besides gaining valuable insight, it’s also the perfect environment to search for ecommerce jobs with minimal effort.

Some of the best ecommerce groups on Facebook include Internet Marketing Super Friends, Digital Marketing Questions, Ecommerce Entrepreneurs, Ecommerce Services, and more. This isn’t an exhaustive list, so feel free to search for other ecommerce-related groups on Facebook to get even more options.

Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs on Co-Working Space Networks

Having access to co-working spaces (either locally or globally) can be a very beneficial way to find remote ecommerce jobs. In fact, new opportunities are often shared internally before the word gets out, so make sure to always be on the lookout for people talking about available remote jobs or remote ecommerce jobs.

Click here to find the Top 10 Co-Working Spaces Around the World and places where you can virtually or physically go to network and search for remote ecommerce jobs.

The Best Job Sites to Find Remote Freelance Ecommerce Jobs

Freelance platforms such as Upwork, Fiverr, PeoplePerHour, and Toptal—to name a few—are full of talented people from all professions, backgrounds, and levels of experience. It’s only natural for ecommerce employers to look for employees who can do jobs on a contract or freelance basis first, before deciding to employ them full-time.

Use this information to your advantage: Make an outstanding profile on all relevant platforms to showcase your knowledge, expertise, and a desire to learn from the best in the ecommerce industry. Making a profile is usually easy and free, but that doesn’t mean that it can’t propel your career to the next level.

Even if you don’t consider freelancing as a long-term alternative to a steady job—it’s still a good way to start. Joining freelance marketplaces is advisable for everyone because once there, you’ll get a better glimpse into the ecommerce industry and how things operate day-to-day. Plus, freelance projects often turn into long-term opportunities if both parties’ expectations are met.

Where to Find Remote Freelance Ecommerce Jobs

• Toptal: The freelance marketplace for high-quality and leading freelance talent.
• PeoplePerHour: Freelance services by the hour.
• iWriter: Online content and article writing service.
• Writer Access: Online marketplace for freelance writers, content strategists, translators and more.
• Article Writing Co.: Online content and article writing service.
• WordGeeks: Online content and article writing service.
• Content Fly: Online content and article writing service.
• Dribbble: Social network for creatives to show and tell, promote, discover, and explore designs.
• Behance: Showcase & discover creative work in the graphic design, photography & illustration fields.
• Freelancer: One of the largest freelance marketplaces online.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.

The Best Job Sites to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs

It might seem like the obvious route to take, but sometimes the most conventional way is usually the best and fastest way to get remote jobs. When there’s a new vacancy, employers are eager to fill the spot as soon as possible, and so one common tactic is to post the opening on as many job sites as possible.

Before applying on a job site, however, make sure to check your LinkedIn connections and other professional channels to see if someone can refer you to that company. It’s always easier to nail an interview when someone vouches for you and your talents.

Where to Find Remote Ecommerce Jobs on Job Sites

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• GrowthHackers Jobs Board: Specializes in providing a very curated selection of Growth Talent jobs in fields like marketing, growth, and growth hacking.
• Upwork: Freelance services in web development, mobile development, design, writing, administration support, customer service, marketing, accounting and more.
• Fiverr: Freelance services in graphics & design, digital marketing, writing & translation, video & animation, music & audio, programming & tech, business, and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• StackOverflow: Remote jobs board for developers.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.

Breakdown of Remote Ecommerce Jobs Based on Skill Level

The most efficient way for you to search for remote ecommerce jobs online may be to search through the various positions based on your skill level. Depending on your current level of knowledge and experience, you can use the sections below to find remote ecommerce jobs that are a good fit for you.

This is a great way for individuals in particular who want to work a remote ecommerce job but think they don’t have any special skills that will land them a position, or for those who have some skills but aren’t really sure how they translate them into getting ecommerce jobs.

To learn more about the best remote ecommerce jobs for your specific skill level, check out the sections below.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Low-Level Skills

For those who think that they lack the knowledge, skills or experience for ecommerce jobs, or just have a very general and basic level of knowledge and experience in some topics, this is the section for you.

While this is the low-level skill section, it doesn’t mean that you have nothing to offer, and it certainly doesn’t mean that there are no remote ecommerce jobs for you. What it means, however, is that you’ll likely start off in a more entry-level position, and if you’re interested in growing your career you’ll have to work your way up from that entry-level position.

It’s important to note that the level of competition between you and other people looking for remote ecommerce jobs at this level is higher than it will be in either the mid-level section or the high-level section, so be prepared to work hard on creating a polished resume, CV or portfolio and get ready to put in the work to prove that you are a great fit for the positions you apply for.

The types of ecommerce jobs you can work as a low-level skilled remote employee include, but are not limited to:

• Virtual Assistant
• Sales Associate
• Telemarketer
• Customer Service Support
• Administration Assistant
• Any kind of Internship roles
• Some Human Resources roles
• Talent Acquisition & Recruitment
• Executive Assistant

When searching for remote ecommerce jobs that are applicable to this skill level, look for job titles that include words like assistant, support, service, associate, etc. These kinds of titles often indicate that the role is a more entry-level position and thus would suit your particular level of knowledge and experience.

You can find these types of remote ecommerce jobs via the following services:

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs for Mid-Level Skills

This section is for individuals who have some knowledge or experience in a certain skill, industry or field but they either aren’t sure how they can use these skills to get a remote ecommerce job, or they aren’t sure what kind of remote ecommerce jobs are even available for the kind of skills they have.

The good news is that there’s a little bit less competition between you and others searching for remote ecommerce jobs, but there’s still some, and you’ll likely have some skills that help set you apart from others which can make you an attractive candidate for remote ecommerce companies. Because you already have some knowledge and experience, it makes you seem like a much more trainable employee which is an advantage for your ecommerce job applications as well.

The types of ecommerce jobs you can work as a mid-level skilled remote employee include, but are not limited to:

• Social Media Manager
• Content Writer
• Copywriter
• Executive Assistant
• Virtual Assistant
• Graphic Designer
• Translation Services
• Social Media Consulting
• Product Packaging Designer
• Shipping Packaging Designer
• Video Campaign Design & Development
• Audio Producing & Recording
• Music Producing & Recording
• Video Editor
• Animation
• Computer Aided Designer (CAD)
• Product Designer
• Marketing Campaign Creative
• Product Creation & Development
• Content Marketing
• Sales Agent
• Telemarketer
• Sales Representative
• Sales Associate

When looking for remote ecommerce jobs in the mid-level skill range, look for employment that’s slightly above entry-level, but aren’t senior-level positions either. These types of positions are usually some of the best ones to gain on-the-job work experience so ensure that you’re looking for remote ecommerce jobs that you can see yourself learning a lot of industry knowledge from.

You can find these types of remote ecommerce jobs via the following services:

• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• WeWorkRemotely: Remote jobs in business & management, programming, sales & marketing, customer support, finance & legal, copywriting, design and more.
• FlexJobs: Vetted remote, part-time, freelance and flexible jobs in various categories.
• Remote.co: Remote jobs for developers, customer service representatives, recruiters, designers, sales professionals, and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.

Remote Ecommerce Jobs for High-Level Skills

Finally, this section describes individuals who have industry-specific knowledge and skills, and likely have a lot of experience working in this field. It’s likely that you’ve worked in this field already for several years, if not decades, and you’re likely at or pretty close to the top of the food chain.

Because these are often very senior-level or specialized positions, there’s much less competition in these ecommerce jobs. Many of the individuals who work in remote ecommerce jobs in high-level positions likely have worked in the corresponding role in a non-remote position and for various reasons are looking to switch to remote employment. This is a great way to use your non-remote skills and experience in a remote field, and there are plenty of remote ecommerce jobs that require high-level skills.

The types of ecommerce jobs you can work as a high-level skilled remote employee include, but are not limited to:

• Account Executive
• Social Media Consulting
• Product Designer
• Project Management
• Campaign Managers
• Marketing Manager
• Content Marketing
• SEO Content Writer
• Digital Marketing Instructor
• Marketing Data Analyst
• SEO Manager
• Email Marketing Specialist
• SEM & Paid Acquisition Specialist
• Public Relations Manager
• Growth & Growth Hacking
• Sales Development
• Sales Manager
• Blockchain Engineer
• Full Stack Engineers
• Front End Engineers
• Backend Developer
• Software Engineer
• Database Engineer
• User-Experience Developer
• Product Engineer
• Technical Support Engineer
• Content Developer
• Web Developers
• Mobile Developers
• Financial Advisor
• Fraud Prevention Specialist
• Digital Security Manager
• Contracts & Grants Analyst
• Medical Scheduler
• General Surgery Coder
• Bookkeeper
• Paralegal
• Therapists
• Accountant
• Payroll Support
• Physicians
• Financial Analyst
• Medical Writers
• Business Analyst
• Mortgage Underwriters
• Attorneys

When looking for high-level skilled remote ecommerce jobs online, search for job titles that have words like senior, manager, specialist, lead, head, executive, instructor, director, consultant, etc. in the title, as these words often indicate more senior-level positions. You can also look in certain categories like accounting, finance, legal and healthcare which often require specialized education and/or professional designations in order to practice.

You can find these types of remote ecommerce jobs via the following services:

• GrowthHackers Jobs Board: Specializes in providing a very curated selection of Growth Talent jobs in fields like marketing, growth, and growth hacking.
• Toptal: The freelance marketplace for high-quality and leading freelance talent.
• StackOverflow: Remote jobs board for developers.
• Jobspresso: Curated remote jobs in tech, marketing, customer support, development, writing & editing and more.
• WorkingNomads: Remote jobs for digital working nomads in categories such as development, management, marketing, design, sales, customer service, writing, consulting, finance, healthcare, legal, and more.
• JobRack: Find high-quality Eastern European developers, designers, project managers, content writers, administration support, sales & marketing representatives and more.

Conclusion

Having the grit and determination to land remote ecommerce jobs is simply not enough—you need to look for remote jobs and remote ecommerce jobs in the right places according to your specific skill level.

Take the knowledge and resources shared in this article and use them to your advantage to find the right remote ecommerce jobs for you. Ensure that you target ecommerce job applications according to your skill level and create captivating job applications that will help you stand out from the crowd.

The post Remote Ecommerce Jobs: Finding the Perfect Career in Ecommerce appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.

By sharing these results, our aim is to demystify some of the assumptions people might have about entrepreneurship and to help budding and experienced entrepreneurs measure their progress against others who are building, launching, and growing their online businesses.

If you’re signed up to our email list, you probably saw us send out this year’s Ecommerce & Entrepreneurial Insights Audience Survey. If you were one of the hundreds of people who submitted your answers to the ecommerce survey, we thank you! It’s participation like yours that makes informative articles like this one possible.

We hope this article will show all entrepreneurs, or “wantrepreneurs,” out there that although the entrepreneurial journey can feel lonely, you are not, in fact, alone. There are other entrepreneurs out there who want to start but don’t know how, there are some who have started building a business but aren’t sure if they’re doing anything right, and there are also many who want to grow their business but aren’t sure what steps to take.

Whatever stage you’re at, you aren’t alone and this article can help you understand where your entrepreneurial journey stands amongst those of your peers and can help you manage your expectations as you start, launch or grow your business further.

So whether you want to start an online business but aren’t sure how or if you’re just ready to jump in headfirst and start something, the results of our survey will give you a glimpse into what others are doing and how they’re doing it so you can compare your progress and plan for your future.

Let’s jump into it.

Ecommerce & Entrepreneurial Insights: Audience Survey Results for 2019

Audience Information

First of all, here’s some information on our audience demographics so you have some context as to who these survey results are coming from.

AGE RANGE

The majority of our audience is made up of adults in the 35-44 age range, which has evolved from our last survey because the majority of our audience then was in the 25-34 age range. Our next-largest audience age group is people aged 45-54 so that means that 50% of our audience is between the ages 35-55! Plus, a whopping 22% of people aged 25-34 consume our content, which means that 72% of our audience is between the ages of 25-55.

This is a large part of the working population so it makes sense that this age range of people is most interested in learning how to start a business or have already started their businesses.

Only 7.9% of our audience is made up of people aged 18-24, and an even smaller percentage of adults—2.1% to be exact—are 65+. These parts of the population are, in general, less likely to have the time, interest, or funding to invest in starting or growing an online business, so these results come as no surprise.

We’ve discussed previously why it’s so important for those who are part of the working population to strongly consider building their own businesses now, as jobs are evolving to become more automated and companies are moving to minimize their workforce in favor of cheaper, less volatile alternatives such as machines and artificial intelligence. It’s encouraging to see that the people who are likely to be the most affected by the reduction of human job positions in companies in the decades to come are also the ones who are taking action to build their own businesses—whether they’re full-time businesses or side hustles—so they can take charge of their future job security.

HAVE A BUSINESS VS. DON’T HAVE A BUSINESS YET

In similar fashion to last year, the majority of our audience is in the planning stages of building their online business, while a healthy percentage of our audience is already operating their businesses and selling to consumers at large.

This year, however, we have seen a slight increase in the number of people who have a business up and running! In last year’s survey, 34% of our audience had a business up and running and in this year’s survey, nearly 38% of respondents cited having an operating business, which is a win in our eyes!

Our aim here at A Better Lemonade Stand, as we discuss in further detail on our About Page, is to inspire, educate, and support entrepreneurs in the early stages of their entrepreneurial journey, so we’re happy to see the percentage of people who have a business rise as people who are currently in the planning stages of building their business eventually make their way into launching their business.

We also asked the entrepreneurs who already have an online business what their most important reason for starting an ecommerce business was, and this is what they said:

For the entrepreneurs who want to start an online business but haven’t yet, we asked them the same question. This was their response:

As you can see, the results between the entrepreneurs who have an online business versus those who don’t mirror one another. Their intentions for having started an online business versus wanting to start an online business are very similar and are likely very similar to many entrepreneurs out there who have already or want to start an online business.

For those who haven’t started an online business yet, we also asked them what’s holding them back from doing so. The results are pretty even across the board, with most people lacking or being intimidated by the monetary investment, others lacking the knowledge to invest in building an online business, and nearly just as many others lacking the time and product ideas to get started.

If you’re one of the people who fall into the lack of knowledge category, we encourage you to stick around our website and try out the various resources we have for people who want to start their own online businesses but aren’t sure how yet.

• Check out our ecommerce blog for informative advice, resources, and tips
• Download our START Guide to get a complete overview of the entrepreneurial process so you know what to expect
• Check out our One Page Ecommerce Business Plan for a comprehensive guide to building and launching your online business without missing a step
• Participate in our free video webinars to get starting building businesses from scratch
• Download our free guides & PDFs to find suppliers, niches and other important information to help you build and launch your online business
• Read the ecommerce business case studies to learn how others have built their businesses from scratch
• Subscribe to our weekly email newsletter to get new content & information sent straight to your inbox
• Use our Instant Product Evaluator Tool to get advice on your product ideas’ strengths and weaknesses

Beyond the resources we offer, there are other great places online that can help you learn more about ecommerce and starting your own online business. We recommend checking out:

• The Shopify Blog for articles covering everything you might need to know about starting your online business
• Skillshare for educational classes taught by leading professionals in many different industries. Find our roundup of the Best Skillshare Classes for Entrepreneurs here
• The Bench Accounting Syllabus for information and advice on bookkeeping and accounting for your online store
• The Indie Hackers website for support from all different kinds of founders creating profitable online businesses and side projects. The Indie Hackers Interviews section has lots of helpful case studies as well
• The Sumo Blog for comprehensive, in-depth and high-quality articles about entrepreneurship and business
• The Ahrefs Blog for information about SEO and marketing

PHYSICAL VS. DIGITAL PRODUCTS

Out of the entrepreneurs in our audience who do currently have an online business, the vast majority of them sell physical products rather than digital products. This comes as no surprise to us as our content primarily focuses on helping entrepreneurs start ecommerce businesses that sell physical products, but we’re noticing a rising interest in people wanting to learn more about what kind of digital product options exist and how to get started selling digital products rather than physical products.

For example, even since our last survey, the amount of entrepreneurs selling digital products has almost doubled! In last year’s survey, only 6% of our audience responded saying they sell digital products but in this year’s survey, 11% of our audience sells digital products. That’s already a big jump in just one year, so we’re interested to see how the results to this question change in the coming years.

BUSINESS MODEL

The type of business model merchants use to sell their products is important to know because it dictates how so many other aspects of their business will operate, so we love observing the results of this question—especially as merchant sourcing method trends come and go.

A small majority of our audience dropships their products, and we see that this has grown slightly since last year when just 32% of our audience dropshipped their products. This comes as no surprise as it’s one of the most accessible ways to acquire products to sell online, and it’s one of the most efficient ways to start an online business, especially if a merchant is starting their very first online business.

The next most popular sourcing method is merchants who make their own products. This is a common sourcing method because the merchant has more control over their products and branding, but it can be difficult to scale your business if you’re solely in charge of making your products as it’s usually quite labor-intensive and takes a fair amount of time. So this is a great sourcing method if you’re running a side hustle or small business, but not so ideal if you’re looking to sell en masse.

A small amount of our audience also sources their products via manufacturing which again, makes sense. Manufacturing can be a difficult way to acquire products to sell online because there are often MOQs that need to be met, inventory that must be managed, and it’s just generally a much more expensive and time-consuming business model to get started with. It can be a very rewarding business model, though, because the margins are generally much more generous than any of the other business models, and it also typically allows for total brand and product control.

And finally, wholesaling is the business model that the fewest merchants in our audience use. This comes as no surprise because the dropshipping business model is similar, however, it’s usually much more easily accessible, less costly to get started with, and offers a little bit more brand control. Wholesale still requires some startup funding because there are usually MOQs to be met and when you sell wholesale products, you’re selling on behalf of another brand, which isn’t as on-trend in the entrepreneur ecosystem at the moment.

We also asked the part of our audience who don’t have a business up and running where they plan to source their products from. Here’s how they responded:

Much more of this part of our audience plans to manufacture their products, which we find interesting and in alignment with some of the responses in the Financing a Business section of this article. In that section, a significant part of this audience report that they plan to have a medium-to-large sized budget to finance the launch of their business, which would be necessary if they’re planning to manufacture their products because that usually requires much more upfront investment than any other product-sourcing method.

No matter which business model you choose, besides making products yourself, you’re going to have to find the right supplier for your business to source products from, so if you’re looking to get started sourcing your products via dropshipping, wholesaling or manufacturing, we recommend checking out our curated supplier directories:

• Drop Shipping Suppliers Directory
• Manufacturer Directory
• Clothing Manufacturer Directory
• Wholesale Suppliers Directory
• Private Label Manufacturers Directory

INDUSTRY

This is a great question you can use to get an overview of which industries other entrepreneurs currently sell in so you can understand what the most popular, and potentially profitable, niches are. Businesses don’t survive in niches that aren’t thriving, so the top niches on this list are likely to be the ones where consumers are most active and willing to purchase products.

If you’re looking to start your ecommerce business, consider which of these industries you’d be most likely to sell in and look to this list for a glimpse into the size of customer base you’d likely have and how many competitors you might be up against. The more popular it is, the more customers and competition you’ll probably have.

YEARS IN BUSINESS

The vast majority of our audience who have online businesses are just in the beginning stages of operating them! Most entrepreneurs have only had their businesses for less than one year and almost just as many have had their business for 1-3 years.

Remember these numbers when we get to the final section of this article on Financing a Business. The numbers in that section primarily exist within the context of new businesses that have been active for 0-3 years, which is very important to keep in mind. Especially if you’re just starting your ecommerce business, those numbers can give you a good understanding of what the first 3 years operating your ecommerce business could look like.

Running a Business

Next, let’s dive into the data on what our audience is doing and using to run their ecommerce businesses.

For those who haven’t started an online business yet, this section can give you valuable insight into tools, tactics, and information you can use to build your future business more successfully, and for those who already have an online business up and running, this section can give you a glimpse into where you stand amongst your peers who also have online businesses on the go.

Let’s jump into it.

ECOMMERCE PLATFORM OR MARKETPLACE PROVIDER

It comes as no surprise that the majority of our audience has built their online business on the Shopify ecommerce platform. Shopify is one of the top ecommerce platforms in the industry and is often the most highly recommended because it’s inexpensive to get started on and offers a host of useful features and reliable support.

When we conducted this ecommerce survey last year we noticed that a large part of our audience has built their online businesses not only on an ecommerce platform like Shopify but also on ecommerce marketplaces like Amazon eBay and Etsy. Online marketplaces can be a lucrative way for new businesses to launch into the ecommerce industry because there are already customers browsing and shopping on these marketplaces, which gives more exposure to brands listing products on the marketplace and makes it easier to get initial sales.

Plenty of ecommerce businesses have their own online store set up on ecommerce platforms like Shopify, BigCommerce or Magento and then also sell on marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, and Etsy. This way they can have the best of both worlds: They can own their own store on an ecommerce platform which means they don’t have to abide by marketplace rules but they can also benefit from the footfall that marketplaces attract to help their products be more discoverable and easily shoppable by consumers around the world.

BUILDING BUSINESSES AROUND A PASSION

This is one of our favorite questions to ask entrepreneurs with ecommerce stores because we love seeing entrepreneurs passionate about the products they sell and the market they serve. We’ve discussed this on the blog before, but being an entrepreneur isn’t always easy and being passionate about what you do can really help see you through the challenging times.

It is by no means necessary to only start an online business because you’re passionate about the products you sell or the market you serve, however, it can be helpful in the long run to love what you sell and whom you sell it to.

Merchants who are passionate about their products are more likely to stick through the tough times that come with running an online business such as months of low traffic, minimal conversion rates, and high abandoned cart rates. It’s also useful to be passionate about the market you serve because you’ll be more in-tune with their wants and needs and will be more likely to create better products and shopping experiences that suit their interests.

It’s still very possible to create great products and a great shopping experience for your customers even if you aren’t passionate about your products or niche but it just might take more effort or research to achieve the same results as someone who’s passionate about the market.

SOLE FOUNDER VS. PARTNERSHIPS

As you can see, the vast majority of our audience is made up of entrepreneurs who are the sole founders of their ecommerce business. For anyone who hasn’t started an online business yet, use this as inspiration to know that you, too, can start an ecommerce business on your own without the help or support of someone else.

Support and guidance from others can be helpful when it comes to starting and running an online business, but just know that it’s not necessary to get started.

Out of interest, we added another question this year that will hopefully be helpful for those of you who might be thinking about starting a business with business partners. Sometimes, working with a business partner can be an excellent experience—they might be able to run the aspects of the business you have no interest or skills in and they might really round-out your team and build the business to a place that you couldn’t have done on your own. However, not all business partnerships are like this.

Some business partnerships don’t work out and can leave you wishing you just did everything on your own in the first place. We caution you to really vet your business partners and take the results of the following survey question into consideration.

If our audience members who started an online business with business partners today were to do it over, 40% wouldn’t work with business partners again. That’s a pretty vast chunk, so maybe it’s something to think about.

BUILD A BUSINESS WHILE WORKING OR QUIT YOUR JOB

This is perhaps a question that every entrepreneur has asked themselves before starting their online business, and the truth is that it’s really up to each individual person’s unique circumstances and risk tolerance to decide which option is right for them.

This, however, is what our audience had to say about it:

Since it typically does take some time to bring a business to life and generate a sufficient level of traffic and sales to make it a viable way to earn a living, it’s generally best to work on an ecommerce business as a side hustle first while working your regular job. This way, you are less likely to put yourself in a compromising position should your ecommerce business not work out or be as profitable initially as you may have expected.

Ecommerce businesses also require a fair bit of monetary investment, whether that’s because of the inventory required to stock the virtual shelves or to fund the ecommerce platform, apps, marketing channels, etc. required to get the business up and running, so it helps to have a reliable source of income that can help cover the initial startup costs.

Again, it’s totally up to each entrepreneur how they choose to approach this part of the startup process, but as you can see, the majority of our audience chose to start their ecommerce business while working their typical day job.

In last year’s survey, however, 29% of our audience quit their job to start their online business and in this year’s survey, we notice that number jumped to 34%! We find that quite interesting, and are intrigued to see how the responses to this question change in the future.

MOST EFFECTIVE SALES/ADVERTISING CHANNELS

Interestingly enough, the majority of our audience uses SEO to attract visitors to their online store followed by Facebook Ads and organic social media. These results are comparable to last year’s so we’re not surprised.

We have noticed a decline in the number of merchants who use Facebook Ads to drive visitors to their store, however. In last year’s survey, 45% of respondents reported Facebook Ads as being their most effective sales/advertising channel whereas this year, only 32% said the same. That’s a 13% drop which is pretty significant and possibly something to take into consideration as for the future of Facebook marketing.

Since last year, the amount of our audience citing SEO to be an effective sales/advertising channel has grown by 7% and the effectiveness of Instagram Ads has also grown by the same amount.

ENTREPRENEURIAL STRUGGLES

Typically product and niche selection is the area that we notice entrepreneurs struggle with the most, however, this doesn’t seem to be the case with merchants who already have a store up and running! A huge majority of our audience struggles to get traffic to their online store, and we don’t blame them. That can be one of the most challenging and time-consuming areas for entrepreneurs to deal with when starting and growing their online business, and it’s clearly one that many, many entrepreneurs are struggling with right now.

If this is something you’re struggling with, take comfort in the fact that you’re not alone. If it’s something you really want to work on, check out these resources to help you get started:

• Getting Traffic:
  • How to Increase Website Traffic
  • How to Build Backlinks
  • How to Cheat at Ecommerce

With this year’s survey results, we’ve noticed that difficulty surrounding Sourcing Suppliers seems to be on the rise. In last year’s results, 17% of our audience struggled with it, but this year, 26% are finding it difficult. That’s a huge jump so if it’s an area of business development that you’re running into roadblocks with, you might want to check out these resources:

• Sourcing Suppliers:
  • The Ultimate Guide to Safely Sourcing Your Products From Alibaba
  • 10 Best Shopify Dropshipping Apps to Acquire Inventory for Your Business
  • The Untold Secrets to Cutting Manufacturing Costs & Lead Times

For the other problem areas, these resources can be great places to seek information from:

• Conversion Optimization:
  • How to Get Your First 100 Sales
  • Conversion Rate Optimization: Ways to Increase Sales
  • The Complete Guide to Conversion Rate Optimization for First-Year Stores
  • The Complete Guide to Reducing Cart Abandonment
  • 6 Website Optimization Tactics: Neuroscience Principles to Increase Conversion Optimization
  • Facebook Retargeting Ads: A Step-by-Step Guide to Sending Website Visitors on a Facebook Retargeting Journey
• Strategy & Analytics:
  • Social Commerce: How to Drive Social Media Sales
  • SEMrush Review: How We Increased Organic Search Traffic by 532%
  • Shopify Google Analytics: The First Steps To Enhanced Ecommerce
• Finding the Perfect Product:
  • 500 Ecommerce Niches
  • Reverse Engineering the Perfect Ecommerce Product
  • How to Find a Product to Sell Online: The Definitive Guide
  • 31 Ecommerce Products You Can Make Yourself
  • How to Start an Online Business When You’re Not Ready to Start an Online Business
  • How to Make Custom Phone Cases to Sell Online: The Complete Guide
• Accounting, Finance & Legal:
  • Small Business Accounting & Bookkeeping: A Guide For Ecommerce Entrepreneurs
  • Small Business Recordkeeping 101: A Guide for Ecommerce Entrepreneurs
  • TaxJar Spotlight: Simple Sales Tax Returns for Ecommerce Businesses
  • Where To Get Legal Business Advice
• Branding & Design:
  • A Better Brand: Ecommerce Branding Guide
  • 200+ Curated Graphic & Brand Design Resources
  • The Top 10 Facebook Post Templates for Ecommerce Businesses
  • 25 Gorgeous Instagram Templates for Your Online Business (+ 10 Bonus Story Templates)
  • Product Photography: The Ultimate DIY Guide
• Shipping & Fulfillment:
  • How to Offer Free Shipping & How to Calculate Your Free Shipping Threshold
  • The Ecommerce Guide to Shipping Boxes: Shipping Boxes & Mailing Envelopes 101
  • The Ultimate Shipping Strategy Cheat Sheet
• Accessing Resources & Tools:
  • 9 Insanely Valuable & Ridiculously Inexpensive Services for Your Business 
  • 10 Essential Productivity Apps for Entrepreneurs & Business Owners
  • How to Cheat at Ecommerce: 50+ Powerful Tools, Apps & Resources for Your Online Business
• Operations & Customer Service:
  • Ecommerce Launch Checklist
  • How To Bulletproof Your Online Business
  • How to Price Your Products: An Easy-to-Use Guide
  • FAM Review: Smart Email Marketing for Busy Entrepreneurs

FAILING AT BUILDING A BUSINESS

Look at these numbers: Over 95% of entrepreneurs failed at least once before they achieved their definition of success. 95%! That’s huge.

Out of that 95%, most of them considered to have failed 2-3 times before they achieved success and 13% failed at least 7 times or more.

This data just goes to show that trial and error is part of the entrepreneurial process and even if you’ve failed in the past when starting a business it doesn’t mean you can’t be successful in the future.

Of course, everyone’s definition of success is different and there’s no concrete way to define it, but take these results as reassurance that even if things don’t work out the first time, try again. The vast majority of entrepreneurs don’t create a successful business the first time, so don’t be too disheartened if you finding yourself starting and failing.

Financing a Business

The funds that it takes to start an online business can be a huge deterrent for new entrepreneurs wanting to build, launch, and grow their own online business so this section is particularly important as it gives a true representation of what our audience has spent in the past—and do currently spend—on their online business to get it running and keep it running.

If the monetary investment of starting an online business is holding you back, pay attention to the data in this section to see what funds you can likely expect to budget to start your online business. You might be surprised!

STARTUP & LAUNCH COSTS

First, we asked current entrepreneurs who have a business up and running what they initially spent to build and launch their online business.

There was quite a diverse range of responses, however, many people were able to build their business with $0-$250 in monetary investment! This goes to show that it’s possible to start an ecommerce business on a bootstrapped budget.

Next, we asked those who don’t already have an ecommerce business up and running what their budget is to build and launch their business when they do start it in the future. While the results were again, varied, many people reported setting aside a budget of $0-$250 or $2,501-$5,000 to spend on building their business.

Based on the results between the people who have started an online business versus those who haven’t, it seems that those who haven’t are planning to spend much more to start their business than those who already have. This discrepancy shows the illusion that an entrepreneur must invest a fair amount of funds into their business to build and launch it, when in reality that doesn’t seem to be the case.

There are many factors that can play into the startup costs of a business, including initial costs like inventory which can really eat into the overall budget, so an entrepreneur’s startup budget really depends on the business model they choose. Since a significant part of our audience operates under the dropshipping business model which requires less upfront investment initially because there’s no need to purchase inventory, it makes sense that many entrepreneurs in our audience started their business on a low budget.

BUSINESS’ MONTHLY REVENUE RANGE

Now compare this data with the previous section’s data: A significant portion of our audience started their business with a low budget, and a significant portion of our audience’s ecommerce stores are earning low levels of monthly revenue.

Take these points into consideration:

• A significant portion of our audience operates their businesses via the dropshipping business model which is well known, in general, for having low revenue earning potential and slim profit margins
• The majority of our audience’s businesses are between 0-3 years old, which means they’re relatively young and are still finding their feet within their industry and are building their reputation
• For our audience members who do have a business, they’ve reported that getting traffic and conversions are the two main struggles they deal with on an ongoing basis. This is likely to directly impact their sales and their monthly revenue range

For those who are looking to start an ecommerce business, this data can demonstrate to you what to expect over the few years after launching your online business. Take the above points into consideration and think about how you can combat the struggles other entrepreneurs are facing which potentially have a direct impact on their bottom line.

For those who do have an online business, use this data to see how you measure up amongst your peers! Think about where your monthly revenue range would place you in relation to others in our audience.

APPROXIMATE GROSS PROFIT MARGIN

This year, we added a new question to get an idea of our audience’s gross profit margin, for the members who have online businesses up and running.

Considering that the vast majority of our audience reported that they source their products via dropshipping, seeing 36%-45% and 55%+ as the top two results is surprising. Dropshipping is notorious for having slim profit margins, so from these results, we’re guessing that our audience might primarily be working with high-quality dropshipping suppliers who compensate the merchants they work with in a fair way.

Regardless, it’s encouraging to see that our audience of entrepreneurs with businesses have such healthy profit margin percentages.

MONTHLY MARKETING & ADVERTISING COSTS

The results for this answer are fairly varied as well, but overall they show that ecommerce business owners in our audience don’t spend a large amount of their monthly budget on advertising their online business.

A large section of our audience, 35%, spends $0 on advertising, indicating that they likely rely on free advertising methods such as SEO and social media to get the word out about their business and products.

Here are some other findings we’ve noticed from the data:

• 15% of our audience spends between $151-$300 per month on advertising
• 15% of our audience spends between $26-$75 per month on advertising
• 7.5% of our audience spends between $1-$25 per month on advertising
• 7.5% of our audience spends between $301-$600 per month on advertising

This data shows us that the majority of our audience isn’t spending a huge amount of funds on advertising every month, but it seems like merchants are either spending virtually nothing on advertising or a few hundred dollars—there isn’t much in between.

MONTHLY APPS & SERVICES COST

Since a very small percentage of our audience spends $0 on apps and services every month to run their ecommerce business, the data from this question shows that apps are useful, helpful and worth the investment when it comes to running an online business.

Almost 86% of our audience spend at least some part of their monthly budget on apps for their online business, so clearly apps are necessary and essential for daily operation. The types of apps used for ecommerce businesses can vary from customer service support systems to recurring payments for subscription service business models to email marketing providers or even dropshipping suppliers.

There are so many different apps available for online businesses and especially for merchants selling on the Shopify platform—which is the majority of our audience—as it has the best and most diverse pick of apps on the market.

Interested in learning more about which apps you can use to help run your business? Check out these articles:

• 10 Essential Productivity Apps for Entrepreneurs & Business Owners
• 20 Smartphone Apps to Manage Your Online Business on the Go
• 10 Best Shopify Dropshipping Apps to Acquire Inventory for Your Business

Conclusion

Even though you might feel alone on your entrepreneurial journey, we hope that this article has shed some light on the struggles other entrepreneurs face and the choices they make to build, launch, and grow their online business. Use the data in this article as a jumping-off point to help you understand what it takes to start an online business if you haven’t already started one and if you have, use the results to measure your progress and benchmark your success.

There’s a lot to take away from the insights learned about our audience in this article, so we hope you can use it to build, launch, and grow a better ecommerce business.

The post Ecommerce & Entrepreneurial Insights: Audience Survey Results for 2019 appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.

Whether you’ve never started a business before in your life, or you’re a seasoned veteran with multiple online businesses under your belt, getting started is always the hardest part. Those initial roadblocks and hurdles for a new project always seem to stall ideas and kill dreams.

So what do you do when you know you want to start something, but you’re just not quite ready to build a business yet?

Believe it or not, there are some steps you can take towards building your online business even if you’re not ready to start selling products yet. These steps are not only easy to get started with but they can also go a long way in helping make your future business much more successful.

In this post, you’ll learn exactly what you can do right now to start building your business, without building a business at all. At the same time, you’ll learn more about your potential future customers, so when you are ready to sell products, you’ll have a much higher chance of success.

Let’s dive in.

Understanding Product/Market Fit

In its simplest terms, a business does nothing other than connect a group of people that share a common interest or need with a product or service that will benefit them in some way. The better the match between the group of people and the product, the more successful a business tends to be. This is called product/market fit and finding it is one of the most important things to work towards when you launch any new business.

Many times on this blog, as well as others, you’ll read about finding products to sell online (How to Find Trending Products to Sell Online, Trending Products to Sell Online, A Treasure Chest of Product Ideas to Sell Online), then selling those products to the right audience. However, we can flip the equation by finding an audience first then learning what products that group needs and then selling products to that group. By starting with an audience and learning more about them (their needs, their wants, and their pain points) we stand a better chance at understanding what products this group requires, and of course, what they will spend money on.

Additionally, by starting with an audience you inherently will have a group of people that, in theory, are likely to purchase your product when you launch.

Start Building an Audience

So let’s assume you’re not ready to start an online business—maybe you have no time, no money, or no ideas for products to sell right now. Your goal at this point should be to start building an audience in a particular niche. This will be a group of people—and potentially, future customers—that you will be cultivating as well as learning from.

If you know what type of product you want to sell (but just don’t have the means to sell yet) then you will likely want to build an audience around that niche and product so that you can attract the appropriate audience for the future. If you’re still unsure what you’ll sell, we would suggest building a community and audience around something you’re fundamentally interested in.

As you begin to grow an audience and communicate with them, you will learn more and more about them, about their likes, interests, desires, and pain points. This all turns into valuable information for products you can sell to this audience at a later point in time, when you’re ready.

Ways to Build an Audience

To build an audience, you’ll generally need to provide some type of value. People will need a reason to be part of your audience. Generally, there are two ways to provide value in an inexpensive way:

• Be a Connector: Help bring them together with other like-minded people that share their interests.
• Be a Content Curator: Deliver interesting content on their topic of interest.

Below are several ideas that you can use to start building something immediately around a particular niche:

• Start a Blog
• Start a Podcast
• Start an Email Newsletter
• Start a Facebook Group
• Start an Instagram Account
• Start a Twitter Account
• Start a Slack Channel

The Best Way to Get Started

As shown above, there’s no shortage of ways to begin building your audience, however, some tend to be better than others and are a bit more future-proof. Consider the fact that if you’re building your audience on a platform like Instagram, Facebook,  Twitter, or Snapchat, these platforms at any point can change their rules, become irrelevant, or they can ban you.

One of the best and more future-proof ways of building an audience for your future business is to collect emails. When you capture emails, you own those emails; they can’t be taken away from you. When it comes to selling products later on, emails also are typically the highest converting channel so it makes sense to build your audience with emails from the beginning.

Here’s how you’re going to build your audience by collecting emails:

• Select a niche
• Create a landing page
• Capture emails
• Curate/deliver content

Let’s dive into more details on each of those elements.

Select a Niche

Focusing on your niche market is going to be the reason why people sign up to your email list in the first place. Being blatant about your niche market is what’s going to entice people to sign up for your email list. It’ll let them know what you specialize in and what they can expect from you.

So, what’s a niche market? A niche market is a group of individuals who are passionate about a specific interest and are usually a subset of a larger market. Some examples of niche markets include:

• Pugs: A niche market of dogs/pets
• Craft Beer: A niche market of alcoholic beverages
• Beard Grooming: A niche market of men’s style/grooming
• Yoga for Expecting Mothers: A niche market of yoga
• Stylish Men’s Messenger Bags: A niche market of men’s fashion

By focusing on a niche market you can send out content—whether it’s created or curated—that directly appeals to a passionate group of people, and they’ll be more likely to support you because your content is specifically of interest to them.

When you create your landing page (next step) you’ll want to make it obvious just by looking at your page what niche you specialize in, so people know what they’re signing up to your email list for. All you need is a simple message saying something along the lines of, “Join my mailing list to get the best links to the newest styles of men’s messenger bags delivered to your email weekly,” and people will know exactly what they can expect to receive from you.

Create a Landing Page

The first step for any online business is to create a presence for your business online. This may seem like an obvious point to make, but if you want to run your own online business you need to have somewhere online for people to go to.

That being said, building an entire website isn’t always an easy option, especially if you don’t have any actual products to sell. You could create an online store with Shopify, but since you don’t have anything to sell yet it’s going to look empty and cost you monthly. You could build a blog on WordPress, which is a great idea, however, this requires quite a bit of commitment, and there’s a fairly decent learning curve for someone not familiar with WordPress already. What you need is a simple and basic presence online that you can send to people to sign up for your email list.

You need a landing page.

Landing pages can serve many purposes. For our purpose, a landing page is a simple, one-page website that serves as an entry point or an introduction to an online business. You don’t need a multi-page website that’s complicated to build and time-consuming to manage, all you need to start building an audience is a simple one-page website that introduces who you are, what you do, and why people should stay connected with you.

Your landing page should include:

• Your name/your business’ name
• Your unique value proposition (“Sign up to get a weekly email of the cutest baby pug photos!”)
• Your email capture field
• Links to any social media

That’s it. You just want it to be a place online that people can go to find out more information about you and to be able to sign up to your list.

There’s no shortage of tools to build simple landing pages. To build your own landing page we recommend using Carrd as they make it insanely easy to set up and they’re extremely inexpensive to use. Carrd has a free option, but their standard premium paid option is only $19/year and gives you up to 10 landing pages/websites.

Carrd has dozens of gorgeous templates you can use and customize to create a striking, yet simple landing page to help you capture emails and build your audience. Within 10 minutes you can have a great looking site, ready to go. Read our full Carrd Review here to learn more about their features and services.

Capture Emails

This is a hugely important aspect of building an audience. In the ecommerce world, emails are king because they go directly to your audience’s inbox. Most importantly, the people who sign up to your email capture are figuratively raising their hands to tell you that they’re interested in what you’re doing and want to stay connected. You want to hang onto these people because they’re going to be instrumental in the future of your business.

By having an email capture you’ll be able to start building your audience right from the beginning. One of the biggest mistakes new businesses make is not implementing their email capture soon enough, and thus missing out on building up their list even more. Start building your list now and you’ll grow a dedicated audience of people to share information and updates with, and then you’ll sell your products to them in the future.

One of the best tools for email capture is Mailchimp (Free/Paid) as it’s been at the forefront of email marketing for a long while now. It’s easy for beginners to use, they have plenty of helpful advice and suggestions available through their blog and their support section, and their service is completely free to use for up to 2,000 email list subscribers. This will give you a great start.

By connecting Mailchimp with your landing page on Carrd, any emails entered on your site will go right into your Mailchimp list where you’ll easily be able to manage your subscribers and send out relevant and interesting content to them.

Another great email capture option is Klaviyo. They offer a sophisticated and robust solution for email marketing so if you’re looking for something that’s going to grow with your business as it evolves, you’ll want to stick with them.

Curate/Deliver Content

Once you’ve set up your email capture you’re going to need something to send out to your audience on a fairly regular basis. This will help keep them engaged and it will help you to maintain and grow your list as you continue.

There are different types of content you can send out to your audience. Some examples include:

• Products: Share the hottest new products in your niche.
• Blog Posts: Share new and highly curated blog posts relevant to your audience.
• Links/Resources: Depending on your niche, curating links and resources might contain lots of value for your audience.

You can do just one of these things or a mix of these things, whatever works for your particular niche and audience. Remember, the most important thing is that you tell your audience what you will deliver on your landing page, then deliver above and beyond their expectations.

All-In-One Curated Newsletter Services

More recently, there have been all-in-one services designed specifically to help you easily build and grow an email newsletter, while at the same time making it easier to collect content to share, as well as making it easier to share that content.

One of the most popular all-in-one email newsletter curation services is Revue. What’s great about Revue, in particular, is that it’s able to store all the links you come across so you don’t have to store them somewhere else or try to remember them. When you’re ready to send out an email list of all the content you’ve accumulated, you can easily format all the links you’ve saved into an aesthetically pleasing newsletter just by dragging and dropping files.

Marketing and Growing Your List

Once you’ve created a place online for people to go, you’ve integrated your email capture and you’ve started to curate content to send out to your audience, it’s time to start building up that audience.

It’s important to know before you start that just because you build something online does not mean that people will automatically come and start signing up to be a part of it. Most of the time, it takes patience and sending out your first newsletters to friends and family before you actually start building any kind of audience.

However, there are some tactics you can use to get your name out there and start building your list:

• Broadcast on Social Media Platforms: Reach out to the audience you already have right now, which is your social media platforms. Whether you have a hundred or a thousand followers, post a picture, make a tweet and link out to your landing page so the people who know you can sign up to it. This will generate some initial traffic to help boost your morale so you have some real people on your email list, even if it’s only a few to start. You may also want to consider creating specific social media accounts to help advertise and grow your presence online.
• Go Where Your Niche Market Goes: Go to the places online where your niche market hangs out and let them know you exist, whether it’s websites, blogs or forums like Reddit. This is why it’s helpful to have chosen a niche market you’re already a part of because you’ll already know where they hang out and how to approach them.
• Pay for Some Ads: You could also always use paid ads to help drive traffic to your landing page to collect more emails. Check out this Facebook Ads guide to learn more about getting started with Facebook Ads.
• Be Consistent: Keep putting out content no matter how many people are engaging with it, and just keep doing it. The more consistent you are the more likely you will be to grow your audience each month, and it will just keep snowballing.

Example of a Curated Newsletter Done Right

You might be asking or wondering how all of this comes together. Below is a great example of one of our favorite curated email newsletters, Opportunity Overload, by the talented folks over at Need/Want.

Opportunity Overload is a weekly newsletter geared towards entrepreneurs looking for new opportunities (that’s you, by the way). The newsletter is broken up into several sections and types of opportunities:

• Broad Opportunities: This includes general trends in society and consumerism for you to think about.
• Marketplace – Companies for Sale: A curated selection of small online businesses for sale.
• Marketplace – Domains for Sale: A curated selection of domains for sale that might spark an idea for a business.
• Community Board: A selection of community-posted opportunities.
• Sponsorship & Announcements: Sponsored messages (they are now making money from their emails) as well as news about Opportunity Overload.

Here’s an example of one of their newsletters:

Amazing, right? Looking for some more inspiration? The Hustle is another popular and very well done email geared towards the tech entrepreneur crowd. The Hustle sends a daily email with a handful of stories in business, tech, and culture that you should probably know about. Click on the newsletter below to open the full size and length email:

Conclusion

Remember, the purpose of setting all of this up isn’t to become an overnight success. You may not be ready to build an entire business yet, but you can build an audience without having any products to sell just by making an online presence and delivering valuable insight and resources to your growing audience. This is the most productive thing you can be doing for the business you don’t even have yet because it will give you a solid foundation of customers who trust your opinion that you can sell to once you actually have the means and resources. Use the resources we’ve provided to create each component and get started building your audience today.

The post How to Start an Online Business When You’re Not Ready to Start an Online Business appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.

• You have a deep-seated desire to build your own business
• You dream of working for yourself
• There’s nothing you want more than to achieve both personal and financial success

If you can relate, you’re in the right place.

In this article, we’re going to explore some of the most important things you need to know if you’re concerned about how to be successful at entrepreneurship and life. Some of the tactics we suggest in this article are actual physical actions you can take while others are strategies you can try and perspectives you can train your mind to execute.

Above all, by incorporating as many of these tactics as possible into your daily life, you’ll likely begin to feel more successful and experience more entrepreneurial success.

Does that sound good to you? Great! Let’s dive in.

How to Be Successful Tip #1: 10% Activities vs. 10x Activities

Success as an entrepreneur comes most easily to those who know where to focus their energy. From now on, approach each task in your daily life—whether it’s a personal task or a professional task—from the perspective of the 10% versus 10x concept.

We originally discovered this concept through Garrett Moon, the co-founder and CEO of CoSchedule, in his Skillshare Content Marketing class (which, if you haven’t heard of Skillshare, we highly recommend checking it out, too). In the class, he talked about this concept in relation to content marketing and content strategy, but it’s an ideology that can apply to basically any part of your life.

What the concept comes down to is understanding which types of tasks bring a 10% improvement to your life and which tasks bring 10-times (10x) the improvement to your life. If you’re looking to be successful in this world, you’re going to want to focus more of your time and your energy into things that 10x your life rather than 10% your life because ultimately, you’ll get more value from them.

This can apply to anything: It can apply to the jobs you choose to work on if you freelance, it could apply to the projects you work on as your side-hustle while you’re working your regular 9-5 job, or it could apply to the extra-curricular things you choose to do in your spare time. This concept goes both ways; not only are there 10% and 10x things in your professional life but there are also 10% and 10x things in your personal life, too.

This isn’t to say that you should do no 10% things ever, it just a reminder that if you’re looking to be successful, you should concentrate more on the 10x side of things rather than the 10%, and that you should take the time to evaluate what falls into which category.

Keep in mind, however, that by making 10x tasks a priority you might feel like you’re actually doing less because you might only be able to fit a few 10x tasks into your day or week rather than several 10% tasks. This is because 10x tasks usually require more time and energy to complete, so you might be finishing fewer tasks than you would be if you were just working on 10% tasks. But, don’t be fooled—although they may be fewer, 10x tasks will take you further and that’s how you become successful.

How to Be Successful Tip #2: Prioritize “Shipping” Not Perfection

It’s common for new entrepreneurs to experience “paralysis by analysis” which essentially just means that you’re too scared to take the next step in your entrepreneurial journey so you spend a lot of time analyzing how you’re going to execute the next step so that you don’t actually have to take the step. We get it. Entrepreneurship is scary and leveling up your life is intimidating, and so many entrepreneurs fall into this trap because they want to stay in their comfort zone where there’s no risk of failure.

Here’s a newsflash for you: Your entrepreneurial journey isn’t going to go smoothly all the time and while you shouldn’t jump into every next step in your journey totally unprepared, just try to be cognizant of whether you’re overanalyzing the next step because you’re afraid to take it or if you really just need more information before you’re ready to take on more risk.

The “paralysis by analysis” experience can also rear its head when it comes to releasing new products (or your first product) or launching content or anything to do with putting something out into the world. So often, creators and entrepreneurs get caught up in making sure the product is “perfect” that it delays the product getting launched at all. Being a perfectionist won’t serve you well if you want to be a successful entrepreneur, however, “shipping” will.

What’s shipping? No, we’re not talking about this kind of shipping, we’re talking about releasing a product, launching a project or putting something out into the world, AKA, “shipping.”

Shipping as an entrepreneurial concept is something that successful entrepreneur and author Seth Godin talks about a lot, and it’s because it’s an essential factor to success. What it comes down to is that delaying a product launch to fix small details so everything’s perfect just ends up inhibiting you in the long run. It holds you up, it stops you from executing, it slows down your processes and makes you inefficient.

Ultimately, perfectionism is just an excuse to not ship which is just another way of you being too scared to step out of your comfort zone. To be successful, sometimes you just have to get it done and get your product launch out there as it is instead of fixing every small, tiny detail until it’s perfect.

By all means, don’t take this as leave to start launching half-executed products, but just don’t spend so much of your time focusing on the tiny imperfections and just launch the dang product already. You can always do a Version 2 or re-release it in the future if need be. Just ship your product and get it out to the world and let your creation exist where it’s meant to be used and enjoyed—in the hands or on the screens of your audience.

How to Be Successful Tip #3: Cheaper is (Sometimes) More Expensive

This is an important lesson and one that most successful entrepreneurs have likely learned at some point in their lives and in their careers: Choosing the cheaper or less expensive option can sometimes cost you more in the long run.

It happens all the time—especially with bootstrapped entrepreneurs who are just trying to make their business work on a budget—where a business owner picks the cheaper option instead of the moderately or more costly option, simply because they don’t want to part with their hard-earned cash.

In some cases, this can cost you more if the cheaper option isn’t executed properly and so, in the future, you need to get it done again. In these cases, it means that you’ll be paying twice—once to get it done badly and another time to fix the mistake—instead of just getting it done right the first time.

This can happen in many different areas of business whether it comes to store set up, product creation, marketing, hiring freelancers or contractors, using tools and services, etc. The challenge here comes down to finding the things where you can and should be saving your money (check out our tips on how to reduce your business’ costs for some ideas) and then also understanding where your money is best spent.

This can take some time to understand, but ultimately you don’t want to pay twice for something when you could have just paid once to do it right the first time. Notice instances of this in your business going forward, and reflect on experiences like this you may have had in the past.

Successful entrepreneurs know that they sometimes have to shell out the big bucks when it comes to hiring the right people, investing in the best services, and using the optimal tools for the job to get done right the first time instead of using the cheaper option first and then having to re-do it again.

How to Be Successful Tip #4: Use the Right Tools

Along the same lines, using the right tools for your online business is one of the best ways to be successful at entrepreneurship.

We discussed 10% versus 10x in the first step and tools and services are one of those things that can 10x your business if you use the right ones.

The right tools can maximize your productivity and can take tasks off your plate which can make you more productive and more efficient, thus, leading you in a successful direction. The tool stack every entrepreneur uses to run a successful business varies but usually it comes down to foundational tools like the right ecommerce platform which performs best for their needs, the tools they use to organize their schedules and manage their time, and the services they use to automate tasks so they can take some of the work off of their plate.

If you’re looking for some of the best tools, apps, and services entrepreneurs can use right now to run successful businesses, we recommend checking out these posts:

• The Ultimate Ecommerce Business Toolbox
• How to Cheat at Ecommerce: 50+ Powerful Tools, Apps & Resources
• Our Top 10 Best Business Apps

How to Be Successful Tip #5: Outsource, Outsource, Outsource

A major part of how to be successful at entrepreneurship and at life is knowing when and where to outsource tasks. Delegation is a key role in an entrepreneur’s day-to-day job and if you want to be successful, you need to take some time to realize where your strengths lie so you can focus on those and outsource the tasks that are your weakest points.

What’s so great about being an entrepreneur in today’s day and age is that you have so many options when it comes to finding freelancers or contractors to outsource to; the sky really is the limit. Check out these marketplaces to find freelancers or contractors of all types to outsource your business tasks to:

• FreeeUp
• Upwork
• Fiverr
• Jobspresso
• Carson
• GenM
• iWriter

By outsourcing menial tasks or tasks you don’t have a lot of experience with, you’ll be able to focus on the tasks that you are great at and get those done while the tasks you outsource get completed by someone much more fit for the job. This helps you get work done faster which can help you grow your business faster and boost your output more efficiently.

How to Be Successful Tip #6: Time Management & Productivity Tips

An essential part of success, mastering your time management and productivity really is key. Following are some of our best time management and productivity tips.

Persistent Starting

The concept of Persistent Starting is simple: Each day you have to be persistent at starting your task. Your task could be anything: Brainstorming product ideas, searching for a product, finding a manufacturer, setting up your website, sending an email, etc. Any task that gets you one step closer to your goal of starting or growing your online business. Pick your task for the day and just start.

It might sound simple, but the act of actually putting it into practice can become difficult. So, to make it less difficult, the next step in Persistent Starting is to set a timer. Often, the hardest part is just getting started with your task, but when you set a timer for 10 minutes and tell yourself that all you have to do is work on your task for 10 minutes then you can stop, it makes the task much more easy to commit to! Suddenly you don’t have one big giant task looming ahead of you, you just have to sit down for 10 minutes and get as much done in that 10 minutes as you can.

Often, once those 10 minutes are up you’ll have gotten into a groove and won’t feel like stopping so you’ll continue until the task is complete, or at least until a large chunk of it is. But, if you haven’t gotten into the groove of things and you still don’t feel like working on the task, then stop—no conditions or mind games—let yourself do something else without feeling guilty.

The next step in the process of Persistent Starting is to do this every day. Think of it this way: The worst that can come out of it is that you lose 10 minutes of your day and the best that can come out of it is you get something done for your business every day! If it helps, schedule in that time to work on your business and honor it like it’s an important appointment. You can’t be late for it, you can’t reschedule it, and you can’t miss it.

Working in Pomodoros

The Pomodoro Technique is a time management technique that breaks down your work period into different intervals: 25 minutes of work followed by a period of time to rest. During the timed 25 minutes, you’re expected to work until the timer goes off. If you think of something else you need to do or something important comes to mind, write it down and then switch back to your work.

Once the timer rings, mark a checkmark on a piece of paper and take a short break. Once you’ve done a few Pomodoros and acquired more checkmarks, take longer breaks. It’s important to track and record your progress as it gives you a sense of accomplishment and you can visually see the amount of time you’ve put into your work.

No More Zero Days

This is a productivity tool and school of thought that rocked the internet when it was first published and since then has developed a cult following that has helped people all over the world accomplish tasks not only in business but in their personal lives as well.

The concept of “No Zero Days” was created by a Reddit user by the name of “Ryans01” when they were responding to a post made by another user who was struggling with motivation and productivity. “Ryans01” gave several pieces of good advice to the original poster, but what became a sensation across the internet was this particular section of his reply:

“Rule numero uno – There are no more zero days. What’s a zero day? A zero day is when you don’t do a single fucking thing towards whatever dream or goal or want or whatever that you got going on. No more zeros.

I’m not saying you gotta bust an essay out everyday, that’s not the point. The point I’m trying to make is that you have to make yourself, promise yourself, that the new SYSTEM you live in is a NON-ZERO system.

Didn’t do anything all fucking day and it’s 11:58 PM? Write one sentence. One pushup. Read one page of that chapter. One. Because one is non zero. You feel me? When you’re in the super vortex of being bummed your pattern of behavior is keeping the vortex goin, that’s what you’re used to.

Turning into productivity ultimate master of the universe doesn’t happen from the vortex. It happens from a massive string of CONSISTENT NON ZEROS. That’s rule number one. Do not forget.”

Once you get into the habit of taking daily action, you’ll develop momentum and strengthen your belief that your goal is attainable because you’ll actively see the work you’re putting in to attain it. This works wonders for keeping you motivated and staying on the right track.

How to Be Successful Tip #7: Be a Lifelong Learner

No one is ever going to become the Richard Branson of Shopify sales in one day but that doesn’t mean you won’t be in months or years to come. All that stands between you and other successful entrepreneurs is time and know-how.

If you study entrepreneurs or just successful self-made people in general, you may start to notice that most of them are lifelong learners—meaning, their education didn’t stop as soon as they graduated (or dropped out of) school. No, they’ve likely taken it upon themselves to continuously learn about their job or their passion or their craft whether through online courses, reading books, conducting research, consulting mentors, or just learning through content available on the internet. Learning is so accessible for most people and if you’re reading this right now, you likely already have all the tools you need right now to be a lifelong learner.

So, how do you get started? First, do at least one thing each day to help you learn something new. It doesn’t have to be directly related to your job or your business—just learn something new about something that interests you, every day.

Schedule a bit of time into your day to make this possible. It doesn’t have to be a huge chunk of time if it’s not feasible for you, just make it something attainable. Of course, the more skills and techniques you learn that are applicable to your business, the more you’ll be able to help your business thrive.

If you commit to learning new things consistently, you’ll probably be amazed at how far you come even in the space of a few months.

You can’t expect to be successful in the long-term if you aren’t constantly growing your knowledge and evolving your expertise so take the time to invest in yourself. Developing your expertise requires time, effort, and perseverance—but, as the saying goes, nothing worth having ever comes easily. In the long run, lifelong learning makes you indispensable, adaptable, irreplaceable, and gives you a leg above the rest so it’s worth the time and effort.

How to Be Successful Tip #8: Filter the Feedback

When it comes to business, especially as a new entrepreneur when you may not have many other entrepreneurs around you, consider only taking to heart the advice that comes from people who are “in the arena with you,” AKA, other entrepreneurs. Be wary of advice coming from people who aren’t also “in the arena” or at least take it with a grain of salt.

This concept is derived from a speech Theodore Roosevelt made in 1910:

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

If those words don’t sum up entrepreneurship, then we don’t know what does.

We include this quote to remind you to be careful who you take your advice from when it comes to starting your business and building the life you want for yourself. To be successful, it might serve you well to only take advice from people who are “in the arena” with you; the people who are also taking risks, innovating and investing in their own entrepreneurial endeavors. The ones who actually know what it takes and have walked in your shoes before.

The advice from these people will likely come from a place of knowing what it takes to get where you want to go and the advice from others who aren’t in the arena with you is likely to come from a place of fear or a place of misunderstanding.

Figure out whose advice to take and filter out the rest.

How to Be Successful Tip #9: Learn from Those Who Have Succeeded You

You’re not the first entrepreneur and you certainly won’t be the last so learn from those who have gone before you (those who have succeeded you—no pun intended) so you don’t make the same mistakes as them.

Check out case studies, read founder stories, study your competitors, and learn from existing online stores to avoid pitfalls others have faced and get through challenges more effortlessly by understanding how others have handled them.

To get started, check out our case studies and Starter Story.

How to Be Successful Tip #10: Collaborate with People You Can Learn From

Part of success comes down to surrounding yourself with the right people. Being around other people who are successful or are at least trying to implement success-generating habits in their life will help influence you to maintain successful habits and achieve success, too.

When it comes to building your business, try to surround yourself with people you can learn from. Develop products with other brand owners, collaborate on projects with other entrepreneurs, and partner with other creators to learn from them and push each other to achieve more and do better.

By collaborating with people you can learn from you’ll work better, be more productive, be held accountable, and typically, you’ll be more likely to execute on what you set out to achieve.

How to Be Successful Tip #11: Understand the Trajectory of Success

You’ve probably heard this before, but the path to success is not a straight line. When some new entrepreneurs think of achieving their goals they think that they just have to hop from one successful accomplish to another, however, that’s rarely how it ever works out.

Usually, what happens while you’re working towards your goals are moments of successful accomplishments with the added frustrations of setbacks, challenges, and failures peppered in between. These can often make our successes feel like they’re few and far between or that every successful step forward comes with two steps back, but that’s just the reality of life.

Things rarely go to plan, people you depend on fail you, you fail yourself, or outside forces that you have no control over impede your progress. This doesn’t just happen to you, it happens to everyone, and you just have to work through it.

So no matter what you face along your entrepreneurial journey just know that to be successful, you’ll face some things along the way that are going to test you. Do what you can to get through those moments and just know that better things are always on the horizon and just because you experience failures doesn’t mean that you aren’t on the track to success.

Robert F. Kennedy said it best when he said, “Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.” So instead of dissolving into your shell when you experience a setback or make an error, see it as an opportunity to learn something and grow from the struggle.

Each and every entrepreneurial journey is slightly different, but two things remain constant:

• They’re all extraordinary in their own unique way
• They’re all long-term missions

You have years to make mistakes—and years to learn from them! If something goes wrong, just remember you’re in this for the long game. One day, you’ll look back on the hard times and realize how far you’ve come as a business owner. So, stick it out, learn from every experience, and continue hustling!

How to Be Successful Tip #12: Think Like a Successful Entrepreneur

There’s a saying that goes, “The biggest mistake a small business can make is to think like a small business,” and the same goes for entrepreneurs. This biggest mistake you can make as an inexperienced entrepreneur is to think like an inexperienced entrepreneur. If you want to be successful, you need to start thinking like a successful entrepreneur.

This is something you’ll need to train your mind to do. When you’re making decisions for your business ask yourself, “As a successful entrepreneur, what’s the best choice I can make for my business in this situation?” And then really try to think from the perspective of the successful entrepreneurs that you admire.

Would successful entrepreneurs take the easy way out in the face of challenges? Would successful entrepreneurs shy away from making important decisions? Would successful entrepreneurs make excuses? Would successful entrepreneurs stay committed to their approach even when it turns out they’ve made the wrong decision?

In most cases, probably not.

When inexperienced entrepreneurs think like inexperienced entrepreneurs, they often take the easy way out, let failure set them back, shy away from making important decisions, make excuses, and stick to bad decisions—simply because no one is watching and no one has any expectations for them.

Successful entrepreneurs have a reputation to uphold, they have expectations that they and others have placed on them and they need to fulfill their promises because they have people who depend on them. This means that they have to make sure that they and their businesses are successful so they approach their mindset from this perspective.

Approach your own business from the same mindset and you’ll likely see that you get through challenges with more tenacity and you’ll see your goals through to the finish line.

Conclusion

We hope you took something away from this article! In short, if you want to start walking on the road to success, we highly suggest putting these tips into action and making personal development a priority. When you do, you’ll likely be astonished at what you can accomplish.

The post How to Be Successful at Entrepreneurship and at Life appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.

That first venture sparked a passion that led me to start this blog, A Better Lemonade Stand. What began as a simple personal journal quickly transformed into a mission to empower others to build something of their own.

Reflecting on this journey, several pivotal realizations emerge:

• My first business and blog became my North Star, guiding me on a decade-long journey of growth and discovery. It taught me invaluable skills like digital marketing, teaching complex subjects through writing, and the art of building a brand from scratch.
• This blog unlocked an incredible network of like-minded entrepreneurs who continually push me to level up. The connections I’ve made through A Better Lemonade Stand have been instrumental in my growth as an entrepreneur and as a person.
• It opened doors to once-in-a-lifetime opportunities, from joining Shopify pre-IPO to experiencing the journey of going public. These experiences have shaped my perspective on entrepreneurship and reinforced the importance of taking action, even in the face of uncertainty.

After ten years of riding the e-commerce wave, I began to see the bigger picture. The rapid advancements in technology and the rise of no-code tools revealed a new path: becoming a digital polymath. This pivot wasn’t just about changing my focus but about expanding my horizons and leveraging the versatile knowledge I had accumulated over the years.

Returning to my roots with a renewed sense of purpose, I’m now focused on exploring and sharing the intersection of advanced tech, no-code tools, and the power of versatile knowledge. This journey isn’t just about running a business; it’s about continuously learning, adapting, and embracing the role of a digital polymath in the ever-evolving landscape of entrepreneurship.

The Power of Generalism in the Digital Renaissance

We’re living in an era of unparalleled change and opportunity – the Digital Renaissance. This time is marked by the rise of generative AI, no-code tools, and automation, which are democratizing technology and empowering a new generation of digital polymaths.

As a generalist, you have a unique advantage in this rapidly evolving landscape. Your diverse skill set, adaptability, and innovative problem-solving approach enable you to navigate the complexities of entrepreneurship with agility. In my own journey, being a generalist has allowed me to:

• Master digital marketing, from SEO to social media advertising
• Craft compelling content that resonates with my audience
• Analyze data to make data-driven decisions and optimize for growth
• Wear many hats and tackle challenges head-on, from customer service to product development

These diverse skills have been instrumental in my success as an entrepreneur, enabling me to adapt to changing market conditions and seize new opportunities as they arise.

Action Creates Opportunity

As entrepreneurs, we often fixate on the end goal of financial success, neglecting the transformative power of the journey itself. I’ve seen it time and again – when you create something, even something small, and pour your heart into it, people take notice. Opportunities emerge that you never could have anticipated.

It’s less about what you choose to build and more about the fact that you’re building something at all. Consistently taking action, however small, is the real key to unlocking new doors.

Why You Have To Be An Entrepreneur

When most people think of entrepreneurship, they think of it in a vacuum – an all or nothing thing. Either you work for someone else, or you work for yourself. However, with an online business and the level of automation available now, you can be an entrepreneur while also enjoying the benefits of a full-time career. This is important because I believe that some level of entrepreneurship is necessary for everyone.

Entrepreneurship is About Security

It wasn’t that long ago that everyone was an entrepreneur. The industrial age changed that. By the turn of the twentieth century, it became the norm to work for someone else. Jobs were plenty, pay was great, and the American dream was something that actually existed. Unfortunately, we’re no longer in the industrial age. We’re in a new age now, one that many refer to as the Information Age. While the name sounds promising, for many of the unprepared, it’s going to be a career slaughter-fest.

The next 20 years will see many jobs being replaced with further advancements in robotics, computers, and machine learning. In fact, up to 47% of jobs in the United States are at high risk of being replaced by technology within a decade or two. These vulnerable professions are no longer restricted to manual or menial labor but have evolved to encompass knowledge and skill-based work as well.

Employment is undoubtedly changing, and we’re already seeing this transition take place. Starting entrepreneurship now will better prepare you for what is coming.

It’s About Owning More Shares In Your Life

No single man, woman, or company should ever be able to take away your entire livelihood, yet when you work a corporate job and a corporate job alone, your boss is judge, jury, and executioner for 100% of your income. One person can decide your fate.

By having your own business or even a small micro-business in addition to your job, you maintain more control over your life. No longer can a single person strip you of all your income. This is a much more powerful position to be in. Just one extra income stream changes everything.

It’s About Learning More Skills To Make You Indispensable

Building, launching, and growing your own online business will likely teach you at least 10x the number of new skills than you’ve learned in the last 10 years. By starting your own business, you’ll be forced to learn things like photography, copywriting, HTML/CSS, internet marketing, conversion optimization, human psychology, customer service, negotiations, and accounting.

All these skills will make you an overall better, more interesting, more indispensable person. These skills can also translate into a better career, if you choose to continue that path as well.

Why You Have To Start Entrepreneurship Early

I started my life of entrepreneurship pretty early with lemonade and vegetable stands in front of the house I grew up in. This level of entrepreneurship evolved as the years went on. In my college days, I tried and failed miserably at consulting and a few other fly-by-night business startups and projects. However, each one of those experiences acted as a step that got me to the next level.

Entrepreneurship is a skill that can hardly be taught. It’s something that takes practice, experience, and time. Here’s why:

1. You must relearn much of what you’ve been taught.

For most people, becoming a successful entrepreneur doesn’t just happen overnight. You’ve been trained your entire life to be an employee, to work in the industrial age. Your decisions generally need approval or have been filtered through many others. Entrepreneurship requires unlearning these habits and developing new ones.

2. Failure is inherent.

There are very few entrepreneurs who have been wildly successful on their first shot, maybe even their second time around. A business is simply the sum of 1, then 10, then 100, then 1,000, then 10,000 decisions that you have to make. Each decision will have a direct impact on your business. You will make wrong decisions, but you’ll learn from each one and its direct impact on your business, using that information to make your next decision better.

3. Time Value of Opportunities (TVO).

There’s a principle in finance called Time Value of Money (TVM), which states that $1 today is worth more than $1 tomorrow. The same principle holds true for being an entrepreneur and starting an online business. A business or opportunity acted upon today is worth more than one acted upon tomorrow, because of the potential earning and future opportunity generating capacity. In the context of an online business, this happens in several ways:

• Domain age and search engine trust
• Traffic growth and optimization
• Email list growth and conversion
• Influence and credibility building
• Network and connection expansion
• Revenue growth and optimization
• Brand building and customer experiences
• New opportunities emerging from hitting milestones and achievements

Where Should You Start And What Should You Do?

Almost everything comes down to building an audience and providing value. Here are some ideas to get you started:

• Start an Ecommerce Business: Platforms like Shopify, WooCommerce, and BigCommerce make it easy to set up an online store and start selling physical or digital products to a targeted audience.
• Start a Blog: Share your knowledge, experiences, and insights on a topic you’re passionate about. Blogging helps establish your expertise, attract an audience, and open up monetization opportunities.
• Start a Podcast: Audio content is increasingly popular, and starting a podcast can help you build a loyal audience around a specific topic or theme. Interview guests, share stories, or teach valuable lessons.
• Start a YouTube Channel: Video content is a powerful way to engage with your audience. Create tutorials, product reviews, entertaining content, or document your entrepreneurial journey to build a community.
• Start an Email Newsletter: Collect email addresses and send regular newsletters with valuable content, updates, and promotions. Email marketing allows you to nurture relationships and drive conversions.

Actionable Tips for Aspiring Entrepreneurs

If you’re just starting out on your entrepreneurial journey, here are some practical tips to help you navigate the digital landscape:

1. Identify opportunities at the intersection of emerging trends and market needs. Look for problems that need solving and opportunities for innovation.
2. Validate your ideas through market research, customer interviews, and small-scale testing. Use tools like Google Trends, SurveyMonkey, and Google Forms to gather data and insights.
3. Leverage the power of generative AI and no-code tools to streamline your operations, enhance your creativity, and personalize your customer experiences. Explore platforms like Midjourney, Copy.ai, Zapier, and Airtable to automate tasks and create content.
4. Develop a strong online presence through compelling branding, engaging content, and strategic digital marketing. Use tools like Canva, Adobe Creative Cloud, and Hootsuite to create and manage your brand assets and social media presence.
5. Embrace a mindset of continuous learning and adaptability. Take online courses, attend workshops, and join communities to stay up-to-date with the latest trends and best practices in your industry.

Your Personal Growth is the Real Reward

As you embark on your entrepreneurial journey, remember that your personal growth is the true measure of success. The skills you develop, the resilience you build, the relationships you forge – these are the things that will serve you well, no matter where your path leads.

Embrace the journey, stay curious, and never stop pushing yourself to become the best version of yourself. Start now, start small, but start something. The journey ahead may be uncertain, but one thing is clear – in the Digital Renaissance, fortune favors the bold.

Join our community of creators, innovators, and risk-takers who are redefining what’s possible in the digital realm. Together, we’ll navigate the challenges, seize the opportunities, and build the businesses of tomorrow.

Embrace your inner digital polymath, take that first step, and let’s create something extraordinary together.

Many years ago, I decided to start something, my first ecommerce business. I didn’t know what to sell, but I knew I wanted to try my hand at ecommerce. So, after months of searching for a product to sell online and not being able to find a perfect product, I chose one at random. Even though I had no interest in the product I was selling, I worked hard and gave my new business the attention and detail it deserved.

My passion for starting and running an ecommerce business led me to start this blog, even though I had no real idea as to the direction I wanted to take with it. To be completely honest, it wasn’t supposed to be anything more than a journal of my thoughts on ecommerce—mostly for myself. However, again, I gave this blog what any new project deserves: attention and detail.

It’s been nearly five years since I started my first ecommerce business and three years since I registered ABetterLemonadeStand.com. Looking back and distilling the last few years of my life, I’ve noted a few things:

Update - May 2024: It has now been 12 years since I registered 

My first ecommerce business and this blog were directly responsible for solidifying my path in life. Not a temporary affair with a new hobby, but a steadfast direction.

My first ecommerce business led me into the world of online marketing, prior to that, I had zero experience with digital marketing.

This blog helped me to uncover a talent of breaking down complicated, non-linear subjects and teaching others through writing, uncovering a skill I didn’t know I had.

My new found talent led me to discover something I am now even more passionate about, inspiring others to be bolder and to build something of their own.

This blog introduced me to others that were passionate about entrepreneurship. Through these new relationships, I became fortunate enough to be able to participate in one of the most exclusive Mastermind groups in the world, surrounding me with entrepreneurs that inspire me to be better every day.

It had me scouted by Shopify to join them in their vision of making ecommerce better. A position that receives hundreds of applications, and one I was fortunate enough to receive without ever even handing over a resume. My blog and ecommerce businesses spoke for me.

After a year and a half, working at Shopify led me to experience a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity of being part of a 2 billion dollar tech company going public on the NYSE and TSX.

Now, I’ve left Shopify, still steadfast on the same path of building things and helping entrepreneurs.

So What’s The Point?

Many times, us entrepreneurs get so caught up in the game of perusing money that we forget to calculate the value of the unexpected events that happen to us along the way.

Life and entrepreneurship are rarely linear. Ultimately, all I did was start something and I gave it the care and attention it deserved. The rest of the script was mostly written by external forces and couldn’t have been scripted or predicted.

And that’s the point. Starting something and giving it the attention and detail it deserves. If you do that, I truly believe the rest of the script will write itself.

Action Creates Opportunity

Action creates opportunity. I’ve seen it time and time again. When you create something, even something seemingly small and you apply attention and detail, people notice. That will create new opportunities.

It’s happened with every business I have started. Even starting something as small as a simple t-shirt business can spawn new and interesting opportunities, but only if you give it the attention and detail it deserves.

I wholeheartedly believe it’s much less about what you do, rather the fact that you actually do something and you do it well.

Why You Have To Be An Entrepreneur

When most people think of entrepreneurship, they think of it in a vacuum. An all or nothing thing. Either you work for someone else or you work for yourself. Many people neglect to consider that with an online business and the level of automation available now,  you can be an entrepreneur while also enjoying the benefits of a full-time career. This is important because I believe that some level of entrepreneurship is necessary for everyone.

Let me explain…

Entrepreneurship is About Security

It wasn’t that long ago that everyone was an entrepreneur. The industrial age changed that. By the turn of the twentieth century, it became the norm to work for someone else. Jobs were plenty, pay was great, and the American dream was something that actually existed. Unfortunately, we’re no longer in the industrial age. It’s come and gone. We’re in a new age now, one that many refer to as the Information Age. While the name sounds promising, for many of the unprepared, it’s going to be a career slaughter-fest. The next 20 years will see many jobs being replaced with further advancements in robotics, computers and machine learning. In fact, up to 47% of jobs in the United States are at high risk of being replaced by technology within a decade or two. These vulnerable professions are no longer restricted to manual or menial labor but have evolved to encompass knowledge and skill-based work as well.

When you consider that and then look at the rapid rate in which work pensions are declining, add to that the rise in living costs and things don’t look great for the traditional corporate work role.

Jeff Goins recently wrote a great piece on this. In it he said:

The best way to keep a job in the future, it seems, is to do the opposite of what our parents did: Don’t rely too heavily on any single job. Make yourself indispensable by acquiring more than a single skill, and combine those skills in interesting ways, finding where your talents and passions can align with the demands of an ever-changing market.” —Jeff Goins

As Jeff also points out, employment is undoubtedly changing, and we’re already seeing this transition take place. In fact, some statistics say that as soon as 2020, 50 percent of the workforce will be contract employees or self-employed. Starting entrepreneurship now will better prepare you for what is coming.

It’s About Owning More Shares In Your Life

No single man, woman or company should ever be able to take away your entire livelihood, yet when your work a corporate job and a corporate job alone, your boss is judge, jury, and executioner for 100% of your income. One person can decide your fate. They can decide if you can pay your rent/mortgage and if you’ll be able to put food on the table for your family.

By having your own business or even a small micro-business in addition to your job, you maintain more control over your life. No longer can a single person strip you of all your income. This is a much more powerful position to be in. Just one extra income stream changes everything.

Ask yourself this: How would your job be different for you if you had a business that was bringing in even a modest amount like $500 or $1,000 each month? Knowing that if you had to leave your job or was asked to leave, you already had another income stream (that you could likely make even more money with, now that you have more free time). Knowing that if your boss isn’t treating you fairly you can walk away with confidence. Knowing that you had more time and could be more picky about your job search if you’re in between jobs. Knowing that if you are looking for another job, you can be that much bolder in your salary negotiations?

Yes, entrepreneurship can allow for all of this because you own more shares in your own life.

It’s About Learning More Skills To Make You Indispensable

Building, launching, and growing your own online business will likely teach you at least 10x the number of new skills than you’ve learned in the last 10 years. By starting your own business, you’ll be forced to learn things like photography, copywriting, HTML/CSS, internet marketing, conversion optimization, human psychology, customer service, negotiations, and accounting.

All these skills will make you an overall better, more interesting, more indispensable person. Again, all this can also translate into a better career, if you choose to continue that path as well.

Why You Have To Start Entrepreneurship Early

I started my life of entrepreneurship pretty early with lemonade and vegetable stands in front of the house I grew up in. This level of entrepreneurship evolved as the years went on. In my college days, I tried and failed miserably at consulting and a few other fly-by-night business startups and projects. However, each one of those experience acted as a step that got me to the next level.

Entrepreneurship is a skill that can hardly be taught. It’s something that takes practice, experience, and time.

Let me explain:

1. You must relearn much of what you’ve been taught. 

For most people, becoming a successful entrepreneur doesn’t just happen. It’s not like you’re working at a corporate job one day, decide to quit and start a successful business the next. You see, for your entire life, you’ve been trained to be an employee, you’ve been trained to work in the industrial age.

Your decisions generally need approval or they have been filtered through many others. This helps prevent you from making the wrong decision. It’s like wrapping a playground in bubble wrap. While it’s safer, it’s not much fun.

2. Failure is inherent.

There are very few entrepreneurs who have been wildly successful on their first shot. Maybe even their second time around.

A business is simply the sum of 1, then 10, then 100, then 1,000, then 10,000 decisions that you have to make. Each decision will have a direct impact on your business.

What if you make the wrong decision?

You will and you’ll learn from each decision and it’s direct impact on your business, using that information to make your next decision better. Sometimes, you’ll make a series of wrong decisions and your business will fail, but you’ll learn from these decisions and you’ll make a better series of choices for your next business. All these lessons take time and sometimes, going through multiple failures to learn from.

3. Time Value of Opportunities (TVO).

There’s a principle in finance called Time Value of Money (TVM). Basically, it states that $1 today is worth more than $1 tomorrow.

The idea that money available at the present time is worth more than the same amount in the future is due to its potential earning capacity. This core principle of finance holds that, provided money can earn interest, any amount of money is worth more the sooner it is received.

I believe the same principle holds true for being an entrepreneur and starting an online business. Provided no major external factors, a business or opportunity acted upon today is worth more than a business or opportunity acted upon tomorrow, because of the potential earning and future opportunity generating capacity (action creates opportunity). In this sense, earning capacity for an online business refers to more than just money. When it comes to an online business, this happens in several ways:

• Domain Name: Domain names get better with age. Search engines see the age of your domain as a sign of trust in their ranking algorithm.
• Traffic: With a little bit of honest hard work and best practices you’ll build your traffic. Over time, you’ll learn which channels deliver the most traffic and the most qualified traffic so you can optimize your marketing and build more traffic consistently.
• Subscribers: In the world of online marketing email addresses mean money. The longer you’re around the more emails you can collect. Over time, you’ll also learn how to better build your email funnel to collect more emails from your particular visitors and you’ll learn more about how to convert those emails into paying customers.
• Influence: The longer you’re around, the more credibility you build and the more influence potential you have. Others in your industry will start seeing you as an expert and people will ask for your opinions and feedback.
• Connections: The more influence and presence you have, the more connections to make which are critical to growth. Your network is your net worth. It takes some to build your network and connections but the longer you’re in a particular field, the more time you have to build relevant and key relationships.
• Revenues: Revenues can fluctuate, but in general, the longer you’re around, provided to keep yourself and your business relevant, the more money you’ll make. You learn more about what works and what doesn’t work. You grow revenues by focusing more time on what works. Day after day, month after month, year after year.
• Brand: A brand isn’t created overnight. A brand is the sum of your customer’s experiences with your business. The longer you’re around, the more experiences visitors and customers have with your business, the stronger you can build relationships and the better your brand has the potential to become.
• Opportunities: Opportunities seldom come out of nowhere and for no reason. They usually manifest themselves in direct relation to you hitting milestones and achievements that others end up recognizing and the desire for them to want to align themselves with you (i.e. action creates opportunity).

Where Should You Start And What Should You Do?

Almost everything comes down to providing value and building an audience. If you’re not ready to sell a product quite yet, start by building some type of audience that you can always sell something of value to later. If you know what type of product you will want to sell (but just don’t have the means to sell yet) then you will likely want to create something around that niche and product so that you can attract the appropriate audience. If you’re still unsure what you’ll sell, I would suggest building a community and audience around something you’re fundamentally interested in.

Below, I have listed several ideas that you can use to start building something immediately around a particular niche:

• Start an Ecommerce Business
• Start a Blog
• Start a Podcast
• Start a YouTube Channel
• Start an Email Newsletter
• Build a Landing Page and Collect Emails
• Build a Facebook Group (not a page)
• Build an Instagram Account
• Build a Twitter Account

Conclusion

We’re no longer living in the 20th century ruled by assembly lines and falling in line. The information age is ripe with opportunity for those that are willing to take the chance to embrace and pursue it. Unfortunately, for many workers, the information age won’t be kind. Like many times before, those that don’t adapt will be left behind.

Entrepreneurship is a lifelong process that requires old ways of thinking to be forgotten and new skills to be learned. Despite the challenges and inherent risks, it is becoming increasingly obvious that you’ll need to know how to make some money yourself, without relying on others.

The good news is that it’s never been easier to be an entrepreneur. If you think it’s difficult to scrape together a few hundred dollars to start your online business, consider the time your parents and grandparents grew up in. Not even 25 years ago, they would have to risk everything and get a loan for hundreds of thousands of dollars to open a physical storefront. A single failure could be catastrophic for an entire family, but here we are today, starting businesses in 24 hours, for the cost of a pack of razor blades.

Embrace the opportunities of the Information Age and prepare for what’s coming. Start something. Build something. Grow something. I promise you, it will be the best decision of your life.

The post Start Something. appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.

Time management apps work wonders for helping you manage your time, input, and ultimately, output better.

Entrepreneurs tend to work for themselves, by themselves and stereotypically struggle with focus, time management, productivity, and deadlines—and, as you’ve probably already experienced for yourself, poor time management comes in many forms!

It doesn’t matter whether it’s deliberate procrastination, genuine distractions, or jobs taking longer than they should—there’s nothing worse than wasting time when you’re already time-poor.

Missing deadlines, stress, and, wasting precious business opportunities are three of the many unfortunate consequences of bad time management. In light of this, we’ve listed and reviewed some of the best time management apps, tools, and resources that help entrepreneurs stay on track.

Let’s dive straight in!

Best Time Management Apps #1: Toggl

Toggl is a fabulous app for helping track your time. Period.

It follows how long you’re spending on specific tasks and allows you to enter and manage your projects manually.

Best of all, you can find and monitor your various workloads by organizing them into:

• Teams
• Clients
• Projects
• Tags

By doing this, you’ll be able to locate and analyze entries within seconds.

You can also add notes into each description box so you can later recall your movements and actions when you then look back at your schedule.

Toggl is also an excellent app if you have a team to manage. From the convenience of one place, you can easily invite each of your workers to specific projects and keep an eye on every team member’s productivity.

You’ll also receive detailed reports on how you (and your team) spend your time. You can choose to review your productivity by week, month, or even year. This should give you a better feel for which projects take the most time, and which team members (if any) struggle to keep up with the pace!

If you’re a paid Toggl user, you’ll also receive detailed insights into how you and your team can better optimize your time—how awesome is that?!

This app is available on:

• iOS
• Android
• Mac

As such, you can track your time across mobile and desktop devices via apps and internet browser extensions. Plus, you can sync Toggl across all your devices, so it doesn’t matter what you’re using, you’ll always have access to the info you need in real-time.

How Much Will Toggl Set Me Back?

You’ll be pleased to hear that Toggl offers a free version. However, you can upgrade to unlock extra features with one of their three paid-for packages:

• Starter: $9 per user per month
• Premium: $18 per user per month
• Enterprise: Custom pricing

Best Time Management Apps #2: The Be Focused Timer

As its name suggests, the Be Focused Timer is a timer that enables entrepreneurs to track their current workload as well as analyze their previous work history. This app is excellent for managing your tasks, business targets, and maximizing your overall productivity.

How Much Will Be Focused Timer Set Me Back?

This app is entirely free and available on iOS devices and Macs.

Best Time Management Apps # 3: Workflow

Workflow is an outstanding app if you value customizability.

This is how it works: Workflow gradually shaves off the amount of time you spend doing routine tasks by automating the complicated jobs you do on your phone.

You can create shortcuts and new apps using simple drag-and-drop commands—both of which come in handy for performing batches of tasks.

It doesn’t matter whether you want directions from Google Maps for an upcoming conference or you need Dropbox to backup your documents—you can create custom apps to handle these kinds of tasks for you, with just a few simple taps on your screen!

Best of all, Workflow seamlessly integrates with other apps like Facebook, Uber, and YouTube.

How Much Will Workflow Set Me Back?

Workflow doesn’t cost a dime—yes, you read that right, it’s completely free! However, it’s only available on iOS devices, so if you’re an Android user, this isn’t the app for you. It’s also worth noting that Workflow conveniently operates inside iOS apps like Safari and Evernote.

Best Time Management Apps #4: Focus Booster

Focus Booster utilizes the Pomodoro Technique to track your work. If you’re unsure what the Pomodoro Technique is, it’s a time management method created in the late 80s by Francesco Cirillo. Basically, you use a timer to section your work into time intervals (AKA, Pomodoros), which are then separated by short breaks.

Focus Booster also provides in-depth insight as to how you spend your time. Not to mention, you can even link your revenue to specific Pomodoros, so you can see the financial impact your work has with just a glance!

Focus Booster works with iOS and Android devices and is available as a web app.

How Much Will Focus Booster Set Me Back?

Focus Booster has a free version, known as their Starter Plan. Alternatively, you can upgrade to their Individual Plan at $2.99 per month or their Professional Plan at $4.99 per month—both of which are incredibly reasonable if you’re working within a tight budget!

Best Time Management Apps #5: Shift

Shift is a handy desktop tool that empowers you to organize your emails—especially if you have multiple accounts. With a simple click, you can move from one email account to another and stay focused on whatever task you’re working on rather than flitting between projects.

Gone are the days where you had to log out and back in to access the emails you’ve received on different addresses. So, if you’re running numerous projects associated with different email accounts, this is the app for you.

For your convenience, Shift also integrates with apps like Trello, Calendly, and Airbnb.

How Much Will Shift Set Me Back?

Shift’s Basic package is free and available on Mac computers. Alternatively, if you want to access more features, you can upgrade to their Pro plan at $29.99 per year or their Advanced bundle at $99.99 per year.

Best Time Management Apps #6: Kiwake Alarm Clock

As you’ve probably guessed, the Kiwake Alarm Clock works as an alarm clock—but the key difference is that you can’t hit snooze! This ingeniously removes the temptation to spend an extra five, ten, or even 30 minutes lazing around.

If you want to switch off the alarm (which we assume you will!), Kiwake forces you to get out of bed, play a brain game, and browse your goals for the day—making it ideal for anyone wanting to become a morning person.

How Much Will the Kiwake Alarm Clock Set Me Back?

The Kiwake Alarm Clock costs $7.99 and is available on iOS devices.

Best Time Management Apps #7: RescueTime

As its name suggests, RescueTime is a time-tracking app that—just like Toggl—records how you spend your time on the web.

It’s great if you want to get an accurate feel for what you’re doing with your day—from procrastinating on social media to all the websites you visit as well as the apps you’re using—it’ll reveal it all.

RescueTime even sends notifications to tell you when you’re spending too much time on specific tasks, so you can take back control of what you achieve within your working hours.

You’ll also get access to in-depth reports and daily highlights to help monitor your progress. Knowledge is power. Once you know you’re wasting time, you can take the necessary action to eliminate distractions, and eventually reap the rewards of boosted productivity.

If you opt for RescueTime’s Premium package, they’ll even temporarily block you from websites that tempt you away from your work!

You can access RescueTime via:

• iOS
• Android
• OS X
• Windows
• Linux

How Much Will RescueTime Set Me Back?

RescueTime Lite is entirely free. Alternatively, you can access their premium features for $9 per month or $72 for the year if you’re happy to pay upfront.

Best Time Management Apps #8: The Loop Habit Tracker

More often than not, poor productivity is linked to bad habits. This is where Loop comes into its own.

This app aims to help you shed these unhealthy habits, so you can enjoy a more productive day—both workwise and in your personal life.

Just set the goal(s) you want to achieve and Loop populates tons of “recipes” which are recommended daily behaviors to help break bad habits. If you stick to the recipes, as time goes on, these new behaviors should eventually come naturally to you.

How Much Will Loop Set Me Back?

Loop is totally free and available to download on Android devices.

Best Time Management Apps #9: Timely

Timely is another intuitive scheduling and time-tracking app. Within minutes, you can organize your workweek for you and your team and keep an eye on how long each project takes to complete. Timely displays your working week in advance to help you predict the amount of time you’ll need for the completion of all your jobs.

As time goes on, you can compare how long you guessed a project would take with how long it actually took. This kind of information helps to schedule your time in the future more accurately.

Timely is available on:

• iOS
• Android
• Mac
• Windows
• As an internet browser app

How Much Will Timely Set Me Back?

Timely starts at $7 per month for an individual user.

Best Time Management Apps #10: Freedom

Freedom blocks the sites and apps that tempt you to procrastinate rather than work. As fun as scrolling through Buzzfeed and checking social media is, it can damage your productivity.

You can set recurring work sessions which start automatically. During these pre-set times, Freedom prevents you from accessing content that could potentially disrupt your focus.

Freedom is available on iOS, Mac, and Windows devices.

How Much Will Freedom Set Me Back?

Freedom costs either $6.99 per month, $2.42 per month for one year’s access, or an upfront cost of $129.00 per year.

Best Time Management Apps #11: Trello

Trello is arguably one of the most popular productivity apps on the market. It’s an incredibly flexible and dynamic project management tool where you can organize pending tasks and collaborate with colleagues—all from the convenience of one platform.

This is how it works: Trello allows you to visualize each of your projects as lists pinned on digital bulletin boards so you and your team can monitor each of your workflows with just a glance.

Now, each of these lists comprises of “cards” which are just individual posts. You can use these to detail your targets, ideas, tasks (or whatever else you want to communicate with the team). As such, it doesn’t matter whether you’re coordinating your next business venture or writing a shopping list for the office, Trello molds to fit the specific needs of your business.

Members of your team can add their own comments and upload attachments which works wonders for ensuring everyone stays on the same page.

Trello is available on:

• iOS
• Android
• Mac
• Windows

How Much Will Trello Set Me Back?

Trello offers its users a free version. Alternatively, if you want access to their premium features, you’ll need to shell out for either a Business Class or Enterprise account.

Best Time Management Apps #12: Noisli

Noisli offers something a little different. This app plays atmospheric background noises to help you block out distractions. Users report that this really helps them to knuckle down and focus on the task at hand.

You can select one of Noisli’s pre-set combos or pick categories of sounds like nature or ocean tones. Alternatively, you can even craft your own mix of noises—it’s entirely up to you!

How Much Will Noisli Set Me Back?

To use Noisli on a desktop device, it’s completely free. You can access it either by their web app or the Google Chrome extension. Alternatively, if you’d prefer to use their mobile app (compatible with iOS devices), you’ll have to pay $1.99—which is still incredibly reasonable!

Best Time Management Apps #13: MyLifeOrganized

MyLifeOrganized allows users to drag-and-drop, flag, and organize their tasks. One of the best things about this app is that all the information is displayed on one simple yet elegant-looking interface.

This tool comes in especially handy for managing unusually large projects, as you’re able to create subtasks to help you keep on track.

Their paid-for packages include access to MyLifeOrganized’s automated smart lists. In short, this is where the app analyzes your tasks and deadlines to determine which jobs you need to prioritize.

You can also set geo-based reminders, which are useful for running business-related errands—picking up coffee, office supplies, going to meetings (you know the drill). This app notifies you whenever you’re near a location where you need to do something.

With MyLifeOrganized, you can stay on track across a whole array of devices—iOS, Android, and Windows. If you opt for a paid-for plan, you’ll also get cloud-based access.

How Much Will MyLifeOrganized Set Me Back?

MyLifeOrganized offers users numerous pricing packages which range from $0 to $59.95—so you’re bound to find a bundle that complements your budget.

Best Time Management Apps #14: OmniFocus

OmniFocus allows you to add your to-do list to your calendar, so you never forget a thing. You can group and filter tasks by adding tags that represent locations, people, energy levels, or priorities.

OmniFocus also sends you notifications to remind you when you have a deadline or an important event coming up, so you won’t have to keep checking their in-app calendar for updates.

Last but not least, you can even sync your data so you can always access the latest version of your calendar on all your iOS devices and Macs.

How Much Will OmniFocus Set Me Back?

OmniFocus offers two pricing plans:

• The Standard Plan: $39.99
• The Pro Plan: $79.99

Best Time Management Apps #15: Focus@Will

Focus@Will is another time management app that provides users with plenty of features to maximize their time better. For example, Focus@Will plays music as well as a variety of other relaxing noises scientifically proven to increase focus by as much as four times!

Developed by three neuroscientists who spent a great deal of time reviewing studies and conducting their own, you can be confident that this app is the real deal.

Focus@Will hosts an exclusive compilation of music to assist you in different scenarios. For example, you can choose a playlist tailored to your work—it doesn’t matter whether you’re running the day-to-day of your business or completing an assignment, Focus@Will has a playlist to suit your needs.

Focus@Will claims to have a specific type of music to help nearly anyone boost their productivity. Just plug in a few details about yourself and this app will play harmonious tunes optimized to your unique set of circumstances.

Focus@Will syncs and works across all your devices, which means you can pick up wherever you left off. At the time of writing, Focus@Will is currently available for both Android and Mac users. However, it’s also reported that an app for iOS devices is soon to be released, so keep your eyes peeled for an update on that.

How Much Will Focus@Will Cost Me?

This app is free, however, if you want to register more than one user to your account, you’ll have to pay a monthly fee.

Best Time Management Apps #16: Pocket

Pocket is a bookmarking app. Put simply, you can save all kinds of web content to come back to at a later date.

Why is this necessary?

Well, never again will you lose focus on your work to an interesting article. Instead, just use Pocket to save everything in one place for you to enjoy after you’ve finished work.

Likewise, you can respect your leisure time by saving work-related content to look at during working hours. After all, everyone deserves some time off.

Pocket also makes it easy to discover new content based on your individual preferences. So, when you decide to delve back into the content you’ve saved, you can immerse yourself in plenty of other relevant materials. This comes in handy for learning new skills to grow your business or researching new topics.

Pocket is available to use with Android, iOS, Mac and Windows devices and boasts numerous internet browser extensions.

How Much Will Pocket Set Me Back?

Pocket offers a free plan for users to try. Alternatively, you can pay $5 per month or $45 per year for an ad-free experience as well as access to a broader list of features.

Best Time Management Apps #17: Asana

Asana is a fabulous task manager for keeping track of day-to-day activities—especially if you’re working in sales.

Sales reps can manage both their leads and customers—as well as collaborate with other team members—all from the luxury of one place.

Asana is available on iOS, Android, and Desktop devices.

How Much Will Asana Set Me Back?

The Basic Plan won’t cost you a dollar, it’s completely free, whereas the Premium Plan will set you back $9.99 per user per month (billed annually). Alternatively, there’s the Business Bundle that costs $19.99 per user per month (billed annually). Lastly, there’s an Enterprise Plan which is the most extensive of the three. If you’re interested in this, you’ll have to contact Asana’s sales team directly to get a customized quote.

Best Time Management Apps #18: Todoist

Todoist is yet another task-management tool that empowers you to organize your entire schedule. You can utilize Todoist’s handy calendar view to visualize your upcoming week (or month) with just a glance.

You can also add recurring tasks and deadlines, so you won’t have to waste time manually inputting repetitive tasks. There are even several templates for you to utilize, so you won’t have to start from scratch every time you generate a new to-do list.

You can also color code tasks to highlight which jobs are a priority. Todoist also integrates with hundreds of different apps, so if you’re already using a variety of software to run your business, you should still be able to stay on top of everything.

You can even tag each project with a different label to help you manage everything on your schedule. Plus, you’ll rack up karma points each time you complete a task on time. We love this extra feature—there’s nothing like giving yourself a virtual pat on the back for a job well done!

We also love that this tool helps you manage your team by encouraging you to assign tasks via their team delegation features.

Todoist integrates with Android, iOS, Mac, and Windows devices and can be accessed through a variety of internet browser add-ons. So, it doesn’t matter whether you’re using a desktop, laptop, or your smartphone, you can still add tasks to your to-do list.

How Much Will Todoist Set Me Back?

Todoist offers its users both free and paid-for options. Their cheapest paid-for plan (Premium) starts at $3 per month for an individual account whereas their Business accounts start at $5 per user per month.

Best Time Management Apps #19: Remember The Milk

Remember The Milk started off first as a sophisticated way to create and manage grocery lists, but now it’s way more than that. Fast forward to today and Remember The Milk is now a time management app that empowers you to create an infinite number of to-do lists with color-coded tags.

If you’re managing a larger project, you can break it up into smaller, more manageable subtasks. You can also opt to receive reminders on any looming deadlines via email, text, IM, and/or Twitter to help you get all your work done on time.

You can also attach files from your Google Drive or Dropbox to enhance your lists and share them with your team members. That’s in addition to being able to connect your Remember The Milk account with your favorite apps like Gmail, Outlook, and Google Calendar.

This app is available for Android, iOS, Mac, and Windows devices, and you can also access it through several internet browser extensions. You’ll also be pleased to hear, you can still stay connected and synced to all your devices even when you’re offline, making it an excellent option for entrepreneurs on the run!

How Much Will Remember The Milk Set Me Back?

Remember The Milk offers a free version and their cheapest paid-for plan starts at $39.99 per year.

Best Time Management Apps #20: Harvest

Simply put, Harvest is a robust time and expense tracking app which encourages you to think about time as a limited resource.

It helps you track all of your billable time so you can ensure every minute of your time is accounted for. That’s in addition to automatically creating and sending invoices to your clients to compensate you for your time.

Harvest also comes equipped with a forecasting functionality which helps you and your team budget ample time and resources to complete your projects and best of all, Harvest integrates with tons of other apps like Asana, Trello, and GitHub (just to name a few!).

You can download and use Harvest on iOS, Android, Mac, and Windows devices. There are also numerous internet browser plugins available.

How Much Will Harvest Set Me Back?

Harvest costs $12 per user per month.

Conclusion

It’s easy to feel like you spend your entire life working when you aren’t managing your time effectively—so let’s change that. By using some of the tools above, you’ll gradually start boosting your overall productivity during your working week which ultimately, should result in a healthier work-life balance.

If you’re unsure which of these 20 tools to try, consider what you’re struggling with, what you want to get from your day, and your budget. We highly recommend trying the tools that come with a free plan, as you have nothing to lose by giving them a go.

The post 20 Time Management Apps to Help You Produce More & Procrastinate Less appeared first on A Better Lemonade Stand.