How to Build an Online Business as a Solopreneur

We create our world based on the information we receive, slowly forming beliefs and ideas. Over time, these beliefs become our reality. If you reinforce them long enough, you’ll either create a story of success or settle for mediocre progress.

The biggest difference between sales and no sales situation is the lack of valid data from your customers or clients. The second biggest difference is visibility.

Avoid jumping to conclusions too soon when you experiment online. Drive as much attention as possible using content to validate your product or service and gather data to improve your market fit.

I often see people discussing scaling and the big picture before they endure the unpleasant, lonely, and uncomfortable phases of business. Nothing happens overnight. There are countless adjustments you’ll make and valuable information you’ll gain along the way.

While information is free, you need to take specific steps to build an online business, maintain attention, collect data, and adjust as you go. Without this, you risk building a beautiful structure in the wrong place—where no one is willing to live.

Start Small

Instead of making drastic life changes, start with a project that interests you. It should be something you can instantly discuss with someone who's a bit behind you on the journey.

The goal is to collect data sets:

• What worked well?

• What didn’t?

• How can you adjust to better position yourself?

This approach requires two things:

1. Offer services based on your experience.

2. Become the person capable of connecting clients to skilled professionals to fulfils their needs.

Both approaches require an investment of time or money—usually both.

Create a simple offer for your services or product and focus on getting attention. When you do, listen carefully to what people really want, how they perceive your brand, and their pain points. Not sure how to do this? Talk to them. It takes effort, but it’s necessary.

If you prefer to hire an expert to deliver the work, invest in becoming the person who understands and delivers that value. This character is always a work in progress, constantly upscaling skills and improving communication. My most recent $5K client came from an inbound lead who saw me as capable of delivering results. Within one meeting, I was able to outline a custom website with unique modules using automation and coding.

You’ve likely heard this before:

• SMMA is dead.

• Affiliate Marketing is dead.

• AI is dead.

• E-commerce is dead.

• Personal Branding is dead.

In my experience, the only thing that doesn’t work is what I don’t work on long enough. Having conclusions like these is fine, but only if you're absolutely sure it’s not for you.

The Power of Reflection

Another lesson I’ve learned is the importance of taking a pause to reflect and move in a more productive direction. Work on the right things. Mastering this isn’t easy, but with practice, it’s achievable. It will pay off a thousandfold.

I’ve invested tens of thousands of dollars to acquire knowledge, learn the lingo, and understand pain points by experimenting with content and paid ads for my own projects. This continuous improvement ensures that when opportunities come through inbound leads, I’m ready to deliver. This is the cost of becoming that character.

Where Do You Start?

Start by helping people who are 5–10 years behind you on the journey—for free. In exchange, you’ll gather invaluable data on their pain points.

To get attention, use social media. You only need 50–100 people who can relate to your content. While more is better, this is a good starting point. Even if you help only a few, that’s when you can start charging for your services.

Post 1–2 pieces of content daily on your preferred platform. You’ll invest more in time than money, but you’ll also learn how to improve.

UGC content is powerful for e-commerce. For service businesses, focus on building relationships, collecting reviews, telling stories, commenting on others’ posts, and creating case studies from your own projects.

If content creation isn’t your thing, the only alternative is paid ads. If you can afford to spend, dedicate time to creating great ad creatives. You’ll pay more in money than time but also learn how to run ads effectively.

I recommend doing both: talking to people online and offline and making content. I do ads for my e-commerce projects and create content for my agency, Observant Convo. My most recent lead came from chatting with someone while sharing an Uber ride.

How I Can Help You

I can help you in two ways:

1. Need clarity? Book a 15-minute call where you can ask anything. This isn’t a sales call—we’re just talking to see if I can help or point you in the right direction. You’ll have access to my 10 years of experience running online businesses—both my own and the businesses I’ve helped.

2. Setup support: I can help you set up your front-end website and back-end CRM system, and assist in tuning your workflows and funnels. This is ideal if you are committed to driving traffic to your offer, either using content or paid ads.

I’m also working on a flagship membership plan as I grow my agency. This is for solopreneurs who want to show up every week, build their own businesses, and hold themselves accountable for their time and effort. More details on this are coming in 2025.

If you’re unsure how to start an e-commerce business, check out my free articles and the waiting list for E-commerce OS at ankitgajjar.me