Becoming your own boss seems to be everyone’s dream. There are plenty of benefits, such as working when you want. You can also make your passion into your business.

But there’s a lot that goes into making a successful start-up. It’s a risk to leave your 9-5 to plunge into your own business.You’re leaving security, and that’s scary. You may also require some investment for your start-up, so you could be spending money before you have a solid business that is making money.

Whether you want to just make a little extra cash this year, or are looking at stepping out into the business world on your own, here are five start-up ideas:

1. Freelance Online

If you have a skill that can help someone in the digital world, starting out as a freelancer is a great move. Think about your online skills, if you are good at SEO, copywriting, graphic design, web design or editing, there’s often businesses looking to hire someone with these skills on varying contracts. Try sites such as Upwork and Fiverr to get started, where you can list yourself and be put in touch with clients.

2. Get Crafting

If you’re crafty, have you ever thought of selling your wares. You can do this online or try your hand at local markets (though you’ll have to rent a market stall). This could be anything; handmade jewellery, lotions, drawings, willow weaving, literally anything. If you can make it unique or personalised, even better.

If you don’t want to rent a market stall you could sell online. Sign up to sites like Etsy and Amazon to sell your products.

3.  Start Cleaning

Offering a cleaning service can be an easy start-up. You can offer your services to local offices and homes. Though you may need to buy your cleaning products (or offer a discounted rate if your clients supply the products), that is basically the only expense you will have to start with.

4. Become A Tutor

Parents always want their children to do well at school and so many will happily pay for a tutor to help their child. If you know a second language, you could offer your services as a tutor. Or if there’s something else that you studied, you could teach that.

As long as you are confident in your knowledge on a subject, you can become a tutor. You can also decide if you would rather go to each child’s house or be based at home.

5. Provide Beauty Treatments

You can easily set up a beauty studio from home. Think of various treatments such as massage, manicures, make overs, hair styling, if you have the skill you can set up a treatment area in your home or offer a service where you go to client’s homes.

Just be sure that you can adhere to your area’s regulations for this service.

Starting your own business doesn’t have to be hard, there are plenty of ways that you can make some money being your own boss. Sometimes you may need to invest in some equipment, or you may need to sign up to sites. If you need some capital to start your business, take a look at the funding solutions that Aurora Capital can offer.

By Eddy

Eddy is the editorial columnist in Business Fundas, and oversees partner relationships. He posts articles of partners on various topics related to strategy, marketing, supply chain, technology management, social media, e-business, finance, economics and operations management. The articles posted are copyrighted under a Creative Commons unported license 4.0. To contact him, please direct your emails to [email protected].