It's no longer a major undertaking to start a business

Starting a business today is not the major undertaking it once was. The large outlay of capital required to get a business going is no longer necessary, if you use the Internet.

You don't need to spend potentially thousands of dollars on getting a store on Main Street into operation, buying supplies and obtaining various government permits to operate a business. You can set up a basic website and potentially be selling in mere hours.

This means, essentially, the only thing holding people back is the lack of a concrete idea of what they are going to do, or sell. If you want to attract external funding, you will still have some hoops to jump through – but that is optional when your premises is in cyberspace.

You don't need to be a cyberspace genius to make money from the Internet. You can be up and running with a very simple site.

The best way to do this is to set up a blog. Sites like LiveJournal.com started the blogging boom, but others like Blogger and WordPress have taken up the baton. They have made blogs easier to customize, meaning even multi-page sites are not beyond a novice.

A page of information on the services you provide, another with a price list, and another with other pertinent information – customer testimonials, for example – can reach the Internet within less than an hour. And that is when you begin promoting your business in earnest. As you are on the Internet, this should not be hugely problematic.