With more people moving away from the monotony of a 9-5 job towards location independent work, it’s no surprise many are looking at teaching as the best online business to start up. You can do it too!
Just ask yourself: 
Do I have a skill others want to learn, a skill high in demand?
This can literally be something you do easily, like speaking English or playing guitar.
If you said yes, then you’ve got something to teach others or coach them on, and you can do it from your laptop!
In this post, I’ll share my top 3 reasons why an online teaching or coaching business is the best to start this coming year.
1. Low Start-Up Costs
While attempting to teach for a company requires you to have a certain level of education or specific certificate, there are many ways you can begin coaching or teaching on your own.
Check out our article here for a list on how to start teaching online.
Realistically, you could start with nothing but a video-call service like Skype and your personal experiences and knowledge. Maybe you’ve gathered some interested potential clients through your friends or on Facebook, so just remember:
They’re interested in what you can teach them and help them with, not necessarily the high-tech gadgets you use to present it to them. Just grab a reliable headset, download Skype or Zoom, and start providing value to interested people!
Plus, there’s an extremely shallow learning curve when it comes to figuring out how to use the basic tools you need to start out.
Have you ever had a video call with your mom or your best friend?
It’s so easy, even kids are figuring out how to do it these days!
And when you’re ready to expand and create your own site with a booking calendar, you’ve got communities like WA with courses to walk you through the entire process.
But what about the internet, you ask?
2. Staying Connected Has Never Been Easier
Can you still hear the grating sound of dial-up internet connecting to the network?
Although I think it’ll stick with me forever, we’re lucky this sluggish beast is now a thing of the past! Coworking and coliving spaces, and even many Airbnb hosts, are upgrading their internet service to provide the fastest and most reliable connection to their patrons.
You can find these spots right here at Teach Nomadic on our ever-growing Connected Classroom Map!
Don’t see a spot where you’re going on our map yet?
TEP Portable Hotspots serve as reliable back-ups when you’re stationary and connected fully to a 4G network. You can literally run your online teaching or coaching business from anywhere these days!
On the students’ side, you have groups like BRCK who work to expand internet coverage throughout Africa and abroad while also providing durable devices and education to students. They recently teamed up with Facebook to work towards this end. Additionally, ventures like Project Loon, developed by X (formerly Google X), help to provide internet access to remote areas via high-altitude balloons.
In June 2016, Cisco released the complete Visual Networking Index Global IP Traffic Forecast, 2015-2020, which predicts Internet users will increase from 3 billion in 2015 to 4.1 billion by 2020.
What does this mean for the budding online teacherpreneur?
You’ll be able to reach more and more people as your business grows, so your list of potential clients and students is only going to continue growing as well!
3. Work From Where You Want!
It’s pretty clear the way in which Reason #2 allows for #3:
You can work from anywhere with reliable internet. This opens all kinds of doors towards increasing your earning potential and your own learning experiences.
Want to live somewhere cheap and warm? Head for Thailand and teach.
Always wanted to improve your Spanish? Get over to Spain or head down to Mexico and learn from native speakers!
Craving traditional pizza and pasta? Skip the restaurant down the street and hop to Italy!
I could go on, but you get the idea. Starting an online teaching business allows you to learn from hands-on experience, and you no longer have to view other countries from the other side of a screen or in pages of a textbook.
Furthermore, it gives you the opportunity to broaden your view of other cultures, including their history and beliefs. In a day and age where ignorance and conflict seem rampant, why not attempt to learn and understand instead of fostering ill will?
With budget airlines competing to offer the cheapest international flights, as well as even cheaper local flights once you arrive somewhere like Europe or Southeast Asia, travel doesn’t have to break the bank. You can even learn ‘travel hacking’ tips from sites like Extra Pack of Peanuts to help keep more cash in your own pockets.
Final Word On Starting an Online Teaching Business
There you have it:
My top 3 reasons why teaching online is the best online business to start this coming year.
When you can start up right away with few costs and just using the knowledge you’ve already got, you can choose where you want to work from, you have an ever-increasing pool of potential students, and you can worry less each day about connecting to reliable internet, it makes teaching online both a financially smart decision and a chance at designing an amazing life on your own terms!
Start by learning how to set up your own FREE teacher’s website in minutes to attract new students!
Why would teaching be the best online business for you? What is holding you back from starting?
Let us know in the comments below!
Hi Jason,
I have been looking online for a while now to transition from trading time for money in a 9-5 to being my own boss, this is another option for me to look into more, thanks
Awesome Charlie! Let me know if you have any questions at all as you start researching, and be sure to check out our post on how to start your online teaching business 🙂
Cheers!
– Jason
Hey Jason, I really like where you are going with this. I actually do a bit of coaching online for the field I am in which is executive search. Like what you mentioned, I totally agree that with the knowledge we have, we can turn that into a resource for helping others either voluntarily or at a cost. All of us are skilled in some areas and by structuring that knowledge and experience, we can turn it into an online business opportunity. In fact, I am currently taking a trading course from an overseas mentor and it is really great for me because I didn’t have to worry about commuting to a physical classroom. We schedule our Skype sessions and I am able to adjust it accordingly to fit his time and vice versa. Perfect for both of us!
Exactly Jude! That’s awesome that you both coach and learn online-a perfect example of the benefits to both parties, as you mentioned! Plus, you’re doing the online coaching in an area you’re already working or involved in, so there’s not a bunch of other material to pick up. As they say, being an ‘expert’ can mean just knowing a bit more than the next guy, so you can take that knowledge and start helping others with it. Great example, and I love to hear it working out for people.
Cheers, Jude!
– Jason
This is something I have already been looking into because I am an educator myself. I’d never heard of this particular network, but as I looked into it to see if it would work for me (because I’m legit interested in what you’re promoting) I found that there’s nothing in the U.S. What gives?! I thought you could operate from anywhere. How exactly does this work and why is it not available in the U.S.?
Hi Jenn,
Thanks for the questions! The Teach Nomadic network helps to connect online teachers by allowing members to upload their location to the map. This way, they can find and interact with other online teachers nearby, or ask questions about an upcoming destination.
Members can then check the map for Connected Classrooms, which are locations (Airbnbs, coworking spaces with private offices, etc.) that offer reliable internet and a quiet space that other teachers have already successfully taught from.
We’re not a hiring agency but a resource for online teachers, especially those who enjoy teaching as they travel. Our members can always add new locations to the map, however, and we’d love more to be added in the United States-maybe you can join and add the first one!
Please let me know if you have any other questions, and thanks so much for stopping by 🙂
– Jason
This is an excellent new way to use the Wealthy Affiliate program for a new demographic of entrepreneurs. Many people struggle with the idea of thinking of a business, but when you ask them what knowledge they have that they think they could teach to others it must instantly inspired many people who had convinced themselves that they hadn’t got a business idea they could run with. So many people have a skill of some sort that they could teach to others. Very inspirational, well done.
Mark
Thanks Mark! I truly believe that even if you’re just a few steps further along the path that others want to take, you have valuable knowledge and skills to teach them. If I had known that all of the info about how to start your online teaching or coaching business was located in one well-organized program like at WA, I would’ve began with it from day one. Now that I found it, however, I’m glad I can pass it on and hopefully help other teachers and coaches save time and money in their transition online by learning from my mistakes.
Cheers Mark!
– Jason