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Physical Products – 5 Things To Know ... Online Marketplace Business – 5 Thing...

Cloud Service Business – 5 Things To Know

What is a cloud service business?

With this kind of online business you would own some software, infrastructure or platform and give people continuous access to it via the cloud.

You’d monetize by charging an access fee, selling ad space, selling user data, that kind of thing.

Software as a Service (SaaS) seems to be the most popular and, I’d argue, by far the most accessible kind of Cloud Service business, so I’ll mainly share SaaS examples on this page.

Cloud Service is one of 19 types of online business and considered a Level 5 online business, according to our framework.

6 Levels and 19 Types of Online Business
Level 1 = Novice

Okay for side income or beer money, but hard to earn a living.

GetPaidTo
Contests

Level 2 = Intermediate

Best for earning a living online when you’re starting out, but hard to scale.

Remote Job
Freelance

Level 3 = Advanced

Easier to scale and higher income potential, but you usually need significant investment of time and/or money upfront.

Agency
Referral
Resale

Level 4 = Superior

Even more scalable and even higher income potential, but also more complex / difficult / expensive.

Authority
Digital Product

Level 5 = Distinguished

Most complex / difficult / expensive, but the rewards here can be massive.

Physical Product
Cloud Service
Marketplace
Social Network

Level X = Wildcard

These are the misfits. Many aren’t even considered businesses in the traditional sense, but they are all ways to make money online. You typically need a lot of time, money, or luck to succeed with anything here.

Trading
Investing
Esports
Betting
Gambling
Multi-Level Marketing

How can you make money online with a cloud service business?

Here are the legit ways I’ve found to make money online with a cloud service business…

Build Marketing Software

Nathan Barry built and grew ConvertKit into a popular email marketing solution…

Nathan BarryFounder of ConvertKit $2+ million ConvertKit monthly revenue

Build a Hosting Business

Traditional web hosting companies fit here, but a more relatable example would be Matt Basta’s podcast hosting service…

Matt BastaFounder of Pinecast $13,000 Pinecast monthly revenue

Build Collaboration Software

Ryan Badger apparently built v1 of his Dropbox-like software in a weekend from a beach in Thailand…

Ryan BadgerSerial Entrepreneur $19,500 peak monthly revenue for Uploadfiles.io

Build Project Management Software

Renato Marinho’s PM software started off as a side project while working for another startup…

Renato MarinhoFounder of GitScrum $50,000 GitScrum monthly revenue

Build Freemium Software

Curtis Herbert built an app that helps skiers and snowboarders track their runs. You can use a free version or pay a subscription for premium features.