Secrets of Online Entrepreneurs: How Australia's Online Mavericks, Innovators and Disruptors Built Their Businesses ... And How You Can Too

CHAPTER FOUR PROFIT

Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

The online gold rush

This chapter is about how to make money from an online business. You'll discover how the entrepreneurs I've interviewed made their money, the business models they chose, why they chose them, the merits of those models, how to source investors, what to look for in an investor and much more.

Few would disagree that we are in the midst of a social and technological revolution. We are living in uncharted territory, some likening it to the days of the gold rush when riches were to be found simply by digging a hole in the right place at the right time. In many ways, we're experiencing an online gold rush of sorts right now. What else can you call it when Mark Zuckerberg, a university dropout, can create a multi-billion dollar company in just eight years? Look at the host of associated industries that have been spawned as a result of Zuckerberg's creation and you can see that indeed a rising tide lifts all boats.

Let's take the gold rush analogy a bit further.

It's a little-known fact that in any gold rush, it's not just the pan-handlers mining for gold who get rich. It's the merchants who sell the miners the pans, the pick axes, the tents and the shovels who get extremely rich too, and certainly with less effort. While the miners braved the wind and cold, sifting through silt and soil on the off-chance ...