We know how it feels. You want to start a business, or atleast a side business while keeping your day job. Something you’re passionate about, or something just to try out. Something of your own, but you just don’t know where and how to start.

Of course, the first step is to come up with business ideas, and here are 4 techniques to find profitable ideas. But, let me show you today 5 tiny, weird, creative but REAL examples of businesses operating and making a living.

1) Ya Training

Who: Yathiraj Agarwal

Business: Ya Training

What: Started by Yathiraj Agarwal, Ya Training helps Professionals and SMEs increase sales and profits by conducting various training programs, coaching sessions and also personalized mentoring.

A graduate from BITS Pilani and working as a sales executive for Procter and Gamble, Yathiraj realized the need in the market for effective sales training.

2) Write Freelance

Who: Ritika Tiwari

Business: Write Freelance

What: Ritika Tiwari is a freelance writer who writes on topics including Technology, Social Media, SaaS, Travel, etc.

Working at an IT job before, she started writing and got her 50 clients in the first 6 months itself.

3) DogFather Training Services

Who: Alistair Fernandes

Business: The DogFather Training Services

What: Perhaps, one of my favorite examples, Alistair has a business on dog training services. He helps homeowners give premium training and services to their dogs like walking, behaviour correction consultation. He also does counselling to people who are planning to get pets.

His previous stints include working for JP Morgan, at an uncles’ company, MasterChef, etc. However, who would have a thought a weird looking idea will actually turn out to be such a successful business. 

4) Body Sculptor

Who: Prashant Sawant

Business: Body Sculptor

What: Prashant Sawant runs a fitness training business, where he helps individuals and even celebrities in muscle building, nutrition counselling, and more.

He also holds online trainings, 1-1 customized plans, and other training programmes.

5) Chandoo

Who: Purna Duggirala

Business: Chandoo.org

What: I love this one since I’ve personally known Purna now and admire the type of material he creates. If there is someone who has amassed a massive popularity, you’ve got to check out this business.

It’s a site which helps corporate professionals become awesome in Microsoft Excel. Think of it as a one stop destination for all things Excel.

The business is featured on various sites — Lifehacker, MSN, Technet, and more. They have a plethora of online courses, master classes and live trainings on the subject.

Few things to note:

• None of them are startups where they’ve hired 50 people, or dreaming to be the next Google or Flipkart. They just have a small group of audience (buyers) in their market
• They identified a need in their market, and people are happy to pay them to solve their problems (something which anyone starting out should focus on when you have some business ideas in mind)
• Maybe they don’t have a fancy logo or a website, or you might have never heard of them raising seed funding or chasing investors, but guess what? It doesn’t matter. They are able to generate –

                  1) Revenue, and 

                  2) Paying Customers 

That’s what matters in having a sustainable, predictable and a thriving online business.