Do you agree with the fact that entrepreneurship is an alternative to tech job?

Often times, developers tends to hunt for tech jobs as soon as they finish learning certain coding languages/technologies. I understand the processes involve is never an easy one, ranging from portfolio design, resume, going to meet ups, interviews and so on and so forth.
I think starting up a tech business is another alternative to salary work. Although capital is another factor holding most people down. However, making money online requires a lot of hard work and persistence; without which little success can be achieved.
Another factor to be considered is this issue of traffic generation, to succeed in the online world, your business needs exposure, therefore you must have enough audience that visits your business on a regular basis. Out of those audiences, you have your clients/customers who will suddenly become a repeated buyer. Therefore, a basic understanding of digital marketing is an added advantage.
Below are some suggestions anyone might want to consider:

  1. Buy domain names, design web-pages and then flip.
  2. Start up paid local or online tutorials about coding.
  3. Apply to become a freelancer and use site like quora to generate traffics for your gigs.
  4. Start up a blog. Generate income by selling eBooks, sponsor ads, lead generation and the likes.
  5. Start up an eCommerce store by offering paid materials to end users.

Note: All these requires persistency but it pays on the long run.

Any addition or subtraction is highly welcome as this is just my opinion about the subject matter.

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these are great passive income ideas.

i wouldn’t say it’s an alternative, because these ideas normally take a lot of time to gain enough traction to have a comparable income stream compared to a normal salaried job.

the gameplan is normally to work a normal job (not just in tech), while working on the grinds at the same time. you can quit the job once you’re making a comfortable stream (important that it’s sustainable).

agreed that learning digital marketing ideas/concepts provide a great benefit for web developers. however, in the long run it’s usually much more lucrative to continue with a tech job instead of quitting and running a passive income stream (just because a lot of people quit).

great post.

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If you don’t know it yet, this forum might interest you: https://www.indiehackers.com/start
They also have a great podcast where they “interview people who built profitable internet businesses”. https://www.indiehackers.com/podcast

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I don’t believe being an entrepreneur is a comparable alternative to getting a tech job.
As one could include the other, along with a bunch of other responsibilities.

The biggest thing that defines building your own business is risk. Gaining exposure is one thing, but building a business not only requires time, patience, but usually requires monetary investment upfront. It could be server costs, upkeep, advertising, hosting, domains, etc etc. These costs don’t go away and must be managed. These sorts of concerns basically don’t exist if you work for someone else.

Its one thing to go on the job hunt which also requires time and patience, but you usually don’t put down your own money to get a job. On top of that once you secure a job you gain a level of security that is as stable as the company you work for. If you end up working for a big company, your job security should be pretty secure for the near future, permitting you do your job :wink:

If you run your own business you put all that risk onto yourself. Make the wrong business decisions and you end up in the hole. This doesn’t even consider anything that comes with the technology side of things which also fall onto yourself.

It pays off if you don’t screw up and build the right business, but its not a guarantee it will happen. There is also survivor bias, as few people write books about how their companies failed. Building your own business has never been easy, it never will be. 90% of startups will fail, even if your not a startup there is always going to be risk.

I’d say building ones own business is “next level” to just getting a tech job. Its possible, but vastly more risky. It pays if you know more about the process than just starting out. Like I would never recommend someone starting their own business without having some kind of experience in what they are doing.

The last thing you want is to start a business that becomes a huge drain on yourself, this happens a lot. You will learn a lot more, but depend on your own personal goals this might be too much risk to take on.

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Thanks for your contribution. You raised a whole lot of valid points.