By: Nick Loper

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Nick Loper starts off his book with a quote from Charles Dickens that is relevant — even 150 years after it was written…

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair …” –Charles Dickens (A Tale of Two Cities, 1859)

The next few years represent either the biggest opportunity or the biggest threat to your livelihood that you’ll experience in your lifetime.

The Problem

As Loper points out, wages haven’t risen in 30 years (after accounting for inflation), and yet our largest budget items all cost significantly more. Job security? Forget about it. 47% of American households don’t have enough cash to cover an unexpected $400 bill, like a car repair.

On top of this, many people are quickly finding their jobs replaced by outsourcing, artificial intelligence, robots and freelancers. In fact, somebody in your company is probably trying to figure out how to get you off the permanent payroll.

Over the next few years, millions of people are going to be calling themselves entrepreneurs for the very first time - whether they like it or not. As one of Loper’s friends told him, “We’re all already entrepreneurs. If you have a day job, your boss is simply your largest client.”

The good news is that - in addition to all this doom and gloom - there is a bright side.

The Solution

Willie Sutton once famously said that he robbed banks “because that’s where the money is.” Similarly, if you want to turn this coming economic shift from a threat to an opportunity, you have to go where the money is.

The solution, Loper says, is to go to where there are already pre-made marketplaces to help you get a new business off the ground quickly and with little cost.

In the rest of this summary you are going to learn about 3 specific marketplaces that already exist where you can start a business:

First we’ll look at the “sharing economy”, where you can put your under-utilised assets to work earning an income. Uber and AirBnB are the most famous examples here.

The second marketplace group we’ll look at are marketplaces where you can sell your skills. Whether it’s cleaning a house or designing websites, there are marketplaces out there that can connect you with millions of potential customers. You might even turn a hobby into a full-time job you love.

The third and last marketplace group we’ll focus on is the marketplaces for selling physical products. Whether you are selling clothes that won’t be worn again, or creating and selling your own products, there are marketplaces that can connect you with millions of potential customers.

Becoming an entrepreneur has never been easier. There’s only one caveat - just like any business, it takes time to get the engine running smoothly. So how your story plays out will depend entirely on when you get started.

Figure it out now on the side (at night and on weekends) and you’ll have a job you love for the rest of your life, and get paid handsomely to do it. Wait until you get handed a pink slip and it might be too late.

The Sharing Economy

The premise underlying the sharing economy is that we all have underutilised assets that we can sell or rent to our neighbours.

Here’s a surprising stat to help you understand the magnitude of this new economy. Peer-to-peer transactions will unlock an estimated $300 billion in economic activity by 2025, up from $15 billion in 2013.

One in five American adults has already participated as a seller in the sharing economy, and nearly half have participated as a buyer. This will soon start trending up towards 100%, just like social media usage has.

This is happening whether you believe it’s a good thing for the economy or not. The great news is that most people are doing this part-time and putting in an average of 10 hours a month.

Here are just some of the sharing economy platforms you can tap into and get started making a side income today.

Uber is the proverbial 800-pound gorilla of the sharing economy. There are approximately 160,000 people who drive for Uber as of January, 2016. As one Uber driver puts it, “when I want to make money, I turn on the app.”

Prefer a more passive way to monetise your car? Try the peer-to-peer car rental service Turo.

Want to turn your car into a billboard for another business? Try Wrapify.com, which will pay you to wrap your car in an advertisement.

Got a boat? You can share that too with Boatbound.co.

Want to get some exercise while you earn your side hustle? Minneapolis attorney Kevin Ha earns a side income by making bike deliveries with the Postmates.com app. Here’s how he explains his experience:

“I enjoy biking and need the exercise, so if I feel like getting an hour or two of exercise, I'll just hop on Postmates and make some deliveries. I can usually make about $15 an hour, and am on pace to make about $2,500 this year — with the added health benefit of biking around town.”

Finally, you can do what hundreds of thousands of people are doing on a regular basis - renting out space in their apartments or homes and earning a side income. Some people are renting entire homes, while others are renting a space on their floor with an air mattress.

If you want an extended list of all the ways you can earn a side income in the sharing economy, get a copy of the book. If you have some free time and need to make some extra money, there is literally something for everybody.

Downsides to the Sharing Economy

A discussion about the sharing economy wouldn’t be complete without covering some of the downsides.

The first downside is called Platform Risk. Let’s say that you’ve created a nice side income by becoming an Uber driver. What happens if Uber (or any of the marketplaces) goes out of business or changes its rules? That income stream goes away. For instance, Uber is actively testing self-driving cars as a way to replace their human drivers.

The second risk is regulatory risk. For instance, Uber was declared illegal in Montreal. Not only were the drivers no longer able to operate, 400 of them had their cars impounded.

Lastly, there’s the issue of health insurance and other benefits. To put it simply - you’ll need to budget for these things on your own if you leave a full-time job.

Marketplaces to Sell Your Skills

As we move on to the second type of marketplace, a question that might be lingering in your mind is “do I have any valuable skills that I can build a business with?”

As one of Loper’s friends likes to point out, if you’ve ever had a job, you had at least one skill that someone thought was worth paying for. And as Loper himself points out, most of the skills he learned to become an author, podcaster and blogger were all self-taught.

Here are just some of the places you can sell your skills online.

You can sell your artistic talent at places like Artsicle.com, or even rent your artwork through places like TurningArt.com.

Do you create digital assets like website designs, stock photos and graphics? Head on over to Envato.com which has a family of brands to help you monetise your digital skills.

Anand Thangavel is a self-taught graphic designer from the UK, and has made over $1.1 million in the last 5 years from the freelance crowdsourced design marketplace, DesignCrowd.com.

On this site, clients submit requests for websites, logos, etc., and then a worldwide pool of designers submit their concepts and ideas. The winner takes the fee for the project, so you’ll need to stand out from your competition. But if a self-taught designer can make a over $1 million, so can you.

Are you an expert in your field? The Expert Institute connects subject matter experts with lawyers and corporations who happily pay for their analysis and opinions.

Are you a massage therapist? There’s even an Uber for massages, and it’s called Zeel. There’s basically no end to the amount of places and ways you can sell your skills online through an already existing marketplace.

Are you handy around the house? You can earn up to $45 an hour as a handy person on Handy.com.

Do you have language skills that might be in demand? Chad Hansen started teaching English on Verbling.com in 2013, and has since made over $100,000 teaching English.

Once you’ve got a steady side income going online, you can start to think about taking it to the next level - making a full-time living teaching online.

A few years ago, Phil Ebiner had never heard of Udemy.com. Once he stumbled upon it, he decided to make a course on video creation - something he had studied in college. He made $62 in his first month while still working his full-time job, and since turned this side-hustle into his full-time business and he’s making 6-figures.

Want more? Head on over and buy Nick’s book on Amazon.com

Marketplaces to Sell Physical Products

Finally, let’s explore the marketplaces where you can sell physical products.

There are 3 different types of physical goods marketplaces - on demand, homemade/handmade, and reselling.

On Demand

With on-demand marketplaces, you generally upload a file or a design, and the company produces the physical item when somebody places an order. There are a couple of advantages to this. First, it keeps overhead low. Second, it allows you to test a variety of product ideas with little risk.

The downside to using this type of marketplace is that the items are usually created in individual batches, which means your profit margins will be lower.

For instance, Kat Parrella had a full-time job in IT for a big company, but had a creative side she liked to explore. When she stumbled upon Zazzle in 2010, she started creating stationary designs (like wedding invitations, for instance) and posting them there. The site then sells the designs, and prints and ships them. Kat takes a cut of every sale Dazzle produces with her design. She’s since quit her IT job and is now doing her design business full-time. Zazzle still account for 60% of her revenues.

Homemade and handmade marketplaces

Homemade and handmade marketplaces operate similarly to on-demand marketplaces, except you are now in charge of producing and shipping the orders.

This type of marketplace is capitalising on the “maker movement”, which is a renewed interest in supporting very small business owners, who are now equipped with the ability to manufacture items on a very small scale thanks to new technology like 3D printing.

The biggest player in this space is Etsy.com. It has 25 million buyers and 1.6 million sellers, and you can find thoughtful pieces for your home, office, kids and more.

Reselling marketplaces

Reselling marketplaces allow you to sell second-hand items, new items you acquired at a discount, and even items you had manufactured to sell under your brand and labelling.

The largest and oldest of the reselling marketplaces is eBay, which helps move $80 billion worth of merchandise a year. Craigslist and Amazon are also big players in this space.

The tactic that most resellers employ is “buy low, sell high.” They find an item that they can buy that is underpriced, purchase it, and then turn around and sell it for a profit - sometimes on the same platform.

Here’s a surprising stat - over 47% of the items that Amazon sells in a year come from third-party resellers, most of whom are employing this technique.

Conclusion

There’s an enormous shift coming whether you like it or not. Your goal should be to start generating another income stream as soon as you possibly can so that you can be ready to support yourself when you need to.

You can rent your assets (like your car or home), sell your time and skills, or even start reselling items for profit. No matter where you find yourself right now, there is no excuse for waiting even one more day to get started.

So, get to work!