9+ Tips To Start A Homestead Business With No Money Down

When you are first getting started building your backyard farm business it can be scary to spend money on something that is not bringing you any return on your work.

While I totally understand the hesitation and don’t want you to spend money un-nessisaraly and I will give you plenty of ideas on how to get started if you don’t have money to invest.

BUT I would encourage you to look at it as an investment into your future. Absolutely test things out before in invest money. But you also have to be wear that if you can’t invest money then you have to invest time.

You don’t get something for nothing.

I will also say that your customers will sense that you are in it for the money and they will also smell desperation when you are trying to hard to make a sale.

Every time I invest in my business it grows so much faster than the times when I try to do things the free way or go without learning the skills I need to do the next step in business.

What Do You Need When You First Start Your Business

In order for me to give you the times to start your business you need to know in the simplest form, what do you need in your business.

It is going to feel like you need a lot of things when you first start your business and you are going to be thrown a lot of resources that claim to have the magic answer to all your problems. RUN if any of them claim to have the answer because NONE of them do.

Running a business puts you in the experimenters seat. You have to be willing to test things out to find what works and what doesn’t.

The Simple 3 Step Business Framework

There are 3 core things you need to do in order to have a business.

1. You need a way for people to find you.
2. You need a way to regularly contact and nurture your current audience or people who are interested in you.
3. And you need ONE PRODUCT to sell to them.

When you first get started you need to keep things easy and simple. It is not easy to have multiple irons in the fire especially when you are trying to get all of them operating well.

So chose ONE thing to fit into each step of the framework and work that until you feel so confident in it you could run it in your sleep.

#1 Put Your Time In The Money Makers

Remember that I said if you don’t have money to invest you have to invest your time?

We are all busy so we have to be intentional about where you invest your time. You need to use your time in the beginning to get more customers, create product, and nurture your existing audience. That’s it.

Don’t get caught up in making things super pretty, building operational systems, or adding all the platforms to your marketing system. You will be sold ideas and courses the moment make your first search on line about business. Nothing is the magic bullet that will skyrocket your success. You have to be intentional with what you have time for and focus on what is getting you results.

#2 Use Free Platforms (Yes Social Media) To Get Your Eyeballs

There are other ways to get eyes on your business but this is one of the best ways you can get started today.

I know, I know, so many people wouldn’t use it if they don’t have to. BUT that is were your customers hang out and how you can get free access to them.

You can have a great thought or create a valuable piece of content and share that with the world right from your pocket. No other marketing method will get you that much awareness without having to go sit all day at a farmers market or spend money to travel to a livestock show.

Start with ONE social platform. Build it up to the point of you feeling like it is second nature to you BEFORE adding more.

#3 Give People What They Want Don’t Force Something You THINK They Need

The easiest thing to sell is going to be something that people ALREADY know they want. You don’t have to convince them otherwise. EVEN IF you know that thing you want to sell is what they need and will give them a better life.

Its like dieting. You can’t make someone else want to lose weight bad enough if they still like the junk food more than they want feel better. Listen to the comments in the social feeds. What are people saying. What do they wish they could have but don’t know how to get.

Find the simplest product you can make and let that be your product.

#4 Start With Free Tools Then Upgrade

Once you do one google search or stop at one personas ad you will start to see sssssooooo much you could spend your money on come across your feed. You will start to find people you like to follow and you can feel like you need to do the exact same things they do in order to succeed.

But let me tell you, EVERY business is different. What worked for them may not work for you.

Its ok to start with the tools that your favorite coach or influencer is using. But don’t assume that will make or break your backyard farm business.

It is the content that you put out and the actions you take that matters.

When you have a small amount of income coming in that you want to invest back into the business. Use the money to help you get more done in less time. That should be the lens in which you evaluate an expense.

I will list my recommended tools both free and paid at the end.

#5 If A Tool Doesn’t Meet Your Needs Change It, But test it first

Some tools you might try and and it just wont work for you or the things you need for your business. IF its not working don’t stick with it because its popular. Look for something better as soon as you start to feel held back by a tool.

I heard an educator I love that bootstrapped her business and she says “use what works with your brain and budget.”

The what works with your brain part is SO important. This is what will keep you working even on that hard days.

Personal Lesson Learned:

An email service I tried had a big problem I did not find out until I was inside the tool using it. The email option forms they gave would not update with any changes you made after it was embedded into a post. So if I wanted to change the color or text I had to manually go in and replace the old code with the new one.

That would not work for a blogger who has hundreds of blog posts.

But I jumped right in and had all of my email automatons set up within a few days of long hard work and within a month I found a different provider that fixed everything I didn’t like.

That was a lot of time wasted if I had just played around with the tool first I would not have had to take another few days to change services again.

#6 Make Your Wish List

It can be easy to spend that few dollars on something you have been dreaming to have because its shinny or seems like what everyone else uses to be successful. But in reality that thing that seems important might not move your business forward or help you do your job better.

… cough cough … Lightroom presets….. cough cough.

Make a list of every tool, product, or course you want to buy and why. Put reason besides that wished-for thing and what it will do for you. Will it make your life easier, will it help you grow, or is it just something you want to try? Any of those reasons is ok but you have to be ok with the results of what you choose to ask for.

#7 Ask For Tools As Gifts

This can be a hard one because we are often afraid to tell family and friends what we are doing until our new business becomes a success because we don’t want to disappoint them or have the feeling of them doubt our efforts.

Be brave and ask for site hosting, your social media scheduling tool, a tripod, or a ring light for your birthday or Christmas gift.

More and more people are just giving cash because it is easier and people can buy what they want. 

Courses are another thing that people can buy you as a gift.

#8 Look For Deals

If you LIKE A TOOL and decide to start using a paid version, check to see if they have an annual plan where you can get a discount if you pay for the year in full. Many tools will give you a nice discount if you pay for the year. Make sure you like it though before paying a lot of money fora tool you aren’t sure you like.

There are also a lot of holidays when tools will run sales. Starting as early as the week before thanksgiving cybor monday is the best week to find deals on digital tools/

#9 Use Apps That Give You Rewards

Use apps like fetch were you can scan purchase receipts of any kind and get a minimum of 25 points per receipt you scan. You can use the points to get gift cards to places like Amazon and use them for equipment for your business or backyard farm. A $10 gift card is 10,000 points but if you scan every receipt it will add up quicker than you think.

Shop anywhere. Snap every receipt. Earn FREE gift cards! Sign up for Fetch and get 2,000 points when you snap your first receipt. Sign Up Here

It may not seem like much but if you want to grow your business with little down you wahve to get scrappy.

#10 Be Strategic In What You Choose To Invest In

Be careful what you choose to spend money on when it comes to marketing your backyard farm. I see so many people spend money on things like T-shirts with their farm or rabbitry name on them. And that’s fine when you attend local shows. But make sure there are things like your website or your social media handles on the shirt as well. People are busy when you are out in public and they are not going to remember a t-shirt logo.

Something better is to have business cards that you can leave for people to grab even if you are not at your station.

Think easy for people to do when you choose what to spend your money on.

Starting with free online tools is completely fine and I encourage you to do that (more on why later) but sometimes the paid less expensive tools are worth their price in gold to save us time, stress, and even give you a leg up. 

Recommended Tools I Use And Love

These are all resources I have used in the past or use currently in both my rabbitry/farm business and online education business.

Social Media Schedulers

Social media is going to be one of the fastest ways for people to find you when you first get started. Google is a LONG game and very hard to rank on google since the 2023 helpful content update.

Schedulers are a Godsend for batch creating your social media content and having a notification show up on your phone reminding you to publish OR auto posting for you when you are not able to post. I don’t recommend doing this for long periods of time but its fine for things like vacation which is what I do.

Facebooks Inhouse Scheduler

Pricing: Completely free.

I always encourage people to use a platforms tool if possible and its not going to restrict workflow. I am using the Facebook scheduler for the rabbitry to allow for auto publishing. It has never had issues with getting content out on time. Its fairly simple to use and does have a multi platform editing option so you can edit a post for Instagram and IG while creating the same post.

I am using it because I don’t want to pay for a second plan for schedulers and the rabbitry can sit a day or two if I am on vacation and don’t have something to post. I also like that when using it you see the data for the content that is created and it pushes you to pay attention to your stats.

I would give it a 3.5 out of 5 score for useability and here is why.

Here are the main reasons I don’t use it for my education business.

• It has issues saving graphics and even a full post for no real reason even when the internet seems to be strong.
• It only allows to schedule 29 days out at a time. So this becomes a problem for vacations and creating holiday content.

Plann – For social media scheduling

Pricing: Free up to 30 posts a moth and their first tear paid plan is $15 a month.

Get $10 off you first month.

I use plan to publish all of my social content. You can schedule up to 30 social posts a month for free and their tools is very easy to use and has a welcoming vibe too it. I know, I know… not the reason to choose a business tool but I also believe that if you are going to use a tool regularly you have to love using it.

My favorite features are:

• The simplicity in scheduling.
• The accurate mobile app push notifications.
• The ability to schedule and not requiring a graphic in the post to schedule. – I post manually on my main account and often have the graphic on my phone already so I use the app to type out the caption and on screen text then push the copy to my phone through the app. This is a must for anyone with limited internet usage or bad connection to cell towers.

A Way To Accept Digital Payment

If you are selling physical goods that people will come to pick up like livestock you need some way to take payment. I use PayPal and Venmo right now. Another option that seems to be common is the Cash app.

I use to only use PayPal to take deposits for the rabbits but I got several questions asking if I had Venmo and once I started looking into it I decided to have it as a second payment option.

Another great thing about them is they don’t charge you a processing fee like paypal. I don’t know why or for how long but I’m not going to ask questions.

Venmo – Sign Up Here

Payment for Digital Products

If you are going to sell digital products you need a way for people to check out and get their product EMEDIATLY you CAN NOT have them pay you through paypal and then email them their product when you have time.

PayHip – Best Choice For No Budget

This is the platform I use to create a shop and sell digital downloads. I also have a few courses and masterclasses hosted there. They are a great place to start because they are forever free and you get access to all the features BUT they do take a 5% cut of every sale. So that does at up but I prefer that over the pressure of paying for a $29 a month course hosting fee whether you make a sale or not.

You can check them out here.

Systeme.IO

This is a great system if you want to be fancy with your automations, marketing, courses hosted, and conversion sales funnels. They are a much more affordable option to Kajabi.

They currently have three plans starting at $29 a month, $49 a month, and $99 a month which is unlimited everything.

They have a great course portal, the only thing with them is they do take a small learning curve and you have to upload your videos to something like you tube (keep them privet of course) and embed them. But that is a minor inconvenience.

Test them out here.

Email Marketing Tools

You need a way to nurture your audience and this is a great way to do that. It already shows they trust you and you have be giving a method of contact.

Instead of posting on social you have no way of reaching a specific person again. You are simply hoping that social puts that piece of content in front of that customer again.

Start with Mailer Lite – Free up to 1k subs

If you are getting started for free I would recommend using Mailer Lites free plan. They give you up to 1000 emails subs for free. Here is why I don’t’ recommend convert kit even though they give you up to 10k subs. They require you to join what is called the creator network which sounds great. But what happens is right after someone signs up for your email list they are asked if they want to sign up for other peoples email lists as well. Which is great for some exposure. BUT that will SEVERLY diminish you conversion rates and personally I think it damages your trust just a little bit.

Normally what you can do is send people to a Thank you/ Tripwire page after they sign up with you. It is a low cost offer where people can buy something typically for $7-$27. This is a great way to get a small amount of income easily.

Systeme.IO

This tool fits under email marketing tools as well and they are very simple to use in regards to email. They have good workflows with some nice automations features.

They currently have three plans starting at $29 a month (5k subs), $49 a month (10k subs), and $99 a month which is unlimited everything. This is way better than almost any other platform that also hosts course.

They have a great course portal, the only thing with them is they do take a small learning curve and you have to upload your videos to something like you tube (keep them privet of course) and embed them. But that is a minor inconvenience.

Test them out here.

Education

Learn about the different parts of business as you go and IMPLEMENT what you learn. Head knowledge is not good enough. You have to act on it.

Love this post? Pin it for later.

Free Education

Remember that the best educators don’t have to be in your niche. You can correlate what they know and relate it to your business.

The first person I would recommend starting with is Jasmine Star I have followed her for years and learned everything I could from her about business and marketing. She is upleveling her business to be for high earners BUT she still has amazing education on her podcast and YouTube channel. I would start with her and go back about a year (from 2024) to find her more beginner content if you are newer to business.

Jasmine Star Website

My Farm Business Education Resources

I’ve got two free business educational resources for you. I’ve been running a farm business since 2009 and been profitable since 2010 so I share what I learn and what I see working on both of these platforms.

• The Farm Business Blog Post Roll – Access Here
• The YouTube Channel Farm Business Playlist – Access Here

The blog farm business category is where I create the most recent farm business education. The YouTube Channel is still very relevant but we now live in a more rural slow internet area so uploading videos is difficult and often takes 6+ hours uploading from my phone so the videos don’t happen as often.

Paid Education

Profitable Backyard Farm Course

This is my exact system and process of growing and running a small backyard farm that earns multiple four figures a year and has been printable for the past 15 years. It is the complete system and everything you need to know about starting and running a homestead business. (except for legals and taxes, that is not something I can cover since it is so specific. The only thing I can do is guide you on where to look in your state or area)

CLICK HERE to learn more about the course.

Order in which I would invest in new business as it was growing.

• Education
• Email service provider
• Scheduler for Pinterest

Like I said before make sure that the tool or thing you want to purchase will make a difference in your business. When you are first starting out there is little money (sometimes no money) to go around and you have to be very intentional with where you use what you have and that’s ok. 

But if you want to grow faster you have to be willing to invest in your new business.