By Raimonda Jankunaite, Founder of Women in Business Club – an international community of over 200,000 female entrepreneurs, set up to empower women to thrive in business.

Let’s be honest, most of us could not wait to see the back of 2020. For many business owners, emotions ran high, we clung on tight to save our businesses and we were often pushed outside our comfort zones.

There’s no doubt that the lessons it’s taught us about how resilient we are when faced with adversity will stay with us for a long time. But for some, levelling up may have not only saved our businesses, it’s also strengthened them as we step into 2021.

At the Women in Business Club, we have been talking about the many ways we’ve turned impossible situations into passive income streams and how levelling up our businesses online can help you make 2021 your year to shine. Here’s an introduction to our favourite 7 tried and tested ways you can grow your business online and start making money in ways you may have never considered…

1. Create an online course to grow your business online
If you have a particular skill or area of expertise, creating your own online course is a sure-fire way of gaining some passive income. With budgets tighter than ever, people (and businesses) are looking to upskill rather than outsource so will happily hand over their cold hard cash for your expert guidance.

2. Host online events
Like it or not, online meetings are here to stay. We’re seeing an abundance of entrepreneurs hosting online webinars, virtual workshops or virtual events – even outside of lockdown due to the ease of being able to learn new things and network, without it taking a huge chunk of our day. Our favourite tool for online events is CrowdCast – it’s super easy even for a non-tech person to set up.

3. Put your email sequence on autopilot
The most commonly overlooked ‘secret’ to business success is not having your sales and marketing funnels set up to do all the hard work for you. Our favourite tools are Active Campaign for email funnels, segmentation and monthly newsletters. We like LeadPages for creating beautiful and functional landing pages.

4. Level up your social media brand & presence
Social media is our main medium where we can share ideas, start conversations and put ourselves out there. Consistency builds trust and brand loyalty, which is what people need right now. We love using Tailwind for Pinterest scheduling and Planoly for Instagram content planning.

5. Start a podcast
If you have always wanted to share your expertise and want to grow your business online, but perhaps you feel a little camera shy, why not record a podcast for your business? Podcasts are a fantastic way to share your story, your expertise and reach a new audience. We love podcasting so much we have our own– so make sure you check it out!

6. Organise a launch
When was the last time you had a launch for your business, a service or a product? These are tried and tested ways to grow your business online. Give yourself 4-6 weeks to plan, prepare and organise a launch. Generate some excitement around what you are launching, and make sure to gather people who are qualified leads and could become potential customers.

7. Create a product staircase
Did you know that most successful entrepreneurs have 7 or more income streams and it is usually made up of low-cost offers, mid-level offers and high end offers? When you think about your customer journey, they may not yet have the ‘Know, Like, Trust’ factor built up with you, so they initially want to try something that is low risk and low value to ‘test the waters’.

If they love what you have delivered they opt-in for a second-tier offer, which may be your mid-level offer. If they have fallen in love with what you do and how you show up online they may be ready to buy your high-end offer. It’s up to you to create the incremental steps for your audience and potential customer to go through to grow your business online. This approach also solves the issue of different affordability levels and different needs of your customer.