How to start internet business in Ghana

The power of the Internet

15.01.2021 LISTEN

The Power of the Internet

Techloo Pretty,

Glad we’re meeting again, for the second time in our mailing, and for the first time in 2021. Happy new year. I hope you still remember what I sent you in the first email. You can still access it in the link below if you need to refresh your mind. [http://onlinepresident.org/2020/12/25/how-to-start-internet-business-in-ghana-step-0/]

As promised in the first email, this is another piece on our journey to creating our Internet Business. I have special interest in today’s topic, and I hope you will too.

So, let’s get started!

In order to get things in order, let’s start with few rhetorical questions.

Do you know that Bill Gate is just a Button Click away from you?
Do you know that the President, Nana Addo is just a button away?
Do you know that your DCE or MCE is just a button away?

I call this the [Button Degree Separation]: thus, the idea that there is only a Button between you and any other person around the globe.

In order words:

The ordinary man has never had such an opportunity to connect or share idea with anyone in the world just by clicking a Button.
The ordinary man has never had the opportunity to connect or share idea with over half of the world population. Yes, more than half of the world population is now online.

Never, we’ve never had such a chance. Give that a deep think. It’s not something ordinary, at all.

Why must this matter to us?

It must Pretty, your Internet Business basically depends on your ability to take advantage of this global connectivity and opportunities. I will give you few examples to buttress what I mean; starting with how I got involved in this whole Internet Business thing.

It all began in around 2011, at Atebubu in Bono East, during national service.

One day I launched Skype to search for muugu (a white guy I can scam). I sent friends request to as many people as I can, both male and female. Out of that pool of friend’s request came Jacky, a business woman in faraway Santa Barbara, Calif; over 12,000km from Atebubu.

To cut things sort, in less than a week, we had become friends. Not as a muugu, but someone I can genuinely work for. She asked of my expertise but there was nothing much up my sleeves. I told her straight up: “I don’t know much but am ready to learn“.

After two months of [search, find, learn, practice], she started paying me monthly. The arrangement was simple; I will work 4hrs every other day. That means I will work 15 days in the month. Will take a task, then research, find, learn, practice and then get the work done and come back in 48hrs time to report on progress, and then take another task.

I started by populating empty websites with content. That was what pushed me to learn WordPress. Something you will also learn in my book, and in this series. Next, I moved to gathering emails online using different tricks, which we later used for Email Marketing. Then I moved to creating video content using PowerPoint and https://www.powtoon.com/. To do a video, you will need content, and we got it in a smart way. Jacky will find a nice and informative video on YouTube, and all I need to do is listen to it, transcribe it, and use a modify version of the message to reproduce another video using PowerPoint or the Powtoon platform. The slides are finally converted to video using same PowerPoint.

You can find some of my early YouTube videos here: https://www.youtube.com/user/kaundaism/videos

They are horrible, but know that that was the beginning of the hustling.

If you can do quality stuff than this, then you already have what it takes to setup Internet Business.

As part of our marketing strategy, we also curated few eBooks and uploaded on amazon for just a dollar.

I'm finding it difficult to add images/links to this article, so kindly check sample ebooks on Amazon from here:

http://onlinepresident.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Sample-Ebooks.png

Finally, I moved to Search Engine Optimization (a very powerful skills that you can live on for the next foreseeable years. This is covered in the book). Then I moved to installing plugins on WordPress platform. After mastering few skills, I launched my own website, my first ever website: thedigitalcompanion.com (it doesn’t exist again). I bought the domain name from dtechghana.com and Jacky hosted it for me, for free.

Pretty, you see the power of the Internet? With the click of a button, all these opportunities became available to me.

Needless to say though, there was some bad news along the way. I stopped working for her early 2014. I lost that job because of Dumsor; my reporting became erratic.

You can check the email she sent me from here:

http://onlinepresident.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/End-of-contract.png

The good news is: Early this year (2021), I’ve started working with her again.

The email says:

As we chat yesterday regarding working together. I pick you because you have been reliable source to get things done, I can hire all kinds of people on Fiverr but I want someone who can work on their own. We'll start with $200/mo for 60 hrs max to see how we do the first month

Check the screen shot from here please

http://onlinepresident.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/New-Job.jpg

Another good thing is, I have the option to either take $200/month or $100/every two weeks.

Let’s do a little break down:

A public servant works from 8AM – 5PM a day. That is 9hrs. If my calculation is right, that is about 180hr/Month but some still get less than $200/month (GHS 1,165.73/month). Another thing to note is, the $200/month is the net. No tax, and no transaction fee. Isn’t that something cool to start with? Especially, when you don’t need to stop your current work, if any. You will be doing this along side your main work. In America, it’s called Side Hustling. lol Imagine, if you get to work for two people, remotely. $400/month?

I’m repeating this: You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to be able to earn online.

You can see she titled the above email as #Project1, and in that Proeject, my task was basically to analyze the website of one of the largest Real Estate companies in the Caribbean. Jacky is in US, but she is the Director of Marketing for that Company.

Welcome to remote work.

Don’t get scared, analyzing that website is nothing big. All I needed to do was to create a word document, create table in it.

For every page on that website,

I pasted the url in the first column
The page title
Has banner? (Yes or No)
Has Call to Action? (Yes or No)
Has Search functionality? (Yes or No)
and few other Yes or No columns.

I then shared it with Jacky, which she will use to communicate with the developer working on the site. Her developers also work remotely – Philippine and Pakistan. This word document will help the developer to know which features are not done yet.

#Project2 was a little bit technical, but was equally simple. All I needed to do was to read around a platform called Google Publishing Center and see how we can publish there. That was my first time hearing that, but all I needed to do was to pull my browser, go to google and read around it – What it is, its benefit, and how to do the publishing. That was all, and there are lots of videos and articles on that, for free!

Pretty, do you need to be a computer scientist to be able to do this?

Enough of that Pretty, let’s see another example.

Engineers Without Borders.

Around the same period in 2011 that I was working with Jacky as a virtual assistant, my cousin, Academic Vuvuzela also caught a Muugu, an IT administrator who works for an oil firm in Canada, and he was a member of Engineers Without Borders (https://www.ewb.ca/en/) and during his holiday, decided to volunteer in Ghana. Within a month or two, he was in Ghana and in the picture below, we were coming from one of his surveys at around Aputuogya, Kumasi. If my memory is right, I think https://farmerline.co/ also benefit from him. He assisted them in their business plan development.

Check my picture with him here:

http://onlinepresident.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Enginners-without-boarders.png

The rest is history.

Let’s see a third example

MAP Concept

One fine morning, whiles working on few tasks, my friend Solo was watching TV. We both were in the hall.

Solo: Khan, come see this lady. Kwasi Pratt’s daughter. They are interviewing her.

I got up, went there and spied a bit. On the screen, I saw Ama Pratt, CEO of MAP Concept.

In a minute or two, I came back to my desk whiles Solo continued to watch the interview.

But I did something crazy.

I googled her out. I found her email, her expired website, her blog on blogspot.com and found her on other popular social media platforms. I analyzed all the accounts I found and this is what I did:

For each account,

I talked about what’s good about it,
What is wrong with it,
And what can be done better.

I arranged it nicely in word document, with necessary screen shots. Then I converted the word document to PDF and sent to her via email. You can find the Email content and the PDF file here

You know what?

In less than 2hr, I got a call from one gentleman called Kwame. Later, I realized he was Ama Pratt’s manager.

Kwame: We are excited but surprised too. We love the work you did but how did you get her email

Kaunda: Oh don’t worry, I mean no harm. It’s part of what I do. [I pretended I did something geeky. but it was basically google search, specifically, Boolean search]

Kwame: That’s great! Can you fix all what you’ve said in the document?

Kaunda: Oh, that’s what I do best.

Kwame: How much will it cost?

In a month or two later, we scheduled a meet at Accra. Kwame came to pick me right in front of former president Rawlings’ house, East Legon. Few matters away, we entered a certain compound house. There we found Ama Pratt. After our discursion, I came back to Kumasi feeling boosu (real Kumerican!) They shared their bigger plan with me, which was to establish a TV station. I recommended we book a domain name in advance, which they agreed. Check it below.

You can see the registration details from here

http://onlinepresident.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Panacricantv.png

Today, on your TV screen, am sure you have ever come across the Pan African TV. I’m not behind it, but If I had wanted to work for them as a permanent staff. The opportunity was right there!!

The rest is History

Sorry Pretty, I’m writing a lot, and it might feel like the Online President is bragging. No, I have no intension to show off. The $200/month is peanut for someone. The purpose is to let you know the power of the Internet, in relation to opportunities.

Let’s look at another example.

Maize Business

On July 16, 2017, Gardner made a post in the Ghana Business Communities group on LinkedIn, asking of The best province to cultivate maize in Ghana. By province, he meant region/district. I quickly send him a private message that Bono Ahafo region is the best region for maize production. I also asked for his email to send him addition info, if he wouldn’t mind. He sent me, and I sent him the email below:

Hi Kevin,
You nailed it, “Agri-business is one of the main industries for potential” That is so true! And it’s great to invest in maize production. You’ve really done background check. According to the publication by the Millennium Development Authority, maize is the largest staple crop in Ghana and contributes significantly to consumer diets. It is the number one crop in terms of area planted (about 1,000,000 hectares) and accounts for 50-60% of total cereal production. Maize represents the second largest commodity crop in the country after cocoa. Maize is grown throughout Ghana, however, the leading producing areas are mainly in the middle southern part (Brong Ahafo, Eastern and Ashanti provinces) where 84 percent of the maize is grown (Facts and Figures by Ministry of Food and Agriculture, 2013).I’ve spoken with my District Chief Executive…. He is very happy with the idea and has promise to made land available. Personally, I’ve lived most of my life in Brong Ahafo Region[Province] but currently working in Ashanti Region. My family has bn in maize and cocoa cultivation for the past 60 years in Brong Ahafo [But on a smaller scale]. I know much about maize production. Brong Ahafo is the best province to choose. It has the best rain pattern, cheap labor and relatively good road for transportation. You can verify from meteorological department. Brong Ahafo is actually the Hub of the Agric business. I suggest you set up your own farm without having to rely on Government One-District One Factory. That gives you more control I’m always available if there is anything else I can be of help. Thanks

Masa, Like joke, like joke, in few months’ time, he came all the way from United State of America and I was with him in the district.

Check us from this link

http://onlinepresident.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Gardner-Kevin.jpg

He needed about 15 standard football size land to cultivate maize. Not for consumption, but to extract ethanol and export. That it is a hot cake in USA.

The rest is history.

You see the power of the Internet? You don’t need to be a scammer to earn from the Internet.

Now, let’s look at one final thing. This particular one is amazing but sad to narrate. I need to take in some sobolo before I can narrate it; let’s therefore go for a quick commercial break.

BEGIN:

My two books are available on Amazon and Play Store (via ReaderApp)

The first one is, My Love encounter with the KNUST Waakye seller. This is one of the finest humor book you can find on the market.
The second one is Who Scams the Scammer.

Welcome back from commercial break.

Now, let’s talk about the last example, a sad example. This one is about Scam documentary.

Scam documentary

Somewhere 2015, I joined a certain whiteboard forum. These are forums that serves as public notice boards. It’s a social media platform that serve as the online version of offline public notice board. It was on that platform that a gentleman from UK posted that his friend at Afia Nkwanta has got a serious accident, and admitted at Afia Nkwanta Hospital. The unfortunate thing is, he can’t hear from her again.

I read it and shook my head. “akoa ye john“, I said to myself.

Then I replied him:

Hello Obroni Kwaadonto, Your friend is likely a scammer.

He is not a woman

He hasn’t got any accident

And he hasn’t disappeared to any where
And if you don’t believe me, listen to this prophecy that will unfold in the coming days Someone will call you claiming to be the doctor who is taking care of your friend. Will tell you your friend is in critical condition and can’t speak. He will tell you how much it will cost to operate on your friend. You can decide to pay if you so wish, but I will suggest another trick.

Tell the doctor that you have a very close friend that UK embassy here in Ghana.

Tell the doctor that your friend at the UK embassy is on his way to the hospital to settle everything.

The doctor will disappear, no one will reply to your chat again

That was exactly what happened. More exact than asumasi bi prophecy (I can’t mention name here please). This simple advice saved that Udiot in UK 1000s of US dollars. He was being scammed completely. He came back and thanked me on the notice board, unfortunately I didn’t visit that forum again. Little did I know that a renowned freelance journalist, who had keen interest in scam activities in Africa, was following our conversation. His research projects are published in all the renown media (CNN, BBC, Aljazeera, DW, etc). The journalist picked my email and wrote me that he will be working on a scam document in Africa (Ghana and Nigeria) and would love to have me on board. I saw that email a year later (Udiot me). He had come to Ghana, did his documentary and left.

I missed that email because that wasn’t my normal email. You can’t use your normal email to be entering every shit hole online. It will be flooded with spam. I have several useless emails I used to register on such types of platforms. I replied him but no feedback till date. Needless to say, the Udiot I rescued from these scammers (probably Sweduru, Ashaiman, Breman or Berekum scammers) went ahead to setup a Romance Scam Alert website. Just to educate other Udiots in UK. On his website, he acknowledged my little support, that saved him $1000s. Unfortunately, I can’t remember his domain name again. Recently, when I published the Who Scams the Scammer book, I reached out to the website http://romancescam.com/, but no reply yet. It looks like that is the website the guy setup then. Now that domain redirects https://www.singles4real.com/

Anyway, that opportunity is missed. By now, ah, [anka me da chrysler bi mu koraa]

This is the internet

Think about these opportunities for now, and roll up your sleeves for the coming weeks. Just get ready to ramble! Next week, we will look at how to come up with a powerful Internet Business idea.

Before I close the curtains, I will love to hear from you at the comment section. Feel free to ask any question. And if this article is helpful to you, then definitely, it might be helpful to someone too. Help me share it. [nipa nia mmoa].

Also, you can subscribe to the Weekly mailing list so that everything will come into your inbox. If my website even disappears, you will still have the HOW TO START INTERNET BUSINESS IN GHANA steps intact in your inbox.

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You might also be interested in my Telegram group. Check it out: https://t.me/InternetBusiness

Have a nice day :)

Online President

Author, Digital First! The Step by Step Self-Employment Guide for Digital Citizens.