4 Great Halal Business Ideas: In The New Normal (Updated)

The human race has gone through a series of changes in behavior since Covid-19 began last year. Where these changes left disastrous impacts on human life such as crushing the world economy, disturbing the supply chains. These major disruptionshave also caused an unprecedented innovation in the world of technology and the way humans define “Welfare”.

Thanks to technology, humans have adopted rather unconventional ways of businesses that were not only the need of the hour but also proved to be groundbreaking changes. If you are thinking of starting a business for yourself, there are still many business ideas that need more attention. Many of the ideas are also a great way for Muslim women to be independent all while staying in the comfort of their homes. 

What is the best business to start in 2021?

Looking at the latest technological innovation and its integration into human life, one can call the current era, “The Era of Technological Evolution”. Digitalization has brought convenience and safety to a whole new level along with several new business opportunities to exploit. 

Here are some of the best Islamic businesses to start in 2021 center around digital transformation. We’ve identified four business ideas that are considered completely halal in the Islamic economy.

Among the most notable digital transformations that are changing our habits, which have lasted since the COVID-19 outbreak. Consider these statistics:

• More people will continue to work from home, as much as 33% in the US. Large tech companies, such as Google, Twitter and Facebook, have announced that they will continue with remote work.
• The internet saw 150 Million online shoppers preferring to shop online rather than from a physical store.
• Grocery deliveries apps downloads increased by 337% during COViD-19, and restaurant delivery apps downloads increased by 51% during COVID-19, based on Apple App Store data.

(sources: Harvard Business Review, Shopify Marker) 

Halal Business Ideas With Low Investments

An e-commerce or online store is a good way to start a business that has low investment requirements.  You can start small, with just a few items, and promote them online, and you make a profit on the difference between what you sell and how much you bought them for, as well as other marketing costs. 

• You can sell a variety of products using online platforms. A home chef can sell his or her halal food products, a fashion designer can sell his or her modest fashion clothing and cosmetics or personal care products. The best way to make money through ecommerce or selling online is to open a grocery store with all Islamic standard quality halal food, cosmetics and many other daily use products.

If you don’t have any products in mind, of what to sell, consider using Google’s own data – Rising Retail Categories. 

Advantages & Requirements For Ecommerce Business:

An ecommerce or an online store is best suited for a person that wants to bring his halal business ideas to life without having to share the earned profit. An online system with integration of the latest and convenient technology enables even a single person to manage and keep a close eye on its inventory sales and revenue all at the same time. Technology also reduces the labor cost of the business. 

Skills Required — To execute such a business idea, one must learn and understand every nook and cranny of the latest technology used for selling, online payments and marketing. Technological skill set will not only help you manage your own business with efficiency but it will also allow you to access a much larger customer base relative to the conventional ways of businesses. 

Capital Required — Usually the e-commerce businesses save you a lot of money by cutting labour and other miscellaneous costs and efforts. You can start strong with a capital of $2000-$4000. A sum of this much money would easily cover the starting expenses of a small business idea.  

Tools & Strategies — The tools and the strategies are the last and far most important steps of establishing your business. As for tools, we’ve mentioned earlier platforms like eBay and Amazon are two tech giants that have provided a common man the opportunity to reach the millions of right customers for what his or her business has to offer. You can even make your own ecommerce website if that works best for you. 

A marketing strategy is what separates an entrepreneur from a common business holder. Look for new ways to advertise your products in the market. Offer discounts and incentives to let people know that your store has the best quality for a reasonable price. Your focus should be on “What makes you different from other stores?”

Is Dropshipping Halal?

If you’ve done some research on e-commerce, you may have heard about dropshipping. Dropshipping is basically marketing and promoting someone else’s products as your own, and getting the supplier to ship directly to your customer without you (the seller) buying the stocks and shipping them yourself. In essence, you don’t touch the product at all, and yet, the customers think the products come from your online shop.

So, is dropshipping halal?

While we’re not Islamic scholars at all, we’ve done some research into it, and found the concept to be non-halal. This is because it is not permitted for us to sell something we don’t own and give the impression that we own the products that we sell. For more information, you can read about the Islamic ruling on Islamweb. 

Also Read: How to Start an Online Clothing Business and How To Sell On Social Media Without A Website

Digital services

Selling your expertise is a great way to make money with a low-cost startup business. These include:

• digital marketing,
• virtual assistant, 
• web development,
• accounting,
• copywriting,
• content writing,
• graphic design, and so on.

You can either market your services directly by using social media, or you can list them on freelancing sites such as freelancer.com, or upwork.com where they’ll find the right clients for you. Looking at the current situation of the pandemic, you won’t find a more appropriate time to start your digital business idea.

This business type can also become a halal life-changing start for talented Muslim women in any of the industries mentioned above.

Agencies For Consultancy, Traveling & More

The pandemic has not only provided new halal business ideas but has also forced the existing ones to adapt to online platforms too. Consultancy businesses are basically sharing your years of experience as advice and guidance for your clients. Many people have different personal businesses to get started, but all they are looking for, is the right direction, you can cash this opportunity.

Other than consultancy, try to create halal opportunities for yourself which no one else is doing. You can open a travel agency, a halal catering company that provides services for Islamic events to benefit many Muslim customers who are looking for special decor for special events which in return create a halal profit for your capital. 

Advantages & Requirements For Digital Services:

One of the best things about providing digital work is the freedom from a tight working schedule like any other office around you. Except for the virtual assistant job where your clients might ask you to work on their schedule. Digital service has a vast freelance market with plenty of opportunities and a massive audience for your services related to technology and marketing such as website development, content writing, or website designing.

Owing to a persistent COVID-19 situation, business ideas related to digital services are needed more than ever. You can either set up a team that you can work with or you can sell your individual expertise in a number of fields.

Skills Required — Freelance work offers a variety of skills and assistance to a large number of people around the world. The industry has remote labor for every work that you can ask for. You can sell anything you find yourself best at.

For example, you’ve studied business or accounting, you can be an online assistant to many businesses even across the borders.

You are good at sketching, there’s work for you. Even if you don’t seem to have any skill set, you can learn skills like writing, marketing, designing and many others using the free and detailed video courses on the internet and get yourself a decent online job. 

Capital Required — Unlike any other business, a virtual business has much lesser cost incurring business ideas. You don’t need a formal office, formal working labor under you or any expenses of maintaining or running your business. You can simply buy a computer at a modest price of $1000 or less and set yourself up as a freelance worker for a particular skill. 

Tools & Strategies — The tools you use will depend on what skill or work you are offering. For example, if you are offering copywriting, you might want to use the tools like Grammarly Editor which assists you in eliminating grammatical mistakes to craft engaging content.

Similarly, if you are setting yourself as a video editor then you need to master the video editing tools etc. The nature of the tool varies with what skill you offer and it is important that you learn and master tools related to your work.

Strategies in an online market are very important. You have to be very specific and professional about what you offer to show your client that your services are worth spending money on. Being confident and acting professionally are two major factors to focus on while dealing with online service businesses. 

Halal Business Ideas For Startups

For tech-based people, you can start a business as a startup, focusing on providing solutions, and these can be delivered as a Software-as-a-Service or as a mobile app. 

A Tech Support Service

Setting up a tech support office is worth giving a shot especially when digitalization is taking over every single aspect of human life. You can set yourself as a tech support company that offers both freelance services or act as a local IT office that provides services to local and national businesses. 

The scale of your company depends on how much you have to spend on your business. A tech support company can start with as low as $1500 and goes up to the maximum average capital of $20,000. Make sure that you have all the expertise required for running such a business.

Offer specific services related to the most used apps and software around your business. You have to conduct thorough research on what software you know best and which softwares are in demand. Advertise and introduce yourself as a trustworthy business in your local market and if possible compete with other IT houses over prices and service quality. Collaboration with tech manufacturing companies is one great way to get your business recognized across a number of audiences.  

For Remote Work environments.  Online collaboration tools are in demand, given that more companies are opting for their staff to work from home for safety reasons, for social distancing practicalities, and more importantly, cost savings for the employers. 

• Teamwork apps have the highest growth segment at 60%,
• Communication platforms and video as-a-service at a growth rate of 30% each
• Unified communication as-a-service and contact center as-a-service at a growth rate of 24% and 18% respectively.

Source: FinancesOnline

Learn to build 10 real-world programs with Python programming.

For Digital Transformation. Companies and many people with individual halal businesses are seeking to move more of their work online and need help with their digital transformation of infrastructure and software for conducting their online work.

Most small businesses have a need for improving their processes by going digital.  These include allowing businesses to run financial operations and accept online payments. For instance, a small independent cosmetics or any other retail store can get a cheaper point of sales system by using an iPad as a point of sale system instead of a terminal point of sales system. 

Another example is that Shopventory, an app that helps retailers keep track of their inventory. Shopventory will help you see what isn’t selling well so you can discount it and skip a restock. It also alerts you if it suspects theft. The app helps small business owners stay up to date on their inventory. 

What you need to figure out is what problems these businesses have, and whether you can provide them with a solution that is cost-effective and easy to use. 

Ali Haider Shah

Ali Haider Shah is a business graduate with specialization in market research. He holds 4 years of experience in business writing where he served renowned online publications like “Digital Diplomacy”. Currently working as a business writer and a market researcher.