7 Hot Startup Business Ideas You Should Explore

Mobile devices are driving Internet usage at amazing rate and the trend is set to explode. Millions of people are connecting their mobile devices to the internet everyday. Entrepreneurs are also exploring new startup business ideas that can be launched to meet the demands of mobile users. This post outlines some of the best small business ideas, best business opportunities, new startup business ideas, mobile business ideas  you can explore. The cost of launching a new business is now lower and the barriers to entry are also very low. If you can create something that solves a problem, you are in business.

1. Scratch your own itch

If you intend to create a new mobile app to break into the top mobile apps, it must be really useful for consumers, otherwise you will be ignored. The App Store now hosts over 700,000 apps, (with 250,000 specifically for iPad) an increase of 10,000 from June 2012 to September 2012. And the Google Play Store has over 600,000 apps. Consumers have lots of choice, focus on building an app that solves your own problem, chances are that somebody else has the same problem.

2. Social apps are still hot!

Social apps are currently centered around Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare and Pinterest, expect that to change soon. People are busy thinking about new ways to innovate and change the social apps industry. Google is trying really hard to change the face of social communication with its Google+, it looks promising but  it’s still not a killer.  79% of the time spent using mobile apps is spent using social media and gaming apps. You have to build the right mobile app to make the most of the mobile platform. If you find a way to carve your own niche in a social or gaming app, the rewards are endless.

3. Social news apps are even hotter

Flipboard is killing it, it’s popular magazine style social news app is  recording downloads in millions and page views are on the roof. Yahoo wants a part of the cake, hence the integration of the Summly in the Yahoo iPhone. You remember Summly, the news summary app Yahoo acquired for $30 million. Pulse, another social news app has also been acquired by LinkedIn.

The growing use of mobile devices are now making it easier to consume news as they happen. Information can reach consumers quicker and faster on social news apps. Millions more will demand their news on a mobile device in the most perfect magazine style. Social news apps are being redefined, you could join the train with an innovative app.

4. It’s all about the CLOUD now

Think about it, all of your purchased or uploaded content (music, movies, books, photos, e-Books, games) are now  stored and be  accessed across different mobile platforms. You can purchase e-books or any file on your laptop, well not really, on your smartphone is now simpler and those files can be accessed on different mobile devices.

Popular file sharing apps  like Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, Minus, SkyDrive and SugarSync doing everything they can to make their products attractive to both old and prospective customers and have gone a step further to create apps for different platforms. Millions of consumers and businesses are beginning to trust the cloud, and they will need secured apps to store content.

The problem is, it is still difficult to access content across platforms.  The need to access all of your content in the cloud on almost every device is creating a new niche. You will want to be able to watch a movie or play a game online on your tablet, go to your laptop and still find the  movie or game in the same paused mode  on your tablet or smartphone.

5. Mobile payment is set to explode

The number of merchants accepting mobile payments is exploding, and many of these new users are trying out mobile commerce for the first time. The likes of Square and LevelUp are recording massive growth and the market is huge. Key players like Apple, Google and Amazon are also watching closely. eMarketer predicts that by 2016, the total transaction value of mobile payments in the U.S alone will hit $62.24 billion. Thinks about the opportunities this presents to mobile app entrepreneurs. The time to cash in is now.

Mobile retail apps might also present a more promising opportunity, given the recent explosion in mobile commerce and Facebook’s determination to make the most of social mobile commerce.

6. Content Curation has come to stay

Content Curation-the act of discovering and presenting digital content was  popular among  consumers and publishers in 2012. Instead of focusing on generating new content,  curation focuses on amassing content from a variety of sources, and delivering it to readers in a visually appealing and organized manner. The likes of Pinterest, Scoop.it, Storify and Paper.li have shown why content curation is still hot.

7. Photo sharing is bigger than you thought

Photo sharing is exploding. In fact there are now better ways to share images than ever. With improved smartphone cameras, every smartphone user is now an amateur photographer. And guess what, Instagram has reinvented  photo sharing. Image sharing is sexy again with new and improved digital filters. It doesn’t get simpler than that. Hundreds of millions of photos are shared on social platforms each month. Think about what can possibly be done with millions if not billions of images on mobile devices. Pinterest is all about images and millions cannot stop pinning. Infographs are also changing content creation for good.

What do you think is the next big thing?