What you need:
15k Two bedroom House (Thika road)
85k (17x5) Five secondhand good laptops – Will save on power as compared to desktops
20k (4x5) Five seats – second hand office seats in Ngara
17.5 (3.5x5) Other furniture- five office tables from kahawa wendani.
5k Internet share one modem 3k unlimited per month.
1k Electricity prepaid per month.
Total: About Kshs 148.5k
AIM: Start a writing bureau
Amount can be reduced by starting with a one bedroom house (save 5k)
Start with four guys (save: seat 4k table: 3.5, comp 17k :: 24.5k)
Get a second hand modem (Save 1k)
And other areas: so good to go with 100k
But considering first two months remunerations to your guys, you need the 150k
One guy will be good in research and article writing if you are not. He/she will train the rest.
You need to give them 5k each first month as they will be in training.
When well trained (will most likely take a week.)
Do five pages per day: you earn $4 x 4 16*3(writers) 48 * 85 (to Kshs) = 4080/=
Five days a week, so on average 20 days a month: 4080*20 = 81,600/=
Each earns 20k:
Expenses ***
2nd month:
Each guy will do 10 pages per day: pay them 150 per page: you get:
10 pages * 4guys * ($4*85-150) = 7,600/=
A month-> 152,000/= Having paid them all.
And the story goes on:
Who thinks of a better idea to start small? Don't provide internet (Someone will soon be offering it free), use it yourself.

@jasonhill; you've hit the nail on the head. This is the greatest and most common mistake that new business people make. They assume that there is always a ready market for their product.

I shall repeat my philosophy about starting a business. You need the following three things...in the order that they appear:

1. CUSTOMERS - people willing and able to buy from you

2. IDEA - what to sell, and how to sell it

3. MONEY - to implement the business


NEVER FORGET: the more money you put in a new business, the more likely it is to fail!!!

Forgive my partial introduction of the idea. I assumed people reading this already knew about the demand for content providers on the internet. You may visit www.freelancer.com (and many other sites) to have a look at what skills are needed, and available jobs.

I did my estimations at $3-$4 per page though there are freelancer sites that pay $10 - $15 per page.
Kenyans have been doing this but most have been writing themselves. The idea here is to get to do more and more jobs.
@mukiha You said it well. I agree with you. I suppose with the additional info its a little bit more clearer.
Like any business idea there are lisks involved to mention but a few:
1. Strict deadlines are involved and thus need good power and internet supply.
2. Might not be easy to get hardworking writers.
And probably much more....
But as they say if it was very easy, everyone would be doing it and there would be no opportunity for you.

@jasonhill Mine is not local content. Its foreign content as it may be called here. Its more on demand than the local content. I believe the demand for local content will keep rising but for now lets take the oportunity and earn from those who need what we have to offer. for local content a good idea is blogging.
Good idea on press releases and such.
Keep the ideas flowing.

India dominates with call centers until Kenya really, truly gets into the game.

But this will require solid, stable, clean power and redundant internet connections that are continuously monitored. Even after the fiber has dropped, connections to East Africa are not stable- they drop packets and latency can be wildly high- and this is not acceptable. But no one is watching, and no one seems to understand how much this hurts international business.

Due to these utility irregularities, a call center would need it's own backup generators (plural), a few windmills, and its own ISP (or two) in order to be successful. You have to rely on redundancy. That changes the cost-per-transaction quite a bit, as you basically have to provide your own infrastructure if you cannot rely on your vendors.

In addition, salespeople in the US and UK must be hired- you need a person that is local to, and connected in, a specific area in order to generate business.

But the English speaking skills are already better in Nairobi.

Best,

Hill