Direct selling either B2B or B2C has a very turbulent and volatile enironment for the forseeable future. If you manufacture your own product and can pass on cost increases then you are most likely ok, but your market will shrink as companies go out of business or as consumers are laid-off.

If you buy your product from a 3rd party the above complications rise exponentially.

If you provide a service, pricing and market shrinkage will be a problem.

In summary - unless you control your product, it's cost and your product is not price sensitive, you may want to proceed very carefully right now.

The answers will depend on what your qualifications are, not where you are located. If you have good Internet, there are many platforms that allow you to bid on jobs regardless of your location and they will pay youso that the money ends up in your account.

They first create a very defined customer avatar. Once that is in place they can:
1) Buy leads
2) Email marketing
3) SMS marketing
4) Paid ads

The customer avatar is the most important element, constantly review it by testing and improve on it as you (hopefully) create a database of actual customers.

That will be very difficult since with every introduction, the person making the introduction is putting their reputation on the line.

So you will have to build up credibility by doing the research and then cold calling the institutions. That will slowly build your network and then you may get reciprocity where people introduce you to their contacts.

Short term answer - yes. However your problem will be execution. A two-sided marketplace takes years to grow and millions of bucks to keep the door open until you are big enough to grow naturally.

The issue is not the cost of the platform (less than $ 100k) - the issue will be getting freelancers and clients - Upwork was loosing money until last year or so.

Set-up a business page on LinkedIn describing your services. Then post interesting content from the business page. Also you can search LinkedIn for companies that could use your skillset and solicit them for your company's services.

Depends what your interests are and where you are located. To start I suggest you study the various freelancer platforms to see what people are looking for and what they are willing to pay.

If you are thinking investments or work from home or multi-level marketing - do your due dilligence - way too many are a scam.

If you do not own your own brand or design/patent you will find out that 99% of drop shipping businesses fail and fail fast. So instead of just drop shipping, create a brand and then find manufacturers that will put your name on the product and all the POS materials and packaging.

Join various platforms such as Upwork, People per Hour, FIVR and offer your services.