Seriously...What would you do with $5000 to Invest?

I was thinking of investing in a rental property. However, after being online for a while now and seeing the massive sums of money that people are making with their online businesses I am seriously thinking of taking this money and starting my own Online Business.

I have dabbled a bit with article marketing in the past couple of years and made a few dollars jumping from one thing to the next but now I want to get serious. So my question is:

If you had $5000 to invest to start your own online empire how would you do it to ensure your initial investment is safe and at the same time see the greatest long term ROI. I am thinking long term here. No get rich quick schemes, MLM or investing in the stock market.

I want to build a long term business that will enable me to quit my day job in a couple of years and work online full time. I want to use the $5000 as start up capital to give myself the initial boost I need to get things going.

Some of the things I have thought of so far was to set up a bunch of niche blogs and outsource my articles right from the beginning. Of course I would be building a list in each of these niches and monetizing in the traditional sense with adsense, affiliate programs, and eventually my own products. I would continue to write my own articles part time and reinvest all earnings.

My question is do you guys think this is a safe investment and if so how long do you think it would take to recoup my initial investment and do this full time?

I am open to all suggestions and plans. It doesn't have to be niche websites or blogs.

For the more experienced marketers out there. Would you do things differently to get started and to ensure you don't take a loss on your investment?

In a nutshell, I guess what I am asking is if you had this sort of start up capital, what step by step plans would you take to get started online, recoup your initial investment and build a long term stable online empire that would enable you to quit your day job and provide a decent life for your family for years to come working online?

Thanks for any and all plans and suggestions,

Robert Thorne