A side hustle can be the difference between the rich and the poor. The poor have his 9 to 5 job. The rich, however, have one or more side hustles that spill in additional cash to the bank. The fact is, the extra money can go a long way in ensuring a financially free life. Your day can, to an extent, can see you through the day, but your side hustle can add some texture to your lifestyle.
It might be scary to plan a vacation on your monthly salary, scarier, if you plan to retire with no other source of income. When you go in-depth and make your calculations, you will discover that even your day job doesn’t pay the bills. You are merely struggling to survive instead of living.
Sole dependence on your job is not the best way to live. Not only will you be struggling to make ends meet, but your financial growth will also be handicapped. To break the status quo and live instead of surviving, having a side hustle becomes a necessity. With the right amount of money in your pocket, you will be able to travel the world and live the life of your dreams.
There are numerous side hustles you can indulge in and make some money. When done well, it grows to the extent where you have to fire your boss and run for your life. Have in mind that all these so-called side hustles are lucrative. The only difference is how you go about it. In this article, you will learn about these side hustles that can make a difference in your financial status.
What is a Side Hustle?
A side hustle is merely another job, outside of your typical 9 to 5 job that pays you some monthly income. Your side hustle allows you to complement your monthly income and possibly, make much more in the long run. With a side hustle, you will be able to make more money, do the things you love, and halt your financial worries.
When you depend solely on your day job to cater to all financial responsibilities, you will remain with nothing. There is rent to pay, food, transportation, entertainment, and utilities. These are like giant monsters waiting to devour your peanut of a salary every month. But with a side hustle, all these can change. In other words, you take absolute control of your finance.
How to Develop a Side Hustle
A side hustle is very much different than your day job. So, developing them is crucial if it must be successful. The reason many fail in their side hustle is starting on the wrong footing. Well, follow the coming guides to develop a successful side hustle.
1. Your passion
Your side hustle has to be something for which you have a passion. Something that keeps you going even when there is no option to continue. When you focus on things you love, the chances of it succeeding is high. This side hustle is done in your own time, hour, outside your day job. So, search for a side hustle that has a lot to do with things you love, your hobbies and skills.
2. Consider investing money
Some side hustles will require some small capital to begin. It is to tackle needs like hosting, branding, and the necessary tools needed for the business. Before making this investment, ensure you plan accordingly. Monitor your growth and income after a while, and decide if you want to continue or not.
3. Eliminate every conflict of interest
When searching for the ideal side hustle, ensuring that it doesn’t conflict with other interests or endeavors is paramount to avoid regrets. If your side hustle conflict, please abandon it.
4. Side hustle time
Your side hustle needs its time if it must be successful. Which is why there has to be no conflict of interest. So, get your calendar and plan accordingly. Three hours a day for your side hustle isn’t too bad, but a start. You can’t start a side hustle only to give it occasional attention. It has to be nurtured, and an excellent ingredient for that is time.
5. Keep your day job
The most common mistake people make is abandoning their day job after listening to an impractical motivational podcast that buffs their confidence. Irrespective of the nature of the hustle never quit or forget about your day job. Unless perhaps your side hustle has started giving you some substantial returns on investment.
Ten Best Side Hustle Ideas That Will Make You Money
1. Start a Dropshipping Business
Here is one of the top side hustles that have made a lot of folk money. You don’t need to have an inventory, work with a reliable eCommerce site, and you’re good to go. The risk in this business is pretty low. You don’t buy any products. Your manufacturer will be in charge of inventory and shipping of the product to the customer.
In this business, your primary focus would be marketing and customer service. That is the backbone of this business. With a strong marketing background, you will be able to succeed without hassles. It is one of the paths that automatically makes you an entrepreneur.
In this business, you can focus on your area of interest. If you are a fashionista – someone who loves and is obsessed with fashion, you can start your fashion store. If perhaps your interest lies in makeup, you can delve into selling beauty products and consequently build an audience that follows your handles.
With a dropshipping business, you can make an extra couple thousand if you put a lot of effort into marketing.
2. Freelance writing
Another excellent side hustle that can make you a lot of money monthly is freelance writing. The upside with this hustle is that you can work at your own convenient time, space, and financial rate. In this business, the more time you invest, the more money you make. You can make over $1000 a month, depending on your rate.
To make it in this business, you will have to be a great and passionate writer. You don’t have to be perfect, but you need to have a strong foundation in the writing niche. There are lots of sources to get clients — freelance sites like Fiverr, freelancer, Upwork, Craigslist, etc. You can predict how much you can make a day based on your capacity, time, and the rate you charge. If you’re pretty great at what you do, your clients will be able to establish a lasting relationship that spills lots of jobs.
To kick-off:
Pick a freelance website that appeals to you.
Learn how the site operates, and sign up
Learn how to attract your first set of clients
There are lots of resources that will guide you, irrespective of whichever platform you choose.
3. Affiliate Marketing
This side hustle can either make or mar you. It depends on numerous factors like the products you are selling and the affiliate network. Some affiliate network pays so low that affiliate marketers are often tempted to start dropshipping the products themselves. However, when you partner with giant affiliate networks like Shopify, you are sure of making a lot of money for every merchant you refer.
With top-notch marketing, you will be making an insane amount of money every month. It will get to a point where your day job will become nothing but a distraction. That is the moment you fire your boss and be your boss.
4. Start Blogging
Although the blogging industry is heavily saturated, there is still a spot for creative and unique folks. With this side hustle, you can work from anywhere. In your home, airplane, even under the sea, if you’re a sea engineer. It also comes with flexibility, which allows you to blog about things you love.
However, you will need some capital to kick off with this side hustle. You will need to order for a hosting plan from a reliable hosting company, and also get your proposed domain name registered. Lastly, you hire a developer to help design and set the blog up. If you have a little knowledge of WordPress, you might be able to handle the process yourself.
With blogging, you get to come across countless opportunities to make money. You can earn through advert placement, sponsored posts, or even through the deployment of affiliate links.
5. Become an Instagram influencer
You don’t need to be a celebrity to become an influencer. In this age, you can build a massive following around your passion and still bank with it. All you need is knowledge of how to create your Instagram account and boom; you’re on your way to making money doing little to nothing. This side hustle can’t infringe on your day job. Just as being on social media doesn’t stop you from going to a job.
However, the only difference is that you’re more inclined to building your account and indulging in the right practices. An influencer makes an average of 200-500 dollars per post. With huge followers comes deals, adverts, and gigs.
6. A Virtual assistant
There are lots of small and medium businesses, even individuals who can pay anything to have a virtual assistant. The services of this assistant vary depending on the need of your employer. It could be to manage his social handles, bookkeeping, administration, and more. This job is a great side hustle that you can do from anywhere without hassles. As for the financial reward, it lies in your negotiation and how much you charge per hour. Some Virtual Assistant makes over $40 per hour.
In other words, you make money trading your time and skills. While starting up, you might find it a little harder. But when you start landing your first few clients, it starts getting more relaxed. There are lots of ways to source for clients. It could be by joining business forums, or popular Facebook group of businesses that might require your services.
7. Sell your photography
If you’re a photographer, or maybe have excellent photographic skills, then you can make additional money aside from your day job. All you need is a camera and capable Photoshop skills. If you’re passionate about photography, you will be making tons of money selling what you love. You can take pictures of cities, plants, lizards, etc. and sell to local newspapers, blogs, or stock image websites.
To make even more money, you can expand to canvas, t-shirts, and phone cases. If your skills are impeccable, sourcing for events to cover becomes an avenue to bank a lot of money. If done well, you will see yourself quitting your day job.
8. Forex & Binary Option Trading
A lot of people have made a lot of money trading on a reliable broker platform. However, you need to be extra cautious in this side hustle. To avoid everything to the wind. The first logical step to this side hustle is learning everything you can about the business.
Forex trading or a binary option is almost like gambling. You mere predict if stock or currency will rise and fall. If your prediction is correct, you earn some money immediately. If the reverse is the case, you lose. As simple as that.
9. Write an eBook
Delving into information selling is a lucrative side hustle. It has made many individuals thousands of dollars. The trick is simple – you write about information that is not readily available and sell it on Amazon for a great price.
However, you will need to invest tons of time and marketing skills in succeeding. There are many topics that you can focus on and write. The fact is, every topic has its target market. One crucial requirement is in-depth knowledge of the information you want to sell.
10. A Part-time job
Aside from these online businesses, you can decide to stick to the offline world and get a part-time job. There are a lot of them, like dog walking, babysitting, barista, receptionist, cleaner, etc. the only demerit is the time and energy invested. Aside from that, you can make hundreds of dollars weekly from these part-time jobs.
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