💰 Make More Money With a Side Hustle

📈 Multiple income streams

First, let's ground the conversation on "What is a side hustle?"

Channeling my inner Nick Loper (🎧 Ep11), a side hustle is doing something else to make extra money outside your regular job. That could be delivering pizza with DoorDash, driving for Uber, or even starting your own side business.

Now you might think, "That sounds like a second job." While both serve the same purpose of putting more dollars in your pocket, a side hustle is more nuanced. I see two primary differences:

• A side hustle has more autonomy. Whether it's a recurring gig, one-time thing, or business, you can opt in, whereas, with a second job, you typically commit to an employer's schedule and expectations.
• A side hustle is more geared towards finding ways to replace your primary job's income in time-leveraged ways. That could be generating recurring revenue from online content or scaling a business.

Side hustles produce both active and passive income streams.

Let me take a moment to clarify passive income because I think it's often misused. Passive income is not free money; it is income that you generate based on investing your time (or capital) upfront.

• If your current actions are generating income, that's active.
• If previous actions are generating recurring income, that's passive.

Passive income is rarely immediate, so be cautious of anyone advertising its simplicity and ease.

But that's the ultimate goal, right? Getting paid more for your time already spent.

⚖️ Gigs vs. building a business

I spoke with Paula Pant (🎧 Ep13) about drilling deeper into the makeup of side hustles. She puts them in two subcategories: gigs and businesses.

Gigs

Gigs have become more prevalent, thanks to apps and Uber-like opportunities. It's easy to find jobs or tasks someone will pay you for (e.g., walking dogs, mowing lawns, or delivering food).

The problem is that the gigs have such a low barrier to entry, so you’re vulnerable to market changes, pricing, and availability. You can do them on short notice, but they aren’t scalable or sustainable long-term.

Building a Business

Building a business is a much more scalable option. But it also demands more than simply picking up a side gig.

Most people start solo in one of three primary avenues:

• service-based business
• physical product-based business
• digital products-based, or around content creation

The service-based business is a popular route because it allows you to tap into your existing skills to offer freelancing, consulting, or coaching services. This approach requires minimal upfront capital, provides a faster entry into the market, and leverages your expertise. It's an excellent way to get started and gain valuable business experience.

On the other hand, the physical product route offers a broader customer base and the potential for greater scalability. This path involves creating and selling physical goods, whether it's through platforms like Etsy or Amazon or even establishing your own direct-to-consumer product company. While it typically requires more upfront investment to create an initial inventory, it opens up opportunities for long-term growth and reaching a wider audience.

A third option worth considering is building a business around content creation and digital products. You can build a blog, podcast, YouTube channel, online course, or even offer productized services. These serve as valuable digital assets that can leverage your time.

With some success, you'll reach an inflection point where you must decide whether or not to scale operations (via hiring or outsourcing). But I’ll save the deeper dive into entrepreneurship for another time.

📏 How to measure opportunities

The purpose of measuring opportunities is to determine whether the side hustle is worth pursuing.

You can start with dollars per hour as a baseline metric. For example, you might come across an opportunity to mount TV stands for $100/hour. While this rate seems great (especially at a 40-hour week equivalent), measuring it this way can be misleading. The gig is limited to how many people need this service or if the appointments impede your day job.

Another way is to hone in on passive or semi-active activities. Visualize your annual income as a pie chart split between passive and active income. Then look for opportunities that are not time intensive instead of high dollar-per-hour amounts.

For instance, let's say you can digitize and organize a local business's files for $1 per file. Instead of manually completing the task, which might equate to an hourly rate of $15, you can invest some time upfront to create an automation process using AI or Zapier. Automating parts of the process can transform a low dollar-per-hour opportunity into a semi-active income stream.

🎯 Finding the right sight hustle

When it comes to gigs, there are thousands of opportunities.

A simple online search might uncover the following:

• notary publics
• online courses
• print-on-demand
• service marketplaces (Task Rabbit, Fiverr, Thumbtack, etc.)

Choosing the right side hustle comes down to you. So rather than telling you what to do, I’ll direct you to Nick’s article on 100+ ways to make $500+ in your free time from SideHustleNation, which should help jumpstart the process.

💡 Generating ideas and experiments

You will have some great ideas and some terrible ones for side hustles.

​Jen Glantz’s (🎧 Ep61) approach is to monetize her curiosities and passions. She proposes you think about what you are doing on the weekend and build around it. If that isn't enough, talk with someone else to spark inspiration.

Nick Loper's approach is to find problems to solve. He uses a few tactics:

• What sucks method - write down everything you do that annoys you, or someone complains about. If it sucks to you, then it sucks to someone else. It also means that if you solve the problem, someone else will find value in it.
• Rip, pivot, and jam method - find an appealing business model in another industry, steal it, and pivot it to an entirely new niche. He saw an opportunity to build a virtual assistant review site modeled after a wine club review site that helped people rank wines to buy.
• Sniper method - build a business as the go-to person for a super-specific need. Where a general handyperson may take a shotgun approach to home services, you can be the go-to person for flat-screen TV mounting.

I experimented with this podcast as a creative outlet. While I envisioned turning it into something bigger, it started as a podcast and newsletter I could use to share information on topics I care deeply about (how to optimize and upgrade your life while spending less and saving more). In the process, I built a side hustle (now full-time) while getting to ask some of the most amazing people how they do what they do.

While generating ideas is essential, it's more critical that you get started.

In full transparency, there will likely be failures along the way. Don't let it discourage you; operate with an experimental mindset. Being experimental makes dealing with the ups and downs easier and lets you see things opportunistically.

My conversation with Jen proves that your initial idea may not directly lead to success but can lead to many opportunities. She started her first blog in 2011 without any followers. It did not generate any income, but with iteration and consistency, she gained readers, leading to a book deal, freelance opportunities, and ultimately Bridesmaid for Hire.

👔 Talking to your employer

Side hustles can be a valuable source of additional income; however, it's crucial to consider the potential implications from the employers' perspective. In a recent conversation with Codie Sanchez (🎧 Ep119), she highlighted the importance of letting your boss know you have a side hustle.

She’s seen people get fired for not disclosing. While it may not be a requirement in your situation, she suggested you flip the perspective and think of yourself as the business owner.

Ask yourself, “What would you want your employee to do?”

Because in this case, you might see how an employee can be distracted and negatively impact your business. At the end of the day, if your job doesn’t allow it, then pick a different one that allows for entrepreneurial pursuits.

🔑 Consistency is key

It's essential to have consistency with whatever you are building, especially early on. Consider creating a side hustle with an audience attached, like a podcast or newsletter (😁). Even though it might be a little anxiety-ridden, having an audience gives you three benefits:

1. They will make you more accountable and likely to show up.
2. They are key to building time-leveraged assets since it takes the same time to produce a video, whether 100 or 10,000 people watch it.
3. They can follow you to new platforms and help you bootstrap endeavors or projects.

The best trick for building consistency is to set a quit date. Choose a date in the next 3-6 months (or, in my case, several episodes) when you will decide to continue or stop. But only consider assessing once that quit date happens, not before. Focus on executing and creating the habit. It will eliminate the doubts that can creep in daily.

💼 When to go full-time

It can be terrifying, and sorry, there is no one solution, but here are a few ways to look at it

• What finally gave me the conviction to go full time on the podcast was realizing that if anyone asked me what to do in my own situation I would say you 100% have to try this full time. So I always suggest either 1) ask a trusted friend what you should do and/or 2) asking yourself what advice you'd give a friend if they were in the same situation.
• Identify someone who has already made it in your industry, and ask about the day-to-day structure of their job. From there, you can determine if it matches your expectation or desire.
• Let your past be your guide. If you have already successfully started a business or side hustle, you know what it takes to do it again.
• Assess whether you can find a different job (if the current one does not work out) or return to the company where you previously worked.
• It's also possible to decide not to go full-time, even if the numbers make sense. You may prefer to have a steady income as a backup.
• You could also go just for it. I'm not saying you have to... but I'm just saying it could be magical 😜.