Side Hustles For Dummies. Alan R. Simon

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СКАЧАТЬ podcast, blog posts, and so on — make sure that your overall schedule gives you enough time to create your content every week, or every two weeks, or whatever interval you’ve settled on. If your schedule isn’t that flexible, or if your day job is one of those where you may unexpectedly need to jump on a plane on short notice, you should probably steer clear of a side hustle where you can’t meet your commitments to produce content, or fill customers’ orders, or otherwise treat your side-hustle business like, well, like a real business.

      You also need to be honest with yourself about how your energy level aligns with the time you’ve set aside for your side hustle. Back in the 1990s and early 2000s, I would typically have two or even three active book projects at various stages at any given point. Because I was spending most of my time traveling, I allocated every hotel night to writing — at least on paper. But you know what? Sometimes, after a really long and stressful day, I would go back to my hotel after dinner, sit down at the desk, open my laptop, and not be able to string together two coherent sentences.

Give yourself at least a little bit of cushion in your overall schedule when it comes to scheduling your side-hustle work. Don’t think to yourself, “Every single night I will …” or “I’ll spend 12 hours every weekend doing… .” You will have days or evenings when you just won’t have the energy, so be careful when you’re planning your side hustle to take this reality into consideration.

Figuring Out Whether You Need Special Skills or Licensing for Your Side Hustle

      You can jump headfirst into some side hustles with absolutely no prerequisites at all. Interested in starting an online boutique? Go for it! Weekend bartending? Start pouring the drinks!

      For other side hustles, though, you may need special skills or even need to be licensed by some governmental agency to certify that you are, indeed, qualified to do whatever that particular side hustle calls for.

      For example, Shauna and Miranda have been friends since high school. Both are interested in doing infusions and other skilled medical treatments for people in their homes — a growing business in general, and one that is perfect for a side hustle.

      Shauna graduated from nursing school and not only has ten years of experience as a hospital nurse, but also has all the up-to-date licenses required by the state where she lives.

      Miranda? Well, she has a business degree and has been a sales rep for one of the big pharmaceutical companies for the past ten years. Miranda may be interested in providing home health-care services as a side hustle, and she may even turn out to be skilled at giving injections and similar treatments, but she doesn’t have the formal educational background or the licensing to legally be able to provide those services. Miranda’s story may be an extreme one, but you get the idea.

      Many — maybe even most — side hustles have no formal licensing requirements of any kind. Others do, though. Just because you’re interested in health care, for example, doesn’t mean that you can just start a side hustle giving home infusions or providing similar services.

      Even if you’re not thinking “health-care side hustle,” you still need to be aware of any licensing requirements. Suppose you want to make and sell homemade wine. Guess what? Most states in the United States require you to have a license for anything related to the manufacture and sale of alcohol.

      PAY UP!

      A long time ago, I was invited to give a paid presentation in Toronto as part of my consulting side hustle. I landed at the airport and, as I was going through Customs, they asked me why I was coming to Canada. I answered honestly: I was there to give a presentation. “Are you getting paid for the speech?,” they asked. About two seconds after I answered “Yes,” they told me that I needed to purchase a work visa to be able to work in Canada. Surprise! It wasn’t a whole lot of money, and at least I was able to take care of the visa on the spot. But I should have known what to expect. I do now!

Make sure you carefully check to see if your side hustle idea has any city, county, state, or even federal licensing requirements. If you plan to do business on an international basis, check for any export or import licenses or requirements or any work visas that you may need (see the nearby sidebar).

Filtering and Finalizing Your Side-Hustle Short List

      Maybe you began with a relatively simple “Hey, this side-hustle stuff sounds pretty good!” But I made you run the gauntlet through one decision point after another. Trust me, though: By taking the time to methodically evaluate all the key decisions and factors covered in this chapter, you’ll be in much better shape when it comes to a side hustle that’s a good match for your interests and expertise.

      Cindy and Miguel both began with “bartending” as the theme of their respective side hustles. Now, after stepping through the decision points:

       Cindy is going to do weekend bartending and will advertise her services on several local marketplace websites. She doesn’t need to make any significant investments, and she can reliably figure on about $1,000 in extra income each month from four or five gigs at the most.

       Miguel is going to take a chance on ad-supported and affiliate marketing videos that he’ll post on YouTube and TikTok. He doesn’t need to make too much of an investment beyond a new webcam and a few backdrops for the spare bedroom that he’ll turn into a home video studio. He needs to study up on social-media advertising and different ways to draw attention to his videos. But Miguel is perfectly aware that he could be doing all this for little or no money if his videos don’t go viral.

Sometimes you may pass through one of the decision points covered in this chapter without a clear-cut “do this, don’t do that” answer. Breanna is definitely going to start her boutique. Even though she has a decent amount of savings available for her side hustle, does she really want to put a ton of money into buying inventory and turning her house into a warehouse and distribution center? Or should she do drop shipping instead?

      Breanna’s problem is that the products that she really, really likes are only available through traditional wholesalers with minimum order quantities, and aren’t available from a drop shipper. What to do, what to do….

      Breanna decides on a compromise solution. She’ll initially set up her store with a mix of drop-shipped products and a few of the nicer buy-and-stock ones. If her store catches on and her inventory actually does sell, she can shift more toward buying inventory that she’ll pack and ship herself. If, however, her boutique side hustle turns out to be a flop, she won’t be stuck with a ton of inventory that she’ll then have to unload.

      As you filter your side-hustle options, you may find yourself left with a package of several that you want to try together, such as:

       Paid video courses that you publish on Udemy or Skillshare along with other videos that you post to YouTube from which you’ll hopefully make money through advertising

       Blogging about the same subjects for which you did videos

       Registering with a speakers’ bureau to try to land conference presentations and maybe keynote addresses, also about the same subjects from your videos and your blog

      At this point, you’re almost done with finalizing what you should do for your side hustle. You have one final step, and it’s a СКАЧАТЬ