The Different Faces of Side Hustle

Many of the people here are just trying to survive.  Many have limited skills or education.  Or they’ve had major life impacts like divorce (stuck raising kids alone and have lost the second income provider from their lives) or health issues.

Here it isn’t about doing what they want or reaching their full potential.  They’re just trying to survive.  Many times they’re desperate to make money.  And make it fast.  This is where many of the scam artists and get rich quick and MLM purveyors hang out and prey on their desperatation.

You see the pain and frustration of just trying to put food on the table.  But complex solutions and even paying for a website or web hosting is too much money.

They’re often looking for a work from home option because they have kids and can’t work in a normal full time job around the pick up and delivery schedules of their kids.  With the internet this has become a more viable option.  There are a lot of work from home opportunities out there.  But you often have to cull through many bad ones to get to something decent.

This is a place the Facebook work from home groups can be immensely helpful.  Many have gone through the frustrations themselves and are more than willing to provide good guidance.

Here is where online marketing, affiliate marketing, coaching, and freelance tech and design work fits in.

You’ll see web designers, Amazon product marketers, authors, and people who have their eyes on the big dollars.

For these people you’re finding most have a good day job and just want an extra couple hundred dollars to a few thousand on the side each month.

A handful also want to eventually leave their day job and do their side hustle as their full time gig.  But this is a low percentage of the whole.  The rest are just looking for a little extra money and to learn, have fun, and create something meaningful that their day job doesn’t provide.

Sometimes the work aligns and supports their day job.  Or it is what they do on their day job just applied as a freelance business.  They may be a game coder during the day and do more coding as a freelancer at night.  Or they’re an internet marketer who’s day job is in digital marketing but maybe just a small portion of it.

This is a much bigger operation and often involves more contractors and employees that the work from home or side hustle model requires.  This is true business building.  And it takes a certain personality and mindset.  You have to be comfortable with higher levels of risk.  And you need to be someone who can both sell a big vision and also build and manage a team of people as the operation is often much more complex than the side hustle model.  Many times there is more than one founder as each person brings a different skill set to the operation.

This is where big valuation dollars are found and money is made or lost rapidly.  This is where the Venture Capitalists, Angel Investors, and Founders hang out.  They’re looking for the next idea they can leverage to the stratosphere.  Something, that if developed right, can create the next Google.  But typically about 1 out of 10 are hits and the other 9 flounder or go under.

The good side of this is predictability.  You know when you go to work.  You know when you leave.  You get a paycheck every two weeks.  You get holidays and paid vacations.  You have most weekends to yourself.

The downside of this is you are still at the whim of your manager or the employer.  If they don’t manage things well you essentially only have one client (the business you work for).  And you could be out of a job in an instant through no fault of your own.

The other problem with this is you aren’t designing your own future typically within that one company.  You may design your career but the company may or may not be a long term play.

Whereas with the Entrepreneurship model you are charting your own course.

So what is the right model for you to work?

Ultimately it is up to you.  It is your choice.  Only you know your skills, interests, family situation, and risk tolerance.

I know for me the side hustle plus employee route has been the best.  It allows me to have a core career that I’ve developed and is now coupled with my side hustle that allows me to create and provide value in a different way.  And it is something I can leverage into my retirement years and scale up or down (on the side hustle front) as makes sense.

If you’re considering your options, email me.  You may find it makes sense to work with someone who’s been through several of these options and can provide guidance to help you along your journey.

Or maybe you’ve already gotten started on one of these and need help getting to the next level.

Either way, have fun and let me know if I can help.