Side hustles, passion projects etc

[Red]

Post pandemic I've seen and heard lots more people promoting side hustles or ways to make additional cash on the side, usually in the form of starting your own little business. Some of the claims are wild, with people reckoning they've made £000s in a couple of months and I've seen them pushed as away of getting away from working for 'the man'.
Obviously MLM schemes are one way, drop shipping, becoming some sort of coach or teacher, it all sounds quite doable but I expect the reality is very hard.

So, do you know of anyone who has successfully set up a side hustle? Taken a hobby and turned it into a way of making some extra cash on the side?

[Luna]

I suppose I’m one in that I’m now direct selling for Neal’s Yard now but that only really came about due to being a therapist again. I use the products and thought I may as well get a discount on the oils I use. It’s never going to earn me a fortune but it’s fun at the moment.

I’m more concerned about a friend of mine who’s been sucked into buying a Japanese water filter for £££ in the hopes of selling them. I really don’t understand the business model (enagic- look up the reviews :eek: ) as it waffles on about affiliate marketing/virtual assistant stuff. I’ve no idea how she’ll ever make any money out of it.

YouTube ads are full of people who have supposedly made a fortune from dubious sounding ideas.

[Little My]

I was just talking to a friend last night about post-pandemic changes. She has a friend who has become a full-time influencer, complete with signing up with an agent and doing headshots to increase her advertising revenue. All based on the fact she decided to let her hair go silver and really got into the community.

[Luna]

Good luck with that

[TracyA]

One of my daughter's friends appears to have done the whole 'influencer '/ Affiliate Marketing thing, she posts on tiktok / Insta a lot about money related matters. She always did a lot of online surveys/competitions, but she has now quit her relatively well paid office job. We aren't 100% sure what she is actually doing to earn the 2,500k a month she shows on her tiktok posts because she doesn't keep in touch with my daughter and her old friends since she moved in with her boyfriend, but the amount must be regular because she has had a mortgage approved.

I have to admit I followed someone in insta who keeps talking about ways to make a bit of extra cash by reading books etc, but in real life I wouldn't have the time / patience to do any of it for long enough to earn decent money, and I wouldn't be willing to part with any cash to 'learn' how to do it.

[Morganna]

My ex-NDN is an influencer/interior designer on Insta and possibly TikTok. She rented next door, and specialised in looks that that are landlord-friendly. From my side of the party wall it seemed to involve a lot of sanding of floorboards, and propping things up instead of wall-mounting them . Tbh I didn't much like the look, but she's got her own place now and it looks lovely - she's definitely got an eye for it.

For some reason I keep seeing reels about people buying books in charity shops and making ££££ by selling them on Amazon, but second hand books go for pennies, so I'm not convinced. I suppose that sort of thing is easier now that you don't have to lug things to the PO, but it still sounds like a faff.

People do make a few quid running poetry workshops on Zoom. I've thought about it myself, but the marketing puts me off, and you really need to be widely published if you don't just want your mates to sign up. I'm sure there are other subject areas that would work too - a look on Eventbrite should give ideas of possibilities. The poetry ones tend to be between £15 and £40 a session (usually 2-3 hours) with a max of 15 people in a group, which adds up to a decent earner as there are virtually no overheads. It would be hard to do anything approaching full time though, as the pool of interested people is small - it's more of a sideline than a mortgage-payer.

[Red]

This is interesting! The marketing of whatever it was you decided to do puts me off hugely, my social feeds at some point have been full of people pushing one thing or another.

Luna, how are you marketing yourself? I'm a beauty nerd so things like this appeal to me but it might be that I just want to use all these products rather than sell them.

My Mum started a business years ago as a VA, it was a slog and she'd given us her job and moved abroad so she HAD to make it work. She was taking very low paying jobs to begin with and constantly doing bits of additional training to add more skills to her repertoire. So not technically a side hustle but she's a good example of building her business from scratch.

I'm very fascinated by the influencer side of things, you must have to a great niche, massive personality and lots of ideas for content. I don't have any of those things!

[Red]

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[Luna]

Hi Red. Yes, marketing.. ahem. I’m so Gen X. I struggle now with things like Instagram and Canva etc. I’m trying to keep Facebook for personal stuff and can just about upload a post or story on Instagram. My clients that i do reflexology on all find out about it when they visit as I use the products on them. I do broadcast announcements on WhatsApp. And err, that’s it at the moment. Sometimes I would like to be really proficient on SM then I worry I’ll alienate people.
What would you like to do?

[Kleio]

I know a minimum of 4 people (through comic cons and cosplay) who now do Only Fans/Patreon as a side hustle.

Two of them make a fortune!

That’s not the sort of side hustle I’d want.

[Annabella]

I don't know how people are making money from books - I can't give them away as many charity shops won't take them now. I have loads of cookery books (inherited) that I need to box and dispose of.

[Margo]

When I was with ex we bought books then sold them on Amazon - we got a bit obsessive about it but we’re probably averaging £500 pm profit, so worth the early morning car boot sales! The knack was to find the right kind of book, scan it on the Amazon app, then buy it if there was a good profit. I sold a ballet photography book for over £100 and plenty of old / odd cookery books around the £50 mark.

I’d do it again but have no storage space at home for all the books.

[Morganna]

I've just joined Jericho Writers, whose model might be adaptable to someone with time to spare to set it up. They have a range of 'courses' (videos of classes on aspects of writing) that they usually charge £££ for), as well as forums, blogs and competitions. Selling the courses at a high price makes it look more of a bargain to join. Membership costs £12.95 a month, but it is easy to find codes that knock it down to £8.50 or so, and after the 14 day cooling down period you can't cancel for a year. I've just joined, and plan to use it in the NY when my resolution is to spend more time on writing, but at first glance it looks to be mostly content that is already there and once it's done you'd just need to update things like closing dates and add to the blog etc.

I guess it's more for hobbyists than anything, but I'm sure the membership idea could work for all sorts of hobbies and be profitable after the site was set up and populated. Again there's have to be marketing, but most hobbies operate in fairly small worlds, so it wouldn't be too difficult to get the word out. You can look around at the public bits here:

https://jerichowriters.com

[Red]

Hi Red. Yes, marketing.. ahem. I’m so Gen X. I struggle now with things like Instagram and Canva etc. I’m trying to keep Facebook for personal stuff and can just about upload a post or story on Instagram. My clients that i do reflexology on all find out about it when they visit as I use the products on them. I do broadcast announcements on WhatsApp. And err, that’s it at the moment. Sometimes I would like to be really proficient on SM then I worry I’ll alienate people.
What would you like to do?

What you're doing sounds great and if you are reaching the right people and picking up work then its working.

I was thinking proofreading, I've seen a few courses that look very comprehensive and get excellent reviews. They are pricey but there are frequently deals to be had.
I'm just wondering if there is work to be had though? Saying that, one of the courses has a few sections on finding clients and marketing so I guess I'd find out.

[Luna]

One of my best friends is a proof reader for a German company called Springer. She’s done it for over 20 years now working from home. I can’t remember how she got into it. I think it’s all to do with medical books. If you have any questions I’ll ask her if you like :)

[Red]

One of my best friends is a proof reader for a German company called Springer. She’s done it for over 20 years now working from home. I can’t remember how she got into it. I think it’s all to do with medical books. If you have any questions I’ll ask her if you like :)

Ooh! Thanks - I'll have a think.

[Kenickie]

I reckon the money is in courses teaching proofreading rather than the proofreading itself, unless you've got really specialist knowledge.

[Red]

I reckon the money is in courses teaching proofreading rather than the proofreading itself, unless you've got really specialist knowledge.

Yeh possibly, but then there is a challenge of finding a cohort of potential proofreaders.

[Red]

I reckon the money is in courses teaching proofreading rather than the proofreading itself, unless you've got really specialist knowledge.

Yeh possibly, but then there is a challenge of finding a cohort of potential proofreaders.

[Rebel Pebble]

Those proofreading courses have been around since forever, long before "side hustle" was even invented as a phrase. I remember the old newspaper/magazine ads for them. They all used to say something like "If yuo can spot the rrors in this thex YOU could make muney as a proofreader". That said, I do know an actor who did some kind of course during lockdown and has managed to get proofing work off the back of it.

I did a 1-week sub-editing course at City University back in the early 00s when my roleplay stuff was slow. I did end up scoring two weeks work off the back of it, at some legal magazine. I didn't really enjoy it that much, then they took fucking ages to pay and then my training stuff took off so I never did any more.

I have a bit of an issue with some side hustles, specifically voice over ones. Quite often, because people have other sources of income and it's "just a bit of fun" or whatever, they price themselves disgustingly low (Fiverr and People per Hour are riddled with them) which drags down rates in a race to the bottom/takes away work from people who actually, you know, do it for a living.