Do You Have a Hobby or a Business?
“You have to be willing to put up with the crud now so you that you can reap the rewards later on.”
Lucas Miller
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Now, back to your regularly scheduled article.
Growing Your Side Hustle Into a Business
Individuals often start out with a side hustle while doing something else that takes up the majority of their time, such as working a 9-5 job, or being a full-time mom. They progress to freelancing, then to outsourcing, and finally to running their own full-blown business.
Having gone through this progression himself, Lucas Miller, founder of Echelon Copy, recently wrote an article for Entrepreneur.com titled, 4 Reasons Why Your Side Hustle Won't Magically Morph into a Scaled Business. He wanted to show his readers how to take their side hustle to something larger, more meaningful, and quite a bit more lucrative.
The 4 Reasons Why Your Side Hustle Won't Magically Morph Into a Scaled Business
1. Building a business means doing things that don’t immediately pay off.
In order to actually build a business and not just a side hustle, you need to take a long-term approach and recognize that delayed gratification is part of the process. People tend to know that certain activities are important for a business, but chalk them up to things that only Fortune 500 companies do. While activities like SEO optimization, branding, content creation, PR, and social media take quite a bit of time, effort, diligence, and discipline, you need to do them from the beginning and be consistent in doing them.
“Expect delayed gratification. Go into building a business with the expectation that this is not going to turn out tomorrow. When we can say that, it becomes a lot easier.” -Janelle Lara (10:52-11:11)
2. Most side hustlers have multiple side hustles.
If you have a side hustle that you’re passionate about and you know that you can grow it, you need to focus on just that thing.
People often mention that millionaires have, on average, seven to eight different streams of income. But most people don’t realize that millionaires start out with just one building it to the point that it’s running like clockwork before they move on to building another.
Entrepreneurs often struggle with shiny object syndrome when they need to be focusing on their bread and butter.
3. You’ll almost always hit the target you were aiming for.
You are the one who sets the limits on what’s possible. When entrepreneurs or side hustlers live in comfort, there’s no room for growth. When you become comfortable with being uncomfortable, you raise the ceiling and give yourself room to grow and expand. If you expand your limits, the natural by-product of that mentality is that you’ll work tirelessly to get what you want.
4. You can’t be the horse, carriage, and driver.
Independent contractors are the lifeblood of entrepreneurship. If you’re going to transition your side hustle into a full-fledged business, you’ll have to bring others on board. You can’t do everything yourself. When you’re doing one million different things, you won’t have the capacity to do ANY of them to the best of your ability.
“When you can afford to have somebody else take care of some of your responsibilities, your happiness will increase because you’ll get your life back.” -Lucas Miller (38:48-39:01)
Back to those millionaires who have multiple streams of income- they’ve gotten to that point because they’ve perfected their process so they can outsource it. Meanwhile, they start working on another new income stream. Focus your efforts on your current business. Then find others to join your team.
Your business can’t magically be scaled overnight. However, make the effort to build your business wisely, and you WILL have the ability to build a business that supports your dreams, while giving you the freedom you desire!
How to get involved
Follow @theparttimeceopodcast on Instagram for special, podcast related updates!
For more resources, information on my coaching services, and a whole community of Part-Time CEOs, find me on Facebook at The Part-Time CEO® Group, my website, or email me at janelle@janellelara.com.
If you liked this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a quick review on iTunes here. It would mean the world to hear your feedback and we’d love for you to help us spread the word.
Feel free to reach out to Lucas on his website at https://echeloncopy.com or on Twitter @echeloncopy.
You can find Lucas’ full article 4 Reasons Why Your Side Hustle Won't Magically Morph Into a Scaled Business here.