A side hustle is one form of income many Singaporean are now taking upon. Whether it is freelancer photography or pet sitting, there are a variety of side hustles to choose from these days with the help of the Internet. These days, 7 out of 10 Singaporeans said that they have at least 1 or more secondary income in order to support their living. The amount needed to buy a house has been growing exponentially compared to the wage growth in Singapore. Therefore, the millenniums and Gen Z of today are looking for ways to start a side hustle of their interest and grow the business to one day depend solely on business income.
Story of how I created 5 main Side Hustle to build my 6 figure networth
Hi, my name is Edmund, the Co-founder of HustleVentureSG. HustleVentureSG is my passion project in order to enlighten other fellow hustlers to pursue side hustling to earn more income in order to FIRE (financially independent retire early). I am a firm believer that in order to achieve FIRE, having a side hustle income is incredibly beneficial. In 2021, I achieved $100,000 networth at 24 years old through a full-time job and 3 side hustle incomes.
The journey to my first 6 figure networth in 4 years was by no means an easy feat. There were many sacrifices I had to took and side hustle businesses that succeed and failed. As of 2022, I am making over $3,000 per month from my 5 different side hustles. Do note that even though the upside can be over $4000, I am only focused on making $3,000 per month from all my side hustle
- Options Trading ( $500 ~ $2,000 per month)
- Blogging Website earns mainly through affiliates & ads (Started in April 2022 – $30 per month)
- Freelance Content Writer ($1000 ~ $1,500 per month)
- Pet boarding ($100 ~ $1,200 per month)
- Affiliate Marketing ($200 ~ $400 per month)
Why take up a Side Hustle?
Unlike a full-time job where pay increment only grows about 2 to 5% a year, a side hustle income is able to grow exponentially by improving your service, hiring more people, and having AI tools to ease your workload. Not only that, a side hustle is a business that follows an own-time-own-target goal system that is solely driven by your desire to make more money. That alone made me enjoy building my own side hustle that some ultimately turned into a business.
Secondly, unlike a full time job, a side hustle income is not tied down to the amount of hours worked. That’s why there is a higher chance you are able to make more money from running a side hustle business than a full-time job. But it does takes time.
Lastly, a side hustle is a good start to helping entrepreneur grow confidence in starting their own business. I starting multiple side hustle, although most failed, it helped me grow my confidence in starting my own business and learn all the work needed to run a successful business.
Ways to Skyrocket Growth in a Side Hustle
Knowing how to grow your side hustle is tough. Different business has their own way to build growth and generate wealth. In all of the side hustle I have built one action still stands out. Which is knowing when and how to reinvest into the business to make more money. This is one of the most underrated skills but the most powerful way of skyrocketing growth in a side hustle.
Creating Efficiency
At some point in the business, you will come to realize that with more work, comes inefficiency. Research indicates that any working adult will become less efficient after working continuously for more than 5 hours. Therefore, knowing how to maximize that 5 hours to work is critical. By investing into tools to help ease your work such as Tailwind. It is an app that allows me to schedule and post social media information on your behalf can be really beneficable in cutting down unnecessary time wastage.
Build and Move On
Sad to say but not all businesses can become a million or billion dollars company. It’s important to admit that you may have reached the peak of earning from this side hustle and it may be time to move on to another business. In order to grow more revenue, the company may need to explore different categories or open another branch to order to grow.
Increasing Manpower with the formula of 70+70=140
The 70+70=140 is a great rule that all business owners need to know in finding new and quality employees or tools. The formula means that 70% of your work should be able to be managed by a person or tool. The problem most businesses face is that they aim to hire that 1 person that can do 100% of the job, it’s almost impossible. That’s why as business owners we should aim to find an employee that is able to do at least 70% of the work.
To let your business run on its own is where having 2 person that is able to provide 70% of the workload each comes in place. Having that extra 40% excess efficiency ensures that the business remains at a high standard should anything happens.
Beat your competition
Knowing your competitor is one thing, being able to beat down all of them is another. In a world of supply and demand, having the upper edge against your competitor would eat a large portion of their market cap (meaning the amount of money they can make). To beat the competition, that’s where you as a side hustler will need to find out your niche and ability to innovate to gain an upper hand against your competitor.
Steve Jobs was able to beat the phone industry because of its innovation in touch screens and simplified mobile phone usability. Elon Musk is currently dominating the EV (electric vehicle) market because it provides the consumer with better functionality and affordability.
To conclude this part, find out what are the pros and cons of a business, find solutions for a problem and aim to use that solution to get ahead of your competition.
Reward-based system
Having a reward-based system in your process will not only help you stay motivated to achieve your target. It helps to set yourself a goal and timeline to achieve the reward. In a book called Atomic Habit which is one of the books I highly recommend beginners start reading. The book shares how to improve productivity with the reward-based system as follows:
- How can I make it obvious
- How can I make it attractive
- How can I make it easy
- How can I make it satisfying
Having multiple small reward incentives does help keep the motivation high to achieve higher growth. In this case, setting up milestones for every 100 dollars you earn per month can keep you motivated.
Creating a system that doesn’t require your hours
The problem most business owners face is that they are too involved in the business. At some point, business owner needs to realize that their work can be outsourced. Knowing when to outsource and how to create more time for oneself is essential for all business owners to know. When you can free up more time, use that time to build a better system to generate more money.
What does it take to build up the income? And how long will it take?
To those who have started a side hustle or a business will know this. The initial phase of the business is the toughest. Where the money earned is often laughable and the workload can be hellish. So this craziness has taught me the importance of learning to use money wisely and saving as much as possible.
This mentality is often what leads to businesses not being able to scale. Most people get too comfortable once they have made a few hundred dollars from their side income. However, to make more money, sometimes you just have to learn to reinvest as much of your earnings in the initial phase. Be patient and stay consistent in learning the process. Set realistic timelines and map out a learning process for you to follow to stay committed.
To scale into a highly profitable business, you have to build creditability in either your service or product or both. This allows businesses to scale faster as people buy a product or service because of what value they provide. Take for example Elon Musk, when people think of electric vehicles or Tesla, his name will come to mind. Another example is Steve Jobs, when you think about smartphones or Apple products, the first person that comes to mind is him. So what I would like to add is that building a personal brand of yourself in the business is important, the more quality and value you provide. More people will be positively impacted and remember you.
Q&A
So there will be a lot of questions asked on how to earn more side income. I hope that the Q&A section would be able to address these issues.
What Side Hustle Should I do?
That depends. There are hundreds if not thousands of side hustles for you to choose from. Whether you like to make money online or do the physical work of hustling, the choice is pretty much endless. Picking a side hustle is not hard, it is managing it and growing it into a business that is what allowed me to earn over $3,000 per month. So we are willing to try out every side hustle as much as possible, learn the mistakes along the way and build a business mindset from each different side hustle.
Anything I should know before starting a Side Hustle?
Although side hustle can be a great way to make more money, it is not for everyone. A side hustle does consume a lot of time in the initial phase and some may need a starting capital to start. Therefore, a side hustle is mainly catered toward students or part-timers trying to earn an extra income. To know more about whether a side hustle is right for you, do check out on what are the things you need to know before starting a side hustle.
How can I make my first $100 for a side hustle?
Earning your first $100 is pretty easy, click here to learn about some ways for you to make money right now. With the Internet now, there are many apps and services you can use to make your first $100. From selling you unwanted or used items on Carousell or taking up surveys to earn a few extra dollars.
I remembered making my first 100 dollars from Petbacker, it was that few dollars that ultimately motivated me to make more money through side hustling and growing businesses.
How much should I invest initially if I am looking to start a side hustle?
If I were to give it a number, I would say to not invest any money upfront until you are confident in running a business. So do your due diligence, find out your target audience and most importantly, find out the demand of your side hustle. If you believe it is or one day will be a profitable side hustle, then go for it!
How do I make my side hustle into a full-time job?
Unlike a full-time job, a side hustle income can be volatile and may be affected by the current economy. To ensure you can commit to your side hustle full time, having a 6 months emergency fund is the basic level requirement. This gives you an added level of security should there be any monetary issues along the way.
Once you have made 2 times your full-time income or have found a steady reincurring cliental base. Only then would it be safe enough for you to do full-time as a side hustler.
What is the easiest side hustle?
Doing surveys is one of the most brain-dead side hustle anyone can do. Simply sign up online to a survey page to start. Although the pay may not be enough most of the time, it is pretty much easy to work that takes little time and effort.
In my case, I use Google Opinion Reward to help pay for books that I buy from the Google App store. If that is what interest you, do download it by clicking on the link above.
How many Side Hustles can one person Manage?
There is no limit to the amount of side hustle a person can take up. A side hustle does not require hours of work to take up. However, if you are looking to make a decent amount of income from side hustling. You will then be required to spend more time working on it.
