5 of the Most Popular Side Hustles — And What to Do Instead
As side hustles become more popular — and perhaps necessary — let’s take a look at some of the common options … and what you might consider doing instead.
Blogging
As someone who’s been blogging since 2009, I can say it’s one of my favorite side hustles, and I’ve certainly learned a lot about it during that time.
For one, I’ve found the writing to be a great creative outlet and a powerful medium to reach a wide audience. (Although the podcast has grown much faster.)
But it was a loooooong time before my blog made any real money, and one of the mistakes I made was not having a focus. I would write about whatever came into my head; current events, our travels, our dog, and occasionally I might throw in something about business or marketing.
There was no coherent theme or really any reason for someone to stick around unless they were interested in me personally. In 2013, I narrowed the focus of my writing to be about side businesses, and that’s when the site traffic started to grow.
How to Start a Blog
If you want to start a blog of your own, check out my free 6-part video tutorial series that walks you through:
- 4 reasons to consider blogging as a side hustle.
- Why a “blog” is probably a bad name.
- 8 ways blogs and websites make money.
- How to pick a topic for your blog.
- How to choose a domain name and get your site online.
- How to install WordPress and begin creating.
I had a lot of fun creating the free “how to start a blog” course and hope you enjoy it too!
Greatest Hits
Whether you already have a blog or are looking to start one, here are some of the best blogging-related articles and podcast episodes from the archives:
- Building a Blog to $20k a Month and Beyond
- What Happens When You Post “Epic” Content? My Traffic, Income, and Subscriber Results
- Quora for Bloggers: How to Accelerate Your Authority, Audience Growth, and Traffic
- The $7620 Blog Post (Plus, my First Real Facebook Ads Experiment)
- How to Write Viral Content – Without Actually Writing It
- Blogging vs. Podcasting: A 1-Year Case Study
- The Fastest and Cheapest Way to Build a Great-Looking Website for your Side Hustle Service [Case Study]
The Best Blogging Podcast
I compiled a binge-worthy selection of blogging podcast episodes from The Side Hustle Show into this playlist. I think you’ll like it!
Enjoy!
Behind the Scenes of the 6-Figure Bird Watching Blog
This week’s guest left his high-paying — but not super satisfying — career in insurance to run a bird blog full-time.
Scott Keller started BirdWatchingHQ.com as a side hustle back in 2016 and has since turned it into a full-time income with half a million monthly pageviews and more than 1 million monthly YouTube views.
But like all businesses, it’s been an evolution to get to that point.
6 Million Visits a Month! SEO and Blogging Tips To Make More Money
From serious health issues and being $500,000 in debt to earning 7-figures a year in ad revenue.
That’s the short story of this week’s guest on the show, Brandon Gaille of BrandonGaille.com.
Brandon has been around online business since the 90s, he’s made a ton of money, battled some really scary health issues, and today is one of the top bloggers in the world earning a collective 6 million visits a month across his three sites.
The $90k Niche Daily Deals Blog
What’s one thing people want?
They want to get great deals on great products, and for you as a side hustler, that spells a business opportunity to curate and disseminate those deals.
This is exactly what Side Hustle Show listener Camron Stover from HuntingGearDeals.com is doing.
The $8k a Month Curly Hair Blog
Ever thought about turning your expertise in an everyday subject or topic into an online business?
For Delilah Orpi, her expertise was on taking care of her curly hair — and starting as a side hustle, she turned that into an online business earning around $8k a month at HolisticEnchilada.com.
Delilah has some interesting strategies she used to grow her audience, build her email list, diversify her multiple income streams — all of which can be applied to a topic of your choosing.
Easy Website Wins: Marketing and Monetization Lessons From 175 Website Flips
Today we’re diving into the easy wins — the quick updates you can make to your websites to drive more traffic and sales.
To help me out on that topic is Mushfiq, a side hustler who has been building, buying, growing, and selling websites since 2008, all on the side from his full-time career.
During that time he’s done over 175 transactions and has a wealth of knowledge on what it takes to make money and build equity online.
12 Expert SEO Tips for 2021: How to Drive More Free Traffic
Want to drive more organic traffic to your website?
I’m sure you do.
At the heart of organic traffic is SEO or Search Engine Optimization.
The better optimized your site is for search engines, the higher you’ll rank for your target keywords – and long-tail keywords – and the more visitors you’ll get.
Blogging vs. YouTube: Which Platform is Best to Grow an Online Business?
If you’re starting an online business and creating content, you’re almost certainly going to create either written or video content – or both.
The problem is that it can be hard to know which type of content is going to work best for your business, and getting off on the right foot is going to save you a lot of time.
So, to help you figure out which type of content is best for you, I’ve bought back, by popular demand, the Side Hustle Showdown series.
$10k a Month Blogging: How to Grow from Here? [Side Hustle Coaching]
Side Hustle Show listener Raffaele Di Lallo has built a successful house plant website, earning $10k a month — on the side from his day job.
Still, he explained that 90% of that income was from advertising, and he wanted to diversify his revenue sources and earn more from affiliate marketing.
To help me talk through Raffaele’s business is a long-time friend and online business mentor of mine, Matt Giovanisci.
Pinterest Marketing in 2021: What’s Working NOW?
With over 500 million users and growing all the time, your target customers are probably on Pinterest.
To help catch us up on all the latest strategies and best practices for getting more traffic, more sales, more leads from Pinterest is our resident Pinterest marketing expert, Kate Ahl from SimplePinMedia.com.
