Maybe your online side hustle is really starting to take off, and you know you’re ready to go full-time with it.
Or, maybe you think you’ve found a lucrative niche but need to know how to turn it into your career.
Perhaps you’re wondering how to tell if you can or should invest more time in the part-time e-commerce business you created.
Wherever you fall in the spectrum of side business success, we have the info you need to go from working your part-time side hustles online to becoming a full-time CEO of your virtual company.
A Strong ‘Why’
Building your company requires that you wear many hats to begin with. You’ll be the only voice in your Customer Service department, the solo hands of Shipping, and the lone inventor of your Sales and Marketing strategies.
With much to do to get your business to full-time status, you must have a solid reason to keep going when the going gets tough. Your passion and love for the project or its financial benefits must drive you.
Take some time to examine your ‘Why.’ Be sure it can stand the test of time.
A Deadline
You’re more likely to shy away from your grand idea of turning your side hustle into your full-time career if you give yourself your entire lifetime to think about it. Determine a deadline for action.
Consider breaking your big idea into smaller parts with deadlines. For instance, if your dropshipping business grows by so much this year, you’ll consider resigning from your full-time job next year.
Look for signs that it’s time to move on, like you can’t imagine staying at your current job past a certain date. Other indicators that it’s time to give up the convenience of your 9-to-5 job include lack of fulfillment, feeling undervalued, and feeling like you’ve lost your purpose or no longer have faith in the company’s mission.
A Business Plan
You’ll want to establish a well-thought-out intent for your business. Some things to think of are:
- Structure: Sole Proprietor, LLC, and S Corporation are most common. Each comes with its unique advantages.
- Permissions: Do you need registrations, permits, or licenses? You don’t want to skip your research on these. The penalties for not having your legal ducks in a row could undo much of what you’ve worked for.
- Finances: As a rule of thumb, you’ll want about six months worth of savings to live off of if you hypothetically had zero money coming in. Additionally, separate your personal and business bank accounts to avoid the frustration of combing through money records later to learn what was spent and earned from your company.
- Clients: Know the type of customer you appeal to and how to advertise to them. You don’t need to market to them in all the ways, but pick a few.
- Competitors: Who else does what you do? What do they do right? What’s unique about you that sets you apart?
A Strategy and a System
Start organizing a way of doing things. The sooner you establish a fine-tuned process, the more you’ll thank yourself later when you start to get busy. You don’t need a perfect plan, but keep thinking through your methods and periodically look for ways to improve.
Professionals can be of great help on this part. Accountants, for example, can help you with many aspects of your business, from properly recording financial data to creating a more efficient workflow using practices and technology they’ve found useful.
Your professional and social networks can be useful for this step, too. Their inventive techniques for what they did when they were in your shoes can give you ideas for your e-commerce shop.
Proper strategies and systems will help you more easily scale your business as you grow. “Scale” has become a hot word in the business world, but it’s how you earn additional money without doing extra work. Ways to scale include:
- Automating tasks
- Forming partnerships and alliances
- Delegating tasks to others
- Investing back into your business
- Applying for grants
- Creating alternative streams of income
A Humble, Hard-working Ethic
Your efforts will take time before they produce financial rewards. Put in the hours early on for a fruitful harvest later. If you can’t live off the results just yet, hang in there and keep hustling until it starts to take off.
You’ll have your hands in all aspects of your company at the beginning. You’re the customer service, sales and marketing, and shipping departments rolled into one. You must be willing to learn all you can about each facet of the business—no job is too small.
Make notes of the challenges you face in each area of the business. Doing so will help you come up with solutions sooner and will help you assist any employees you bring on board.
A Network
You are the top dog in command of your business. It can be lonely at the top.
Surround yourself with like-minded people also starting a side business, and you won’t feel alone. Go-getters like you should connect often in person or virtually. Besides companionship, you’ll learn from one another, lean on each other for support and understanding, and motivate each other.
Once you’re well on your way to making your side hustle all you want it to be, pay it forward. Help someone who is where you used to be or on the same path as you. You’ll never regret taking the time to invest in goodwill.