Side hustles have an increasingly popular appeal for the modern digital user. Indeed, we all know that the traditional 9 AM to 5 PM office job doesn’t fit the bill anymore. More and more households want to gain financial freedom and stability; all of which can be challenging to obtain if you only depend on your day-to-day career. Indeed, if you’ve never played the “What if” game before, now the best time to start: What happens if you lose your job? What happens if the company has to cut down your hours?
If you can’t find a satisfying answer to these questions, you’re probably better placed to understand why side hustles are a game-changer. A side hustle allows you to set up an income-generation business without taking the risk of giving up your primary career. As a result, you can combine the best of both worlds, which means that you can build up financial momentum and secure a plan B in case of troubles. Experienced side hustlers can even run multiple small ventures simultaneously online. The keyword here is online. Bringing your business idea to the digital market is the best thing you can do for your financial stability.
Make sure people find your side hustle online
The online world is full of opportunities. You can get in touch with clients all over the world if you’ve got a website; that is if you’ve got a website that is properly indexed by search engines. Indeed, SEO is not an optional strategy. It is mandatory if you want to be found on the web. You will need to ensure that your website follows the main SEO rules. Thankfully, most digital platforms let you set up additional plugins such as Yoast, to introduce your metadata – aka the data that is picked up by search engines and that appears in the SERPs. You can customise your permalinks, which are the address of each page, in such a way that your keywords are in focus. Additionally, most web platforms have the option to create a sitemap of your site, which you can share with the Google Search Console to help the indexing process. You also want to ensure quality hosting and media to improve your ranking chances.
Actually, you can also target your audience directly
You can make the most of your SEO strategy to also create keyword-centric marketing campaigns on Google AdWords. But, if you’re new to the sector, you might have to consider other advertising methods to boost awareness. Social media advertising can be extraordinarily successful for side hustlers, especially on popular platforms such as Instagram. Indeed, the visual ad can not only help you to grow brand exposure, but you are more likely to generate leads on the platform than you are via Google AdWords.
Even a small business needs professional IT
However, before you launch your first online campaign, you need to think ahead of the game and prepare your online system to handle the increased demand and contacts. In other words, just because you run a side hustle business, it doesn’t mean that your personal laptop is the best tool for the job. If you’re planning on growing your presence, you need to consider bringing in professional IT consultancies for SMEs to address your specific business needs. Ultimately, the last thing you want is to let your clients hanging before your laptop has encountered an update error. That’s precisely why it’s crucial for all businesses – regardless of their size – to rely on managed IT support and solutions.
By the way, do you know the basics when it comes to social media?
It’s important to understand that dedicate IT services are designed to keep your business up and running. But it doesn’t affect your online strategy. In other words, if your social media presence is counterproductive, you can only blame it on yourself. As a small business, you need to be careful about your strategy. With several networks available, you can’t afford to pick and mix at random. You have to be where your audience is too. You also need to schedule regular and informative posts. Your social media advertising strategy can only go so far. Without a solid and organic presence to support it, it falls flat!
Make it easy for customers to pay
Online customers want easy and practical transaction methods. You’ll find that your side hustle revenue is most likely to grow if you opt for user-friendly payment options such as Paypal. Additionally, you should also ensure that your clients always receive a detailed invoice of their purchase, as this establishes your venture as a professional seller.
Pushing your side hustle online doesn’t happen overnight. From SEO challenges to user-friendly applications, you need to build a professional presence. But if you take the time to create a secure and reliable presence, you can create for yourself a second source of income.
This is a collaborative post and may contain affiliate links