Life with Helen Johnson

Do you fancy starting a side hustle? Are you considering finding new ways to earn extra money? If so this blog is for you, because I’m breaking down 5 crucial things to consider before starting a side hustle.

#1 – Chose something you love to do

This may sound obvious, but if you’re going to spend your precious evenings and weekends investing in this side hustle/business then it’s crucial you actually enjoy it. For me personally a walking business made so much sense, because I would go out walking in my evenings and weekends anyway. I learnt to use a passion of mine and find a way to make money from it. I would recommend asking yourself these questions…

• What could I spend my spare time doing and actually still enjoy my life?
• What would bring me fulfilment and joy even if I wasn’t making money from it?
• What am I gifted in that I could share with other people?

You won’t make money from day one, but that doesn’t mean you can’t grow and be thriving. I personally hope that one day my walking business will be my main source of income, however I’d still be doing it even if it wasn’t because I genuinely love it.

#2 – Set clear boundaries from the get go

If you don’t set boundaries then this side hustle will take over your life. When I started blogging I was determined to only spend 2 hours a week blogging, but this turned into 3 hours, then 5 hours. I needed boundaries so it wouldn’t consume all my spare time. One thing I will say is that starting a business is not simple, and it will require you to give up spare time to help grow the business. However you still need YOUR time. Because I have clear boundaries with our walking business I can hang out with my friend on Tuesday evening and not feel guilty, I can take Sunday off all work and feel revived. There’s a reason why you shouldn’t take work home with you, but when your home is potentially your place of work it can become tricky to set those boundaries. Start setting them NOW and don’t let work eat up all your free time.

#3 – Make it manageable & flexible

You may be in a quiet season and have loads of spare time, but what happens when work picks up, or when you have children, or when a family member is sick. At present I do have more spare time and so it would be easy to launch 5 walks a week and that could feel manageable, however in a year or two when we have children will it feel manageable then? You don’t want to set the bar too high that it’s impossible to reach when life gets busy. You also want a side hustle that has a degree of flexibility, you want it to work around you and your routine. Often people think about the customers and tailor it for them, whilst ignoring their own capacity. Obviously any successful business needs to think about the customers, and so it will require some negotiation. However it’s important to remember that this is your life, and so therefore it needs to primarily match your lifestyle and your capacity.

#4 – Make it something that can grow without JUST YOU

All successful businesses have multiple employees – it’s never just the founder doing all the work. Now obviously at the beginning it will just be you and it could be many years before you can afford to employ others. However your aim is to get there eventually, and so therefore you need a brand that can go beyond you. Let me share two personal examples…

• My YouTube channel and this blog is a solo project, it would be very difficult to get people to help as the brand is me and my life. Of course people could help edit my videos or share my content, but the content in of itself is me and only me. This will mean that the business will naturally come to an end one day, and will only grow so much because I can’t scale it.
• My walking business is a joint project. Firstly it’s a business I run with my husband, but it is also a business where we could hire other instructors to lead sessions for our brand. Walx Bradford (the name of our business) could last beyond Andy and I, our kids could continue the business if they wanted too.

Do you get what I mean by making it something that isn’t just YOU. The question to ask yourself is…’if I stopped being available to give to the business is there a way it could still prosper without me?’

#5 – Chose something that has the ability to grow as you grow

In point #3 I shared that your circumstances can change, and so therefore your business will be required to change. Lets say you start the business as a single woman, what happens when you get married and have children? Is the business able to grow with your lifestyle change? One of the reasons we chose the business we did is because it would work now, in 5 years and in 25 years. The customers we attract might look different and the hours we work might look different, but the business won’t be non-existent if our life changes, which it naturally will.

Let me give you an example – if your side hustle is working every evening and it can only function if you give that time to it. What happens when you have young children? What happens when you can no longer offer up every evening? You want to create a business that is long lasting, as the only way to make that happen is for it to be something that can grow with you.

I hope these things to consider have been helpful. Any business requires a lot of work, but it also requires you to make smart decisions and pick the right business from day one. Don’t waste your time investing in something that isn’t manageable or that won’t grow and be flexible with your own life. The blessing of start your own business is that it is your choice and you can make it anything you want it to be!