QUARANTINE HACK: How To Build Your Side Hustle with NO Money
IT'S YOUR TIME! Let's face it, we are all going through a lot right now and we have two choices:
ONE: Either, we become paralyzed. We feel the fear, we let the uncertainties get to us. We complain, we get stressed, we do nothing different.
OR...
TWO: We see this time as an opportunity. A time to really evaluate how you have been living all your life....do you like what you see? Its a time to do the things you have always wanted to do, or to finally see what you never liked and learn how you can turn them around so you truly live a fulfilled life.
We can't just hope for the best. You can take Action Now and do something with the situation. We are all at home and we have the opportunity to take some time for ourselves and think. Life is giving us a lot of Lemons right now, so let's make some delicious Lemonade.
Here are the Ingredients you can find right in your pantry
ONE: Have a Clear Idea
I'm sure you have an idea in mind, either it's something from before or something you just came up with now....or maybe you don't know yet. Any of these are ok. What you want is NOT to spend to much time PLANNING....I know, we have always been taught that you must spend about 60% of your time planning and the other 40% executing the plan. Well, for Digital Marketing, this concept is not as effective nor the best way to spend your valuable time.
What having a clear idea looks like:
A) Know Your Offer: What area of expertise do you have? Is it a service? Due to the epidemic we are going through, its best to think of a service rather than a product. Why? Because a product requires, investment, logistics, distribution, and its much more complicated and resources everywhere are limited....so if you stick to a service, such as: Offering a course, hosting Webinars, Coaching, etc, these kind of services are great to create right now.
B) Don't Spend All Your Time Creating The Whole Idea: Don't waste your time on this.....just create an outline of what you think people will want to hear.....a tip for this, would be to see what other people who are successful doing? and model them. Join one of the courses or coaching's and see what they do first, then second, see what emails they send out, with what frequency, how they engage with everyone, what tools they use, what they offer and see who there audience is.
Remember: With What You Know Today, You Are An Expert To Someone, Somewhere.
TWO: Learn What People Want and Are Willing To Pay For
After you create the outline, selected a date to launch (give yourself enough time to be able to promote it, maybe 2-3 weeks), define a price (make it very affordable, once you have a satisfied client, it's more likely they will buy again, and pay more if they see the value), have a place they can go to register and process a payment (I will share more on this below) then share it with your Facebook friends and family or where ever you have a group of people, it can even be an email list.
Then what you want to do is simple: LISTEN
It's important to LISTEN to what people are saying, engage everyday and ask questions, like: What would you like to learn specifically on Topic A of my course or program? or What struggles or questions do you have on this Topic A? Do this on other groups as well where your target audience may be. This tactic will allow you to see what are people's real needs are and this insight is what will help create the rest of your course or coaching structure. Remember, you only are promoting the outline of the course, you yet haven't defined the sub-topics, yet created it.
If you see a topic is more popular than another, then make that the focus of your service.
THREE: Build Your Space
It's time to build your platform.....but chances are, most of you are not a programmer, am I right? Well, I'm not a programmer and I build this whole website Assett.ca on my own (It's definitely a work in progress, but remember, we are not aiming for perfection, we are aiming for DONE!), "Done" my friends, is what brings RESULTS, working for perfection, will always hold you back and delay you, it's just another way to procrastinate.
I will share some tools I have used and have found that can allow you to create a website or landing page, quickly and easily. As a disclaimer: I am in no way affiliated with these companies or being endorsed by them, feel free to evaluate if they are a good fit for you but its up to you.
1) Wix : Wix is a website builder. It has a cool drag and drop system, and tons of free images you can use. You can use the free version to start, but note, that it does have limitations, like adding your own domain name.
2) Social Media: Creating a Facebook Page is another way to build a space where you can showcase your offer, build an audience, engage with them directly, promote a service and you can also setup payment methods directly on facebook or connect it to Eventbrite. Facebook offers tons of cool features, where you can easily create videos, Lives, and it has a video editing tool, you can create landing pages and forms, and much more. There are also tons of tutorial videos on how to do this yourself.
FOUR: Create Your Brand
I've been developing brands for over 15 years and I can't express enough the importance of having a Brand. A brand doesn't mean, having a logo and all your stationary printed. No. It means much much more than that, and its even easier than dealing with stationary designs and prints :) I will share below what it's really about:
1) Have a Logo: Even though I just said its not about having a logo, I said, its not JUST about that, but it is important. Now, your logo doesn't have to be the best of the best, but try your best to make your logo represent you or your brand promise. Your brand promise, is simply what you are promising your audience? Try to reflect this graphically as simple as possible (to many elements is not good). We have all heard the phase: Less is More. Well, for brands, that's 100% true. All you need to do is:
A) Pick a Name (I recommend you do your research to make sure its not taken). Make the name short and straight to the point if possible,
B) Choose an Icon that can represent your brand (this is optional). You can find tons of free vector graphics here. But, you may need to have some kind of design program, like Illustrator, Photoshop or Indesign (this would be too advanced for some people) So, if you don't have these programs or don't know how to design, I would love to recommend Canva. It's an awesome designing platform where you can quickly use beautiful templates already created, change text, colors or images and download and post it. It's a lot of fun and very easy to use.
C) Choose one or two colors for your brand. Make sure you have a primary color and secondary color (make sure you know your swatch color number, keep it somewhere, you will need this a lot as its important to keep it consistent).
D) Choose a type of Font (you can have two, a primary and secondary) normally the secondary is for your tagline. Google fonts has many fonts you can download.
Doing this, you now have a Brand.....but like I said, a Brand is not ONLY about a logo design...its about you, you are your brand. It is important that you define your voice and you build your brand, and this is done only by being CONSISTENT. Which means being consistent in your message, consistent on your brand promise and consistent on your brand colors, font and look & feel. So, if your brand is blue #0877f4, Please Do Not use another blue, or another font. Thank you!
FIVE: Promote Your Offer
This is simple and I will keep it simple. There is no magic to this, especially when we are under budget or have no budget. This is what I recommend:
1) Choose a Platform: This can be a social platform, such as: Facebook, Instagram, TikToK, LinkedIn, Youtube, or any other one you like such as a podcast platform or a Blog. Each Social Platform has a somewhat defined audience, choose yours based on where you think you audience may be.
2) Share Everyday: Yes, share a post, a video, a podcast, or a blog, and do this everyday, or every week to start....but whatever you choose, be CONSISTENT. Even if you don't want to do it, do it anyways.
3) Build an Email List: Find out ways to interest people to join your email list. From good information, to fun tips and giveaways...whatever you want, but be creative, see what others are doing, create your own hooks.
4) Be Authentic: When you share, whatever you share, be real, share what your doing, share what your are thinking, share your mistakes, share your achievements. People love to follow stories, and most importantly, stories they can relate too. This will help create a strong connection between you and your audience.
Remember, don't aim for perfection, aim for getting things DONE!
With everything going on because of the COVID-19, we need to over share what we know, the impact you can make on even just one person is worth everything you are doing. There is no time to be afraid, or shy or judgmental... don't "think", just "do". It's about keeping in Action all the time.
People are at home now, and maybe, just maybe what you have to share is exactly what they need, so let this be your motivation to get your dreams DONE.
SIX: Do it Again
Ok, so now you have an idea of what you need to do. Once you did all this, and you launched your side hustle (which hopefully becomes more than just a side hustle), and you get your 1st. customer, and you finalize building the full course or coaching structure or whatever it is, and you get the feedback from everyone (those 5- 10 people, maybe at first). Then you take that, and you adjust, and adjust until it becomes the best service, course or program you have to offer. When you are here, recommend to allocate some of your budget to some paid ads, so you can boost your offer and obtain a wider reach in audience.
Keep in mind, when your create a hook (ex: an affordable course), and you get customers, like I said before, chances are they will buy again and pay more (if the experience was good), always plan ahead and see other ways you can serve your audience, what do they need? remember, you will know this by LISTENING. See how you can create the next thing, that has more value for them, and set a higher price.
When you are ready to launch the next service you offer, share it with your email list,
Other Tools and Resources I highly Recommend
These tools are not all free like the ones listed above, but I think they are worth having if you have a budget for it.
Google Analytics: Connect your website or platform used to Google Analytics. Everything done online must be measured, this will allow you to see if the efforts you are doing are worth your time. See what worked and what didn't. (FREE)
Click Funnels: A cool platform and support group for creating effective Landing pages. They also have the other resources for creating content and meaningful and effective marketing campaigns.
Anchor: This is an App where you can easily create your own podcast, easily edit and it will automatically post on about 8-10 podcast platforms, including Spotify and Apple (FREE)
Mailchimp: This is a great way to stay connected to your email list, here you can easily create emails and share everyday, you can automate your emails and more. (FREE + Paid)
Pexels: Great place to get free Stock images. and they look great. (FREE)
Udemy: Great support Platform for creating a course and promoting it. I haven't officially used it, but I will soon as it has been very well recommended. (FREE + Paid)
WebPowerUp: An amazing cloud-based platform, where you can create quick landing pages or websites, do live streaming, have different logins for different audiences or customers, its pretty much everything I mentioned above, but all in one place...it's awesome!
Mindvalley: Great space for Personal Growth. Its always important to continue learning and knowing yourself. I love Mindvalley, they provide a lot of free information that inspires and motivates you to keep doing what your doing. (FREE + Paid)
So, I hope you found this blog useful. If you did, please leave me a comment and share with me what you will be creating. Also, please share with your friends!!
I am planning on doing a two week course, where I will dive deeper on some of these topics and I have a few more I want to add. Please let me know what you need most help on?
If you want to have a chat about your business or business idea, I would be more than happy to jump on Zoom. You can find my contact info here.
Stay safe,
Joyce