The Side Hustle Show

Latest Episodes:

331: A Look Inside a 6-Figure Online Business: Traffic, Monetization, and More Apr 18, 2019

Show notes

A few years ago, a side hustler named Brock McGoff reached out to me with a guest post pitch.

The post detailed how he was making, at that time, $4,000 a month, from his blog about men’s fashion, on the side from his day job.

Since then, Brock has turned TheModestMan.com into his full-time focus, into a 6-figure income, and into a media empire that expands well beyond the blog itself.

In this episode, Brock talks me through how he generates content ideas, how the business makes money, where he’s focusing his energy for the best results, and how he’s taken his site from a side hustle to a full-time business.

Don't have a website of your own yet? Check out my free video series on how to get up and running in no time.

Full Show Notes and PDF Highlight Reel: A Look Inside a 6-Figure Online Business: Traffic, Monetization, and More

330: Land Flipping Revisited: From Zero to $10,000 a Month on the Side Apr 11, 2019

Show notes

Roberto Chavez started his raw land flipping side hustle a little over a year ago, and with persistence, has already built it into 5-figure of monthly revenue.

This is a business model that was first introduced to me by Mark Podolsky, from TheLandGeek.com, in episode 108 of The Side Hustle Show.

He called it "the best passive income model" because it avoids "the 3 T’s" of traditional real estate investing: tenants, toilets, and termites.

How the model works is you:

acquire parcels of land on the cheap because the owners don’t want them anymore
re-sell them either for a quick cash flip, or more commonly, as an owner-financed sale.

This is where the passive income comes in as you collect monthly payments for a period of 3-7 years, or whatever terms you agree on.

For example, buy a $10,000 parcel upfront for $2,500, and resell it for $199 a month for 5 years. In that scenario, your total payments collected would be almost $12,000, and you'd breakeven on your initial investment after about a year.

Where the persistence comes in, is the initial seller outreach. It’s very much a numbers game, as you’ll hear Roberto explain. I think that’s what separates those who have success in it from, those who don’t.

Tune in to learn how Roberto finds parcels to buy for 25 cents on the dollar, how he figures out how much to offer, the due diligence that goes into these deals, and how he re-sells them for profit.

Full Show Notes: Land Flipping Revisited: From Zero to $10,000 a Month on the Side

Note: Roberto is actually a student of Mark's. When I told Mark we were recording this episode, he offered his Land Investing Launch Kit (normally $97) free for Side Hustle Show listeners. I'm also an affiliate for his paid program; use code "sidehustle" for $500 off.

329: Get Better, Not Bigger: On Growth, Freedom, Online Marketing, and "Enough" Apr 04, 2019

Show notes

"Growth isn't the byproduct of success," Paul Jarvis told me. "Or at least it shouldn't be. The byproduct of success should be freedom."

Paul is a talented writer and designer who’s made a living--and a name for himself--by often taking the counterpoint to the conventional wisdom, especially when it comes to entrepreneurship and business growth.

His latest book, Company of One, caught my attention. It’s about why building a better business doesn’t necessarily mean building a bigger business.

In this episode Paul talks me through:

The decision-making frameworks he uses in his business and how you can apply them to yours
How he’s intentionally set up his own operation to maximize time leverage and freedom
How he’s built a list of 33k+ email subscribers over the 8 years and how this list drives his business today

Full Show Notes: Get Better, Not Bigger: On Growth, Freedom, Online Marketing, and "Enough"

Bonus: 7 Ways to Scale a Service Business Apr 01, 2019

Show notes

As we’ve mentioned, “scaling” a service business can be one of the biggest challenges with this business model. In fact, it’s a sticking point that keeps a lot of people away from freelancing altogether.

But if your goal is to get big or even to just avoid trading time for money your whole life, there are lots of ways to scale a service business.

If you'd like to learn more about starting a service business and connecting with your first clients, check out this in-depth interview with Abbey Ashley (Episode 328).

Abbey's claim to fame is she booked enough virtual assistant work during her maternity leave that she didn't have to back to that job she hated when her leave was up!

Abbey also put together this killer free training on how to launch and grow your freelance business.

In the meantime, here are the 7 Ways to Scale a Service Business from this episode:

Raise your rates
Go From one-to-one to one-to-many
Hire subcontractors
Create productized packages
Play Matchmaker
Look for affiliate opportunities
Create a product

Enjoy!

328: How to Start a Service Business to Replace Your Income, Step-by-Step Mar 28, 2019

Show notes

Starting a service business on the side is one of the fastest ways to build extra income. It's flexible, low-overhead, and you can probably start with skills you already have.

“I had a lot of drive underneath me," Abbey Ashley told me, about starting her service business back in 2013. "I was super pregnant and I hated my job so much,”

Abbey started offering her services as a virtual assistant, and connected with her first clients at local networking events in Washington, DC. My the time her maternity leave was up--just a few short months--Abbey had booked enough work to not have to go back to that job she hated.

On top of that, she only had to work 20 hours a week to do it, and could work from home.

There are almost no barriers to entry to starting a freelance service business, and the startup costs are minimal. (All Abbey did was make business cards for networking.)

In fact, it was a service business, a house painting business in my case, that was one of my first entrepreneurial adventures.

Over time, Abbey scaled her virtual assistant business from just herself at $20-30 an hour, to her own little virtual agency, to $75 an hour and up for some specialized work. Before long, the questions started coming in:

How can I do what you do?
How can I work from home and set my own hours?
How can I do work I enjoy?

In response, she built up a complete training program for would-be virtual assistants. She's helped thousands of people start their own service businesses and has built a thriving free community of virtual assistants.

If you want to dive in deeper, check out her free training called Become a Booked Out Virtual Assistant. (That's an affiliate link; if you buy her full program, I'll receive a commission.)

Full Show Notes: How to Start a Service Business to Replace Your Income, Step-by-Step

327: How to Get Unstuck: 6 Levers to Pull to Level Up Your Business Mar 21, 2019

Show notes

Todd Tresidder took his own personal net worth from less than zero at 23, to self-made millionaire and retired at 35.

When it comes to building wealth, he's the smartest guy in the room.

His latest book is The Leverage Equation: How to Work Less, Make More, and Cut 30 Years Off Your Retirement Plan.

We met through the FinCon community several years ago and I've learned a ton from our conversations. Todd has a unique perspective on business and investing, and our conversations over the years always get me thinking a little differently. He blogs at FinancialMentor.com.

Tune in to hear Todd talk me through his 6 types of leverage and how you can apply those as needed in your business:

Financial Leverage
Time Leverage
Technology and Systems Leverage
Communications and Marketing Leverage
Network and Relationship Leverage
Knowledge and Experience Leverage

Enjoy!

Full Show Notes: How to Get Unstuck: 6 Levers to Pull to Level Up Your Business

326: Reselling on Amazon with a $1 Million Seller: Let’s Go Pick Up Profit! Mar 14, 2019

Show notes

Jessica Larrew and her husband Cliff have been reselling on Amazon for years. And though it started as a part-time side hustle, it turned into a serious business--they've sold more than $1 million worth of stuff on Amazon!

What's surprising – and I think exciting – is that they’ve done this is by finding profitable products to resell primarily in nearby retail stores.

How Reselling on Amazon Works

Jessica takes advantage of Amazon’s FBA program, or Fulfillment by Amazon. This is Amazon's way of crowdsourcing its inventory, and letting regular people like us tap into its world-class logistics network.

That means this Selling Family doesn't have to ship anything to the end customer, handle returns, or write up product descriptions.

How the business works is like any other retail business: you profit on the spread between the cost of your product and what it sells for. Now you have to account for Amazon's fees and shipping costs, but it's basically buy low, sell high.

And the best part of this side hustle is that you can get started today with whatever initial inventory investment you're comfortable with.

Full Show Notes: Reselling on Amazon with a $1 Million Seller: Let’s Go Pick Up Profit!

325: The Million Dollar Hobby: How to Monetize What You’re Already Interested In Mar 07, 2019

Show notes

Marc Andre made over $1.1 million dollars from his photography hobby.

But what’s interesting is that he never:

got paid to take pictures
sold any of his photos
held any photography workshops

So, what did he do instead?

He built and subsequently sold 3 websites related to photography – that sold digital products to other photographers.

His journey started in 2012. Marc wanted to upgrade from a point-and-shoot camera to a nice DSLR and some lenses but couldn’t justify the $5k price tag for the equipment.

Instead of settling for something else, Marc set himself a challenge to see if he could raise the $5k starting a photography-related side hustle.

Things escalated quickly, from starting a site to creating digital products, he made that $5k in a few months.

Marc carried on scaling his business, creating more products, starting two more photography-related sites, and over the next 6 years pulled in more than a million dollars in revenue.

Tune in to hear Marc’s unique process for starting and growing sites, why he decided to create products before having an audience to sell to, how he used sites that already had traffic to drive sales, and how he scaled up his business to more than a million dollars in revenue in such a short space of time.

Full Show Notes and PDF Highlight Reel: The Million Dollar Hobby: How to Monetize What You’re Already Interested In

323: Financial Independence Fast-Track: How to Replace Your Salary by Buying Mini Businesses Feb 21, 2019

Show notes

Stacy Caprio was desperate to leave her day job.

She ended up doing just that after acquiring – and improving – a portfolio of mini online businesses. In her case, these were websites that make money from advertising.

Now, this asset class can be risky, and Stacy is open about her early failures.

But if you have some online skills, (or management skills to bring people in if you don’t want to run the site yourself) this can be a fast-track to the cash flow you need to fund your lifestyle.

Since websites often sell for 20x monthly earnings, they're perhaps 10-15x "cheaper" than if you were to rely solely on traditional investments and a 4% withdrawal rate.

Sound like the kind of investment that suits your lifestyle?

Tune in to hear where Stacy finds these businesses to buy, her unique filtering criteria, and a few quick ways she’s been able to accelerate the cash flow of her portfolio for even better returns.

Full Show Notes and PDF Highlight Reel: Financial Independence Fast-Track: How to Replace Your Salary by Buying Mini Businesses

322: My 5 Favorite Books of the Year and My Top Takeaways from Each Feb 14, 2019

Show notes

"We are simultaneously gods and worms.”—Abraham Maslow

Power plus humility, right? It's a great combination and something to keep in mind as we try and build our businesses.

We can accomplish amazing things, and yet, we're gone in a flash. Mere blips on the historical radar.

But let's be the gods of our side hustle universe today, and focus on shaping that business in a way that best serves ourselves and others.

In this special solo edition of The Side Hustle Show, I'm breaking down my Top 5 books from last year, and the actions I took (or am taking) as a result of reading them.

Hopefully there are a few nuggets you can borrow!

Full Show Notes: My 5 Favorite Books of the Year and My Top Takeaways from Each

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