Did you know that running a side hustle can exponentially expand your main career? Here are a few reasons why.
First, choosing the right side hustle can make it easier for you to enjoy your day job, contributing significantly to your mental health, wellbeing, and productivity at work, because outside of your job, you’re doing something that you love. Second, it can complement your existing career through establishing you as a multifaceted thought leader and expert within your industry.
Another benefit of having a side hustle is that it sharpens entrepreneurial skills such as strict time management, attention to detail, multitasking, collaborating with new people, and researching and understanding the needs of your customers—all of which are prized by employers eyeing the next employee for a promotion or pay raise. It can also complement your resume and be viewed favorably by employers when searching and applying for a new job.
But perhaps most importantly for many professionals, a side hustle is a non-negotiable, an absolute necessity if one is to thrive in an inflated economy in 2024. Approximately 39% of working Americans reported having a side hustle in 2023 according to a Bankrate survey of 2,505 U.S. adults.
And although it would be expected that those with a household income within the lower income brackets would be most likely to have a side gig, the Bankrate survey interestingly revealed that generally, those with a household income more than $100,000 are most likely to have a side hustle. This might be due to higher taxation rates, or that those with higher incomes are prioritizing the stabilization of their long-term financial and career prospects, such as paying off debts, for example.
Approximately 28% of the survey’s respondents said they will always need a side hustle to make ends meet, and 23% stated that they neither side hustle due to inflation, while a further 20% agreed that they don’t necessarily want to work their side hustle but they have no other choice. Furthermore, 19% intend to make it their main source of income one day.
Do you fall into any of the above categories? If you decide to opt in for starting a small side business, it’s usually better to run it almost entirely from home.
Deciding to run your hustle remotely is beneficial whether you already work from home in your regular day job or not, because either way, it is flexible and can accommodate your busy schedule and lifestyle. This is especially the case if you choose to work with clients who are located in a different time zone to you, as depending on the time zone, they will be in daylight and regular business hours while you have already finished working at your day job.
Side Hustle Ideas From Home
Here is an extensive list of some side hustles that might be an extension of and complement your day job, that you can run almost entirely within the comfort of your own sofa while building financial freedom and the respect of industry stakeholders:
- Freelance writing
- Social media management
- Online tutoring
- Affiliate marketing
- Selling photography to stock photography websites
- Marketing consulting
- Course creation
- Virtual event planning
- Project management consulting
- Software and app development
- Investing in stock
- HR consulting
- Teaching English as a foreign language online
- DEI consulting
- Video editing
- Podcast hosting
- Legal consulting
- Providing nutrition advice as nutrition advisor
- Voice acting
- Financial coaching
- Business and start-up coaching/consulting
- Career coaching
- Cybersecurity consulting
- Communication coaching
- Sales coaching
Peruse the above list and see if there are any that resonate with you. Remember, starting a successful side hustle may not be easy, but if you launch one that complements your existing industry experience, you will be able to tap into your network of industry connections and your existing skill set to make it profitable.
Source: 25 Side Hustle Ideas From Home For Busy Professionals In 2024