As a freelancer, it’s worth the money and time to find apps that reduce your time expenditure and … [+]
Ever since the boom of the side hustle, freelancing, or gig economy within recent years since the pandemic, holding down an alternative or secondary source of supplementary income has become the norm. Almost everywhere you look on the internet, you’ll find stories of professionals who’ve successfully navigated their freelancing journey and have secured eye-watering six and seven-figure incomes, enough to make you consider turning in your notice at work and jumping on the side hustle bandwagon.
But before you do, it’s critical to remember that there are some essential elements to running a high-income side hustle and successfully navigating your freelance career journey.
First, you need to identify a high-income skill that you either currently have or would like to develop. Next, you need core soft skills such as communication skills, time management, and problem solving.
And of course, you need to set your expectations realistically, establish your goals, define your niche, and build your personal brand, amongst other things.
But besides all this, to make it easier for you to eventually create passive income, to streamline your processes, and to reduce the headache that comes through juggling personal and work life, studies, and your side hustle at the same time, there are some business tools and apps which are indispensable for you as a freelancer in 2024.
Here are a few below:
1. Dubsado
This tool features an entire suite of helpful features that makes your admin work much easier, such as invoice creation, automated workflows, and client portals. You can use client portals to simplify the process of signing contracts and liaising with clients, using one organized place, giving you one less thing to worry about after a long work day. Dubsado also provides you with forms and templates for essential documents you will need to manage your side hustle, such as contracts or questionnaires.
2. Canva
Canva is very convenient for freelancers, especially if your strength lies in your domain and not in designing. It also comes with AI-powered assistance to help you streamline your personal brand, and helps you quickly generate images and videos to promote your work and your presence on social media and online. You can also use Canva to design eye-catching presentations for new customers (and even in your main job).
You might also want to use Canva for other branding elements such as making your own branded t-shirts.
3. Doodle
You may have heard of booking apps such as Calendly, that integrate with your email calendar. But things can get tricky if you’re arranging a meeting with several people at once, especially if your client is a business. First impressions count, and the back-and-forth of arranging the intricacies of dates and times for a meeting can put your clients off from working with you and can be a source of stress and confusion.
This timely app, Doodle, is helpful because it allows you to create a group poll in which you assign specific times and dates, and those who are invited to the poll can vote for as many slots that will work for them. This enables you to gather consensus and easily book your next meeting without the hassle of constantly switching dates and times.
4. HyperWrite
There is a plethora of AI writing tools available on the internet, such as ChatGPT and Grammarly. HyperWrite is another AI-powered writing assistant, and it offers you support as a freelancer with writing marketing copy, responding to those tedious emails, editing your content, or repurposing your social media posts and blogs. It also comes with a handy Google Chrome extension.
5. OneNote
Life doesn’t always go according to plan, and sometimes, regardless of how much you’ve meticulously planned your work day, things can happen at work or in your personal life that threaten to derail your plans. To help you stay on track, OneNote can be a useful tool. As part of the Microsoft
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You can also draw or write, or create tables like a miniature spreadsheet. This productivity tool works well when you have a brilliant idea or lightbulb moment for your side hustle, but don’t currently have the time to fully commit to business planning due to work commitments.
OneNote is useful for jotting your ideas on the go when juggling your side hustle with other tasks
These five tools assist with content creation, brainstorming and note-taking, client and project management, and organization, and are must-haves if you are considering freelancing or starting a lucrative side hustle in 2024. After all, if you can’t organize your time, yourself, or your client projects, you can’t expect to have a thriving, high-income side hustle. Once you start using these tools, you can eventually research and discover other software to help you scale faster and be more efficient in your work.
Source: 5 Business Apps You Need To Run A High-Income Side Hustle In 2024
