How to Side-Hustle like a Pro in Africa

You are a pro at side-hustling, when your income from side-hustling becomes equivalent to or higher than your income from your main hustle. This is the dream which everyone aspires to achieve- the question is HOW?

There’s a large disparity between the number of young people wanting to be their own bosses, and those who are actually managing to pull it off.Side-hustling is one thing which many of us would like to do, and would like to make a lot of income from, but unfortunately, it isn’t as easy as it probably sounds.
As millenials, we all crave to do something worth our while and this often ends up being our side hustle. With the desire to become super relevant at something, we sometimes get caught up in a lot of webs, and eventually, well…we might get entangled in one of those webs except we:
1. Take time into consideration
Your side hustle isn’t exactly something which you have all day to focus on. With this in mind, you would then agree with me that time management is critical here. For instance, if you have a day job and relative dissatisfaction has pushed you to have a side business, then you have to bear in mind that your ‘passion’ for this side business cannot eat you up all day. Compartmentalization is the key here. It’s no longer a side hustle if the time you’re supposed to spend working at your day job is mostly invested into the side business. Besides, no one likes a shoddy employee (who spends office hours on his or her own self and ends up not meeting deadlines etc.).

2. Evaluate your competition
Be smart. You have competition. This is no time to be all laid back and assume that you would over time, become relevant. Work hard at evaluating who your competitors are, their strengths and weaknesses. You might have to also check out those ones who seem to be excelling flawlessly and see how they do so- a valued shock absorber I offer you; while it looks like they are excelling flawlessly, they are more likely than not, putting in a lot of work into the business behind the scenes. While evaluating competitors, you are likely to have better output if you not only evaluate those within your environs, but also those who have better facilities than you do, but the key here is not to get intimidated. You might learn some key principles from this sort of evaluation.
3. Set aside time focused solely on your side hustle
While I’ve made clear the fact that you cannot convert the time spent at your day job into that spent for side hustling, you still have to create time which is solely set aside for this business. This is the ‘behind the scenes’ work I talked about in point number 2. Let no one tell you they became great by chance, it involved a lot of work; even if it involved a lot of ‘luck’! You’ve got to work this thing if it’s gonna work well. Even if it’s a few minutes per day (preferably around the same time each day if you work well with routines), time spent brainstorming, researching and actually working in tandem with your business would go a long way in helping you become the Pro you so desire to be. It might look as though you aren’t investing much time, but you’ll be astounded after a while that for real, tiny drops can make an ocean!
4. Set aside resources focused mainly on side hustling
As we are all too well conversant with in our part of the world, things like power supply and Wi-Fi are rarities, and so we have to (rather unfortunately), set aside all such requirements as out-of-pocket investments for the sake of our side-hustle. It is apparently different from doing same in another part of the world, but we need to make do with what we have.
Besides those things that might count as operational costs, you would also have to set aside money and other essentials for emergencies that may come up. It is when you choose to go solo that you often discover how much effort and resources are required to run a business efficiently- and you just might start appreciating your bosses well!
5. Spread News of Your Business via Word of Mouth
A good way to start a business and to keep it running is via word of mouth. Professionals are known for delivering quality work. If that is what you aim for, you’re going to find out that your business would spread from one satisfied client to the next in no time. Brand your side business with the mark of quality, and watch it grow in leaps and bounds.