Ideas to Make a Side Income While Growing Your Business

Being an entrepreneur is synonymous with being financially unstable at times. While you’re growing your company, it’s important to be focused. But what if you could get a side hustle that would help bring in a healthy secondary income to alleviate some of that financial stress? And, best case, what if this side hustle could also help you grow your core business?

The good news is that there are a lot of companies that create opportunities for entrepreneurs that don’t require full-time work and can become a great companion to the work you’re doing. Better yet, they take out the hassle of having to create a second company to supplement your income because they do the legwork and allow you to plug in your skills and time.

Here are nine examples of opportunities that might be the perfect side hustle for you as you continue to grow your company!

1. Invest in real estate.

There are a lot of methods for making money in real estate, many of which don’t require your full time effort. Josh Dorkin, CEO and founder of BiggerPockets says you should consider land lording, flipping houses or wholesaling. His company’s website will help you manage and understand all of the different state laws and regulations, as well as leverage the largest worldwide network of real estate investors who come to his site to ask questions and help one another.

He also recommends finding people in your area with skill sets and expertise that you don’t have, and to partner with them or use them as a place to park your investment cash. You can join BiggerPockets for free and he recommends reading its Ultimate Beginner’s Guide, a free eight-chapter book on real estate investing for novices.

2. Drive a taxi.

Most of us are familiar with Uber and Lyft, the companies that took limo and town car services and gave them riders in their down time, and then expanded into recruiting regular citizens to utilize their free time to become taxi drivers. Have you considered being one of them?

I’ll never forget one of my UberX rides where the driver told me that he uses his spare time to make money driving as well as to leverage the networking he can do with each of his passengers as he grows his new business -- genius!

"One of the greatest things about the Uber platform is that it offers economic opportunity for a variety of drivers -- full time, part time, teachers in summer, full-time students, military spouses, etc. -- in more than 260 cities around the world,” says Molly Spaeth, an Uber spokesperson.

So if you’re in one of the 260 cities, you could be making your car into a money-generating experience and a networking opportunity on wheels!

3. Host the next-gen of tupperware parties.

There are many companies that do at-home parties and trunk shows where you can utilize the company’s products, marketing and operations infrastructure to build a side income by plugging in your network.

One that has proven to be very successful is Stella and Dot, where you become a jewelry consultant and host parties at friend's homes, local boutiques or events. Other popular brands include Rodan + Fields and Pure Romance.

4. Outsource your skills.

Can you do graphic design, data mining, website development, video editing, software development or customer service? Then you can parlay those skills by signing up on sites such as TaskRabbit or ODesk and get hired by their members to do jobs in any of these areas. You can pick and choose how often you want to work and what jobs you take!

5. Be a temp.

Long gone are the days of temp agencies and scouring the Internet for part-time or short-term work. Enter Wonolo, which helps people “work now locally.”

“Wonolo is a company that allows anyone to work for a few hours or a day at real companies doing real work," says AJ Brustein, the company's co-founder. "Want to help an ecommerce company fulfilling orders when they are busy, help out at a conference taking tickets, or assist in data entry at a wealth management firm? You can get numerous career experiences around the flexibility of your own schedule.”

You can get alerted of jobs available in your area immediately via Wonolo's app. Sounds perfect for a busy entrepreneur!

6. Rent out your pad.

Are you traveling for a business meeting and leaving your home empty? Do you have a spare room or guest house? It’s time to put them to work and list them on Airbnb or VRBO and make money on your property when you’re not using it!

7. Rent out your car.

If you can get on board with renting out your home, you’ll certainly understand the model created by companies such as RelayRides and FlightCar, which allow you to rent out your personal vehicle to their users.

I recently used RelayRides during a trip in San Francisco and had a great experience that didn’t require me to find a rental car center, and the cost was right. I even was able to get acquainted with the car’s owner, to whom I offered to help find a job.

It's another way to make money and network when you’re not using your car (like when you're parked at the airport thanks to FlightCar)!

8. Don’t just buy on eBay, sell there.

You can simply sell your own items, or you can make it into a side business.

“I run an eBay franchise in which I teach people how to run a re-sale business on eBay," says Garrett Brustein. "I do one-on-one training to show them where to get their inventory and how to list and ship items the same way I do so they can emulate the process and take all of the guess work out of the business. They are then able to do this as a part-time job in their free time."

 

Just think -- you can unload the stuff you don't want and go shopping to resell items all in the name of making money!

9. Get paid to network.

I know this one from personal experience! After founding my first company, a credit card processing brokerage, I began to organize networking events in my city to help young professionals interact in an environment where they wouldn’t fear getting sold to or hit on. I quickly realized the events were not only helping those in attendance to make valuable connections, but that there was real money to be made, as well.

Over time, I packaged the operations of Network Under 40 to enable entrepreneurs in other markets to bring the events to their cities. By becoming the epicenter of the network, it naturally parlays into building their full-time businesses as well as creates a healthy side income.

If you’re looking to make some money on the side and/or find channels through which you can build your primary business, it’s time to look into some of these options.