Yahoo Finance Side Hustler on Track To Earn $100K: Avoid These 5 Gigs That Aren’t Worth It
Helena Di Biase, a full-time VC investor and part-time side hustler, set out on a mission to earn £100,000 ($126,906) in side-gig income 12 months, and has been documenting the journey on TikTok. Along the way, she’s learned which side hustles simply aren’t worth the effort.
“Nine months ago, I set out to see if I can make £100,000 in additional side hustle income alongside my full-time job, testing out all of this stuff that you see on TikTok to see if it actually made any money,” she said in a TikTok video. “Here’s some of the stuff I’ve tested out [that] hasn’t worked for me.”
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Selling Personal Items on eBay
Di Biase said that while she did find some initial success as an eBay seller, she didn’t find it to be a scalable way to make money.
“I’m going to immediately contradict myself by sharing something that actually has worked out and made my initial startup capital so I could invest in some other things, but it’s not scalable,” she said. “It’s not going to work out for me long term and it’s definitely not going to make me £100,000 in 12 months. And that’s why I’ve caveated it by saying [it’s a] great starting point — selling on eBay.”
Di Biase said that she began her side hustle journey by “selling stuff literally from just in my house in order to make some initial money so that I can move on to other side hustles,” but could not figure out how to keep the money flowing in from this side gig.
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Print-on-Demand
Print-on-demand is a business model that involves printing designs on apparel, accessories and home decor — and as the name suggests, these products are only produced after an order is placed.
“Again, this didn’t work out for me,” Di Biase said. “The main problem I had with this business model was the cash flow. I wanted it to be good. I wanted it to work out. But I think if you’re starting from zero, print-on-demand is really, really difficult. It’s great in the sense that you don’t hold any inventory — you set up a website, you have a company [that will] fulfill those products for you when you make a sale — [but] you need to pay for the product in advance before you actually get the cash in from customers. So you do need a buffer of cash available to you.”
Selling a Physical Product
For her next side hustle attempt, Di Biase developed a range of kids’ products to sell.
“I wasted a ton of time and money developing physical products,” she said. “It was a range of products for kids that have never and will never see the light of day. I made a ton of mistakes with this, mainly, again, with finding a manufacturer and inventory, and also really understanding how much time and effort I would need to put in in order to sell a physical product.”
Once again, Di Biase encountered cash flow issues.
“The margins were really low,” she said. “I didn’t know how I was going to be able to hold inventory without paying for a warehouse. And I just decided, you know what, this is too much hassle for what I am trying to do. And it wasn’t worth it to pursue for me. I know a lot of people have made really, really successful businesses and side hustles from selling physical products, but it just wasn’t something that I wanted to pursue.”
Selling Digital Products on Etsy
Selling on Etsy was another side hustle fail for Di Biase. That’s because she was already earning money via her own sites by selling online courses and other digital products, and found the cost to sell on Etsy wasn’t worth it.
“I know a lot of people, especially on TikTok, who have got great really, really scalable, really sustainable Etsy businesses,” she said. “It just didn’t work out for me, I think because I just didn’t put in the time and energy into Etsy for specifically selling digital products. That’s because I already have my own website and I already had a Stan Store. It was working really well for me and I didn’t want to pay the commissions that I would have to pay to Etsy, despite [it] actually having a bigger audience.”
Surveys and User Testing
Online surveys and user testing can be fine for quick cash, but if you’re looking to make anywhere close to six figures, this isn’t the best choice, Di Biase found.
“I’ve made decent amounts of money from surveys and user testing over the last nine months — I’m talking hundreds of pounds,” she said. “So I think they’re another great starting point. But again, it’s just not scalable. And it’s not going to get me anywhere close to the targets that I had set [for] myself.”
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: Side Hustler on Track To Earn $100K: Avoid These 5 Gigs That Aren’t Worth It
