Try 12 New Online Side Hustles this Year
Are you up for the challenge?
Recently, I wrote about the hardship of being a content creator and how difficult it is to make a living from it, despite what we might think. I’ve taken the job far too seriously for the past six months, obsessing over my “niche” and growing an audience…
But I forgot why I started initially: for the love of building things online. Writing blog posts, creating websites, teaching stuff — it’s all fun and exciting to me. Although somewhere along the way, the fun turned into a “make-money-at-all-costs” mindset.
This year, I’m challenging myself to try 12 new online side hustles. Not just for the sake of making money — though that would definitely be nice — but for the fun of learning and building things.
As a generalist, I’m a serial learner — no-code engineering, behavioral science, philosophy, copywriting, marketing, screenwriting, entrepreneurship… I have dozens of passions. This challenge will allow me to explore them and perhaps diversify my income streams.
Every month, I will release one piece highlighting my experience with one particular side hustle among the following:
Medium
January is the month I’m going all-in on Medium with a 30-day writing challenge. I already made a pledge and shared my plan for success.
Freelance writing
This is the one I’m least enthused about. Not the writing part, but the outreach that comes with looking for freelance gigs. The endless scrolling on Upwork, cold emailing, ugh… Not looking forward to it. But it can be a lucrative side hustle and I love writing, so I’ll try.
Script coverage
As a screenwriter, helping fellow writers polish their stories is something I truly enjoy. I’ll try to get a freelance script reader job and see where it leads me.
Self-published course
I already created and published a course on Teachable in late December, but I haven’t really advertised it yet. We’ll work on that and determine the best way to sell and advertise a course online.
Skillshare course
I’ve seen creators make millions from Skillshare while others barely made a dime. I’m curious to see how the process works.
Micro-course
August Birch wrote about micro-courses and how they help him pay off his mortgage. We’ll make one and market it.
Website Flipping
The positive side of being a generalist is that I have a wide range of skills, including no-code development. I’ve had an idea for an app for quite a while and will try to build it myself, then flip it.
Newsletter Flipping
Can I grow a newsletter in less than a month and then sell it for a decent amount of money? We’ll figure it out soon enough.
E-book
I’ve heard everything and anything about e-books, from “I’ve made millions” to “I haven’t sold a single copy.” Can we achieve a decent income from a single ebook? We’ll research the most successful types of ebooks and make our own.
NFTs
The only NFT I ever created was a picture of my cat. Let’s do better than that. I’m looking forward to learning more about this topic!
Online community
Can I create an engaging online community? How? We’ll learn from the best and apply their tactics.
Background Sound
I run a newsletter for remote workers called Coffeehouse. Every day, I curate and share a new background sound with my subscribers. What if I tried to create my own sounds?
I’m not planning to treat this challenge as a “one month, one side hustle” thing but more as a to-do list. Some of these projects will take me several months to complete while others will be contained into a single month.
What I’m hoping to achieve
Learning and having fun
Creating more income streams
Make enough money this year so I can retire (just kidding)
Join the Building Stuff community and stay up-to-date with the challenge.