Do you want to know how to turn your side hustle into a full-time business? You’re in the right place.
Whether you’re a writer, video creator, podcaster, or create any other type of content, you may dream of turning your content side hustle into a full-time business. While it takes a lot of work and dedication, creators go full-time every day. If you plan ahead and take the right steps to prepare your finances and build your business, you may see success taking your side hustle full-time.
Side hustlers face many unique challenges when shifting to a full-time business, ranging from not knowing how to handle business entities or accounting to struggling with irregular income schedules and health insurance. Follow this guide to learn more about the steps for turning your side hustle into a successful business for years to come.
Building a Strong Foundation
Before you take your content creation full-time, it’s wise to take steps to turn your hobby into a real business. That includes formalizing your content strategy and optimizing every hour you spend on the business to maximize impact and income.
Structuring Your Content Creation Workflow
Every content creator is unique, so there’s no one-size-fits-all formula for audio, video, written, or graphic content. While your content should reflect your personality and goals, you can follow best practices to create repeatable systems and workflows that bring out your best.
Start by assessing how long it takes to publish a new piece and comparing to your ideal publishing schedule. While some creators record in one take and do little editing, others spend hours writing scripts and editing to perfection. Again, there’s no right or wrong approach across the board, but you need to understand and test to find out what works best for you and your audience.
Once you understand the time commitment, you can plan out a content calendar. Sticking on a publishing schedule, whether monthly, weekly, or multiple times per week, helps build an audience and master content platform algorithms. You can use project planning software, an online calendar, or even an old-school paper calendar to plan your ideal schedule and begin calendaring future projects.
You can use various tools, including AI-based platforms, to repurpose your content across multiple platforms. For example, a long-form YouTube video could turn into multiple shorts for Instagram and TikTok and an audio podcast if the content works without visuals.
Expanding Your Content Offerings for Scalability
Content is inherently a time-intensive business, where you have to spend hours creating to earn a reliable income. Understanding how to get the most productivity from your efforts helps you scale your output.
You’ll likely find your content offerings scale in several ways as you gain experience:
- You become more efficient when creating with practice and improved skills.
- You discover new tools and platforms to help you create faster and higher-quality content.
- You learn how to use one project in many ways across multiple social platforms.
- Your business grows to the point where you can afford to outsource certain tasks.
When starting, the most successful creators typically focus on one favorite platform, like Instagram or YouTube. As their audience grows, publishing expands to multiple platforms, an email list, and their own website.
Consider where your target audience spends the most time online and who may be interested in clicking the subscribe or follow button. For example, a workout brand may do well on Instagram but wouldn’t likely gain a following on Twitch. Short-form comedy does well on TikTok and Reels but may struggle on X. It’s not always about where you spend time online, it’s where your target audience spends time online.
Always test new ideas, from YouTube cover images to hashtags and beyond. Many platforms allow users with professional accounts to A/B test, giving you data on what works best. You might find a slight tweak to something as simple as a background color or font leads to a much higher conversion rate.
Scaling Your Audience
Earning a small side hustle income through content is easy enough if you’re consistent and create high-quality content. Turning that into a full-time income can be much more difficult, however. Just as it’s important to scale your content creation, it’s critical to scale your audience.
Deepening Engagement with Your Existing Audience
Before you grow your audience to the millions, it’s important to build a strong relationship with your early followers. Encouraging them to comment, like, and share your content with friends is one of the best ways to get started. If you can turn a new fan into an evangelist for your content, you’ll have a free built-in marketing team that can help your brand go viral.
The more you interact with subscribers and followers, the higher you rank in the platform’s algorithms. Every engagement counts! Asking readers, listeners, and viewers to comment with their experiences, give you feedback, and ask questions can supercharge engagement.
Interactive features like live streams with Q&A, polls, and comment sections go a long way in building community. Early in your creation journey, high engagement is a sign of success in the future. Don’t just look at subscribers as a measure of success.
Leveraging New Platforms and Trends
Be thoughtful as you look to new platforms. If you find a new opportunity that looks promising, however, don’t hold back. It could be worth expanding if you can maintain quality and engagement on new platforms.
On the flip side, you don’t have to be everywhere, particularly if you can’t keep up. A stale page on one social media platform can harm your entire online brand. Growing slowly and sustainably is better than going everywhere and burning out.
Also, remember the tip from above. Using automation and repurposing, you may be able to reach new platforms with very little additional work. New platforms can expose you to new audiences, but move to new sites carefully.
Monetization Strategies
You can’t pay your rent or mortgage with likes and followers. It takes money in the bank to pay the bills. Here’s a look at ways to grow and maximize your online revenue.
Maximizing Your Revenue Streams
Direct revenue opportunities allow you to earn from the platform where you publish, and indirect opportunities allow you to earn from your audience elsewhere.
Direct Revenue Opportunities
Programs like the YouTube Partner Program and Meta for Creators give you a share of the revenue generated by the platform when you drive traffic to the platform and your audience generates revenue. If you bring in a hundred thousand views and those viewers look at a hundred thousand ads, you should get a share of the revenue, right? That’s how these programs work.
You’ll typically need to reach a certain threshold to access creator programs. Once unlocked, they can become a steady income source and may give you additional opportunities for exclusive memberships and merchandise sales.
Indirect Revenue Opportunities
As your audience grows, you may find opportunities to partner with outside companies for income. Those include:
- Affiliate marketing: Mention a partner’s product or service and get a commission when someone you refer signs up.
- Direct sponsorships: Get paid for sharing a product or service with your audience regardless of signups.
You can also create your own digital products, like courses and workbooks, that give you another revenue stream beyond advertising.
How an LLC Helps Content Creators
As your business matures, you’ll encounter financial challenges and legal liabilities that can be fixed with an easy solution: turning your business into a legal business entity.
Should I start an LLC for my side hustle? Probably! Consider the costs and benefits of forming an LLC to decide if it’s right for you.
Protecting Your Growing Income and Assets
Even when you’re working as a side hustler, you’re exposing yourself to certain legal and financial risks online. Forming an LLC and managing your business well can protect your personal assets while setting you up for long-term tax savings.
For example, if you create a video and are sued for any reason, right or wrong, it’ll cost money to fix. If you lose and have to pay a settlement or legal judgment, a properly run LLC can protect your personal assets. While your business still has to pay up, it could be the difference between losing or keeping your house and retirement account balances.
This protection only works if you follow specific requirements, such as keeping your business and personal finances separate. But the extra time and effort are well worth the investment.
"Why Every Creator Needs an LLC" — A creator uses props (e.g., a piggy bank breaking) to visually demonstrate the risks of not separating personal and business finances, followed by a simple explainer on LLC benefits.
Improving Credibility for Brand Partnerships
In addition to legal protections, having a registered business offers credibility when working with brands. Marketing teams understand creators, and those operating as sole proprietors (under their personal name) often have less experience than those with a legal business entity.
With an LLC, S corporation, or other legal structure in place, you put a professional face forward and may be able to get a better deal. A business entity shows you have your act together and can likely deliver on promises.
Unlocking Tax Benefits and Deductions
As your business grows to a full-time income, you may benefit from S corporation taxation. You can get this tax treatment with an LLC or a corporation, but not when operating as a sole proprietorship.
With S corporation tax status, your business pays you a salary, and any additional profits are treated as business income. You only have to pay self-employment taxes on the salary, and other income is taxed at a lower rate. When in doubt, it may be best to consult with a tax professional to learn how this could benefit you.
Having an LLC also makes tracking business income and expenses easier with dedicated business financial accounts. You can deduct many costs directly related to your business, including computers, equipment like cameras and lighting, travel to industry conferences, and software subscriptions. Every dollar you can deduct lowers your taxes, which is a win for your finances.
Charting a Path from Side Hustle to Full-Time
According to a study from the Keller Advisory Group, the United States is home to 22.6 million content creators, but only about half are full-time. To make a living as a full-time content creator, formalize your business, from designing the ideal content calendar to forming a suitable business entity. If you want to thrive as a creator, treat it like a business. That’s the best path for side hustle to full-time success.
How can creators take the next step in formalizing their business? Get started here.
