Q&A: What’s the best way to keep track of side hustle ideas?

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

Ideas are everywhere. When I started this podcast way back in January 2017, I worried about running out of ideas. I worried about running out of stories. You know, the first three years of the show, you might have been listening during that time. If so, it's awesome that you're still around. Before we had this listener Q&A segment, every single day I had

to source, write, edit and record a new story with a new idea. So there were some times when the team and I weren't sure what was coming next week, but we never actually ran out of ideas. So ideas are abundant. We're all about execution, implementation, how do you take an idea and make it reality. And once you develop the process of coming up with ideas, or perhaps borrowing them from us, which is totally fine, you need some way to keep track of them. You need to retain information, or at least be able to quickly

refer to them. You know, the whole goal here is to help you take action. It doesn't help if you have a bunch of ideas and somehow record them. It can't get back to that information. So today's listener is wondering about a good way to keep track of ideas. And naturally

he's thinking about side hustle ideas, but it really could apply to any sorts of ideas. So I'll give you at least three good options in my answer. Stay tuned. Hey, Chris, this is Eric from Kansas City and I've been listening for a while and I've also done a lot of my own research. My mind is bursting with ideas. So far, I've just

been making some simple notes in my journal. Is there a better way to keep track of all the different possibilities? Each project I think of or hear about has different pros and cons and some seem more doable or just a better fit for my skills than others. Maybe I need a dedicated idea notebook, but I wondered if there's any software that could make this process easier or more efficient. Thanks, Chris.

Eric, man, thank you for the question. I love the idea of bursting with ideas. It's so fun to be in that stage of coming up with different ideas, doing your own research, as you said, plus listening to the podcast. I really think the future is bright, especially if you begin implementing those ideas as mentioned. So an idea notebook is great. I mean, just

an idea notebook or journal, like Eric mentions, that is not only acceptable, but it's helpful and useful. I would just say the key part is not only recording or journaling or writing down those ideas, but just doing so in a way that you can easily refer to them. Otherwise, you just end up with a long list that you never actually track. So in my case, I've been using an app called Roam Research. No affiliation. I just am a customer. I like

this app myself. So it's called Roam Research. There's some others in this category. Notion is a popular one. It also includes scheduling features, to-do lists, etc. Obsidian, OBSIDIN

is another one like that. And all of these are kind of the next wave of note-taking apps. If you think about things like Google Docs or Evernote, probably some others, they were the first wave. And I used to use Evernote all the time. I'm using it less and less in favor of this new tool. I really like the feature that offers bidirectional linking.

It allows me to see cross-references of notes and ideas, which is really cool. Because again, it's about retaining information, being able to recall it, draw upon it, whenever you need it. That said, the main rule of a note-taking system is just like a to-do list app or any productivity tool, if you like it and use it, that's what matters. If you don't find yourself using it, it doesn't matter how many five-star reviews it has or how many other people on Reddit think it's really cool. These tools need to improve your life, not add more of a burden to them. So the qualities of a good system, whether it is an idea notebook

or one of these apps or something else, qualities of a good system are you use and like it. It helps you refer to ideas quickly, not just record them once and never see them again. Good luck, Eric. Good luck, everyone else out there with an idea. If you have a question, come to sidehustleschool.com/questions. I hope the podcast will continue to be helpful

and useful to you. My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Side Hustle School. From the Onward Project.