This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
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Let's talk about how you can become a side hustle detective. What does that mean? Well, we're gonna talk about all the things you can do to research a market effectively, if you have an idea and you wanna see, you know, is this idea viable? Is it feasible? Is it something I should move forward with?
Well, to do that, you want to learn from existing businesses before launching your own side hustle or small business or other venture. Welcome friends, welcome community, welcome to Side Hustle School, this new segment, it's all about helping you learn the key steps to a new hustle in 2025, one step or concept per week. It includes activities, examples, and more. And of course, it's all free. So today's topic is noted.
We're talking about learning from other success. And we're gonna use the book "Side Hustle" from idea to income in 27 days. It's available wherever books are sold, including an audio version. But if you don't have the book, I'm gonna take you through these key steps along with those stories and examples. All right, so today our learning objective, discover how to research your market effectively and learn from those existing businesses before going out on your own.
When I say going out on your own, I don't mean quitting your job, I just mean before you start. So imagine a new cafe that's gonna open. There's a new cafe that opens down the street. Well, an experienced cafe owner or restaurateur is gonna study the neighborhood carefully. They're gonna observe foot traffic, they're gonna look at competing establishments, identify gaps in the local market.
And this methodical research significantly increases their chances of success. Now the same principle applies to any business idea. You don't have to conduct such extensive formal research, but understanding your market before launch gives you some insights. And also just to be clear, it's not about copying others, it's about learning what works. Like what works, what doesn't work, and where are there some opportunities for improvement?
So think of yourself as a detective gathering evidence. Your goal is to understand two key things. Once you've got your idea, you're like, okay, who else is offering something similar? And how could my approach be better or different? Doesn't have to be different in every way.
It doesn't have to be better in every way, but some sort of key differentiator. Now, sometimes the market appears crowded at first glance, but careful observation reveals untapped opportunities. For example, if you're looking to start some kind of online business, you might find dozens of competitors, but when you study their approaches, you can see some kind of gap in service, underserved customer segments, or just a way to improve upon an existing offering. And your goal is to observe systematically rather than making assumptions. You should look at how they present their offerings, how they set their prices, how they communicate and solve common problems.
And all this is gonna help you develop a more effective business model for yourself. All right, so an example. Imagine somebody out there is interested in starting a small coaching or consulting practice. Rather than immediately advertising their service, they would first examine the landscape by studying successful consultants or coaches, looking at their marketing materials, their websites, considering their pricing structures, the different offers they have and so on, and understanding which industries or individuals that they serve. And this initial research often reveals that the most successful consultants focus on specific industries or specific target markets instead of trying to serve everyone, which is a valuable insight that could inform your own business strategy.
All right, we're gonna take a quick break. And when we return, what kind of research should you do? How do you do this? And what is essential and what can be ignored? 'Cause I wanna save you as much time as possible.
There are just a few essential things you should do. So we'll talk about what those things are right after the quick shout out to our sponsor. [Music]
Okay, so here's the principle. The success of your market research depends on having a systematic approach. Rather than trying to gather every possible detail, it's not gonna be good for you, focus on collecting specific information that will inform your business decisions.
So what does that look like? What might be some key areas to research? This is gonna depend on your specific business, your specific idea and so on. But generally, you wanna start with products and services, study what competitors offer and how they describe their offerings. What are they selling?
How do they talk about it? Next, pricing. Analyze how others price similar products or services. And notice in particular, whether they offer different tiers or packages. Next, marketing approaches.
We talked about this a little bit already, messaging. Examine how successful businesses attract and communicate with customers. Pay attention to what platforms they use, what style of communication, the frequency or cadence of it. And you can do this just by signing up for their newsletters. Sign up and pay attention and see what they do.
And then last but not least, customer experience. Look at the entire process as much as possible from a customer's perspective. If you're able to purchase, that's especially good 'cause you can see the whole flow from the initial contact, the purchase, the follow-up, the confirmation messages. Is there any upsell? How do you feel as a customer going to make that purchase, making the purchase?
How do you feel afterwards? And you might notice something there that you can improve upon for your own idea. All right, so your action exercise. We do one of these every single week. This one is to select three successful businesses in your intended market and just create a really simple analysis.
Could be like a document, could be half a page. But for each business, note their main offerings, their pricing strategy, how they market themselves and what their customers say about them. All right, now here's a bonus. Also look for any gaps or opportunities you notice. Like where are they not doing a great job or where might you do a better job, let's say.
And the goal here isn't to copy existing businesses but to learn from their successes and failures. It's going to help you. These insights are going to help you inform your own unique approach to serving your market. All right, friends, all right listeners, be a side hustle detective. And as always, it's better to have a simple idea you can start immediately than a brilliant idea that never launches.
I'll leave you with that today. Thank you so much for listening. More to come. My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Side Hustle School.
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From the Onward Project.
