This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Well, hello. What's up? Welcome to Side Hustle School. My name is Chris Guillebeau and this is the weekly recap. What number is it?
I think it is number six. The sixth weekly recap of season three, also known as episode 771. Hope you've been having a good 770 days since we started the show. I've been doing great. I feel so fortunate to bring you the stories every day and hear from a lot of our listeners in lots of different forms, fashions, emails, online chat, which we introduced recently on the site in the Side Hustle Society, which was recently relaunched out and about as I travel sometimes.
We have a lot of great people out there and you are one of them. So thank you. Now in today's audio update from a previously featured case study, which we do every weekend, this person mentioned something about changes being made in regards to Etsy. And Etsy is the main platform she uses to sell her jewelry. So she talks about how there've been lots of changes there.
She has to keep up, et cetera. And she also mentions in this update, you'll hear, she mentioned she's actually making less money than she was when we first featured her on the show a while back. So I just kind of point that out because, I'm not trying to sugar coat anything here. We're trying to present real life. This is real life, real stories.
Sometimes there are ups, sometimes there are downs, and sometimes there are changes. I had a conversation with somebody recently where they were asking like, why do you think Side Hustle School has resonated? Why are people listening to it? Why are some listeners, in fact, listening every single day for going on our third year here? And my first response is to kind of turn that back to the listeners and say, well, I don't know, you tell me.
Like, why is it that you listen? Why is it that you take time out of your day to invest in yourself, as I often say? But I think it's firstly because we have a specific audience in mind, really trying to make this show for people who aren't necessarily trying to become full-time entrepreneurs, or at least not serial entrepreneurs, like they've done other stuff with their lives. They have jobs usually. They might have families or other responsibilities.
So, in my opinion, these people aren't really served very well by a lot of other resources that are talking about starting a business. Now, secondly, I think I'm also trying to give specific practical steps. You know, the whole tagline of the show about inspiration and action, like I want it to be inspirational and motivational, but I also want people to be able to go away and do something, be able to have an idea, oh, here's a website I can check out. Maybe I can make a profile here. Maybe I can buy something and sell it here.
Maybe this gives me an idea for something else that I can do. And then the third kind of overarching goal, and there is a point to this, by the way, I'm gonna come full circle in just a moment. The third overarching goal of everything here is to create a sense of possibility, just to get people thinking and help them understand there are so many different ways they can make money. And this is something that's really important. It's really critical in this day and age, in this economy, to be able to look out for yourself.
No matter what your employment situation is, you still need to look out for yourself. So my hope is that all this kind of put together is creating a sense of possibility. So you'll have to let me know how that goes. But to return to where I started, this need to keep up, I was thinking about this, this need to keep up, if you are using a platform, if your business is predominantly built on a platform or a network, a website, et cetera, like Etsy, like Amazon, like Shopify, it could be many, many others, what is it that you need to know? Because things are constantly changing.
And so if your business is built on one of those platforms, it's probably important to stay current about that platform or the trends that relate specifically to what you're trying to do. But at the same time, it's impossible to keep up with everything. So don't try. Another concern I hear over and over is, I just feel overwhelmed, I can't possibly keep up. And my response is, yeah, you're right, you can't possibly keep up with everything.
So be selective with the things you choose to keep up with. And then last but not least, when it comes to keeping up, remember that change presents opportunity. So for every strategy or tactic that no longer works, something goes away, you have to adjust, you have to tweak, there are probably many new ones. There's probably something new coming out that might help you even more than what you were doing before. So that's how I try to frame the situation for myself.
Like I'm not immune to this, like changes come along, I have to make adjustments. Sometimes, to be very honest, I hold on to the old ones, the old way of doing things for too long myself. And almost inevitably, whenever I finally let go and say, okay, that was fine for a while, but you know, something is different now, like the world has moved on, I gotta mix it up. And once I actually embrace what's new, then I usually tend to feel better, I tend to have better outcomes, I tend to just be more successful, like all positive things. So if you find yourself struggling to keep up or adapt to a platform that has changed, perhaps adversely affecting you, at least in the beginning, again, I'm not gonna sugarcoat it.
It's not fun when something comes along and your business declines or whatever, but at the same time, remember that change presents opportunity. [Music]
All right, so let's continue this examination of the topic, but from a different perspective, perhaps, I'm gonna turn it over now to Ruthie, who we featured way, way back, I think it was episode 110, but she'll tell us that along with an update and some advice. - Hi, this is Ruthie Youngman, and my side hustle is Love Your Bling jewelry on Etsy, and I was featured on episode 110. Here's an update on how my hustle has been going. 2017 has been particularly challenging for my Etsy shop, so I decided to break it up into two brands to create more cohesiveness with the designs.
Love Your Bling focuses on minimalistic, Swarovski crystal jewelry, while my new Etsy store, the Green Antique Trunk, focuses more on an eclectic mix of vintage-inspired pieces. Etsy is always in flux, and it can be hard to keep up with the many changes that have occurred, especially this past year. With all the new modifications to the site, revenue for my shop has been down about 35% from last year, and it has motivated me to take control of my content. The array of selling platforms are wonderful ways to start a side hustle, but the end goal for any real business should be to become an independent entity. Since the episode aired, I have been focusing my attention on expanding my site, loveyourbling.com, and utilizing social media marketing tools to increase brand awareness.
I continue to be a member of the Artisan Group, and I'm excited to be participating in some new TV show giftings for the winter season. This next year, I will be working to fine-tune loveyourbling.com and drive more traffic to the site, and I always have a side hustle going, whether it be handmade jewelry, jewelry supplies, or in the field of mental health, I never keep all my eggs in one basket. - Yay, thank you so much, Ruthie. I appreciate that detailed and honest update. Really great to hear how you're responding to those changes.
I love the sentence that Ruthie used when she was talking about how the changes have affected her business. She said, "It's motivated me to take control of my content." I meant she had some specific recommendations for our listeners as well. Of course, leading up to never keep all your eggs in one basket. That's right, doesn't matter how big your basket is, doesn't matter if your basket is lined with titanium, doesn't matter if your basket comes from the government or whatever source is supposed to be secure and unchanging. You never know what's gonna happen.
We saw that recently with a 35-day government shutdown, so that's why you need a side hustle. But don't take it from me, take it from Ruthie and all the other people that we're featuring every day on the show. More of these updates to come, and also we'd love to hear from you. If you have a question or comment, just call the Hustle hotline. You can leave a short response to ask a question.
You can also email us. So the number for that hotline is 8449HUSSELL. That's 844-948-7853. Or you can email podcast@sidehustleschool.com. Or we've also been experimenting with online chat on the site, especially when we have something specific happening.
Myself or Whitney or Jed or some combination of the three of us has been chatting with lots of visitors. It's really fun to see the different kinds of questions and comments that come in through that platform. [Music]
So this has been quite the week of interesting stories on the show, including some stuff that we have never talked about before. Again, here we are in the middle of the 700s, episodes 765 and beyond, and we're still covering stuff that we've never talked about. Because again, so many different ways to make money, including a feature on two sisters who become auctioneers, auctionistas actually.
That was pretty cool, episode 765, as well as a vigil anti-hacker, like a vigil anti-hacker, not a vigil anti-hacker, who logs $110,000 in profit by helping companies discover bugs in their website code, which I thought was also pretty amazing. Those were just a couple of highlights. Oh, there was also the paleo bagel, no weed, no worries. So, you know, all kinds of stuff out there. And then next week looks pretty good too.
I can see in my notes here, I have something about a mommy shuttle. Not sure what that is, mommy shuttle. Also something called neuro gum, which I believe is some kind of caffeine supplement. If you don't want to drink a lot of coffee or if you don't want to drink energy drinks, these two guys come up with an alternative that they believe is better. And it seems to be working out pretty well for them so far.
And of course, much more, you never know what you're going to hear. And I myself almost never know from day to day what we're going to cover. I know about a week or two in advance, but really that's it. We have a wonderful team out there that is making this possible. Sourcing stories, drafting scripts, doing some fact checking, doing all the audio production, just a lot of stuff.
Customer service, online chat, as I mentioned. So I appreciate everyone who comes together to make this possible, including our partners Cadence 13 and Gretchen Rubin, her onward project, of which we are a proud inaugural member. Producer Chuck Reed from Los Angeles, content manager Whitney Karinic from Portland, community liaison Jed Chang is currently in Vietnam still. He's been there a couple of months. I think he'll be moving on somewhere else soon.
Our cat herder Tina Hart, also based in Portland, and the official show cat Libby Gillipo, based mostly on the couch. Sometimes the floor, couch floor. That's kind of how it goes. My final thanks are to you, the listener. Thank you so much for being out there.
Thank you for listening to the show. Thank you for telling your friends about it. It's a free listener supported show. If you're enjoying it, I always appreciate those five star reviews and ratings and Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. I want it to be the best possible, easiest solution for you.
You can also subscribe at sidehustleschool.com, but wherever you are in the world, take care of yourself out there. We've got a lot more coming up and I hope you'll join me for it. So as I may have mentioned earlier, consider this a short daily investment in yourself. You gotta do something for yourself. You gotta look out for yourself, but it's not a bad thing.
It can be something very positive, very motivating, and very encouraging. Episodes go online at 6 0 1 a.m. Eastern time every day. My name is Chris Guillebeau, and you've been listening to Side Hustle School. [Music]
From the Onward Project.
