I frustrate my mother, as I’m sure all of us do for a million different reasons. My particular reason is because I do too much. Always trying another projector side hustle. Always biting off more than I can chew. Well, we all have our flaws, and that is one (among many) of mine.
So if you are worried because you just don’t know what side hustle will work for you, I’m here to tell you that you don’t have to choose just one. Different side hustles are right not only for different people, but also for the same person at different times in their life.
My first side hustle (after the age of 10) was a multi-level marketing company. If you have found or are hoping to find success in MLM, I wish you all the luck. With that said, it wasn’t for me. I did all the things one was supposed to do, but some companies just aren’t quality companies, and I finally cut my losses.
However, my MLM experience probably taught me the #1 most important lesson for success in money AND in life: feed your mind and control your mind. As most MLM companies, mine offered extensive ‘professional development’ in the form of conferences, CDs, books, and seminars. Eager to succeed, I dived right in. I read and listened to some of the top names in personal development: Earl Nightingale, Zig Ziglar, Dale Carnegie. They led me to other motivational thinkers like Marie Forleo, Tony Robbins, Jack Canfield.
I don’t pretend to have things 100% figured out. I get in funks like everyone else. But most of the big things that I have accomplished in life have been possible because I kept going. And how did I keep going? By feeding my mind a constant diet of encouragement and focus.
Almost 15 years ago, I broke off an engagement and gave up on the idea of getting married. But I knew with 100% clarity that I wanted to be a mom. With an adopted sister who has taught me more things than I can tell, adoption was an easy choice for me.
What wasn’t easy was the adoption process. I spent 19 months assembling documents, reading about adoption, assembling the necessary funds on a teacher’s salary, and a hundred other things. Oh, and doing them all as a single woman.
Through all the headaches and heartbreaks, I had tremendous support from family and friends. But I also made a conscious choice to keep my mind right. I listened to leftover tapes and CDs from the MLM. I continued to read books.
Ten years later, my husband (so much for giving up on marriage) and I decided to move to Norway. Again, it took focus over time. Over two years after starting the process, we finally settled in Stavanger, Norway. (For more info on life in Norway, you can check out my lifestyle blog here.)
This time, keeping my mind right was a little different. It involved looking daily at housing, checking facts, reading the posts in Facebook groups, and changing my password to NORWAY2018, so I would remember several times a day where I was headed.
Even though I didn’t make millions (or even hundreds) in the MLM, in a very real way, that first side hustle made it possible for me to follow my dream all the way to motherhood and Norway. Life isn’t perfect, but I am loving my life in so many ways. And I don’t really think I would be here if I hadn’t had that lesson from my MLM experience.
If you have big dreams, especially big dreams that are going to take a long time to realize, get your mind right. Find a podcast or two that wlll continually point you where you want to go. Watch Youtube videos, read books. Whatever works for you. But you need to find a way to keep that dream front and center.
Why? Because you’ve got to find a hundred different ways to remember what I am always telling you: You’ve got this.
So you are thinking you need a side hustle, but you are frustrated because you feel like there is not much you can do until society opens up a bit more? Actually, ground work you do now could put your side hustle or micro-business light years ahead of where you would be if you jumped right in. Here are 5 questions to help find the perfect side hustle for you.
What are my side hustle priorities?
And do not write: “#1 Make money. #2 See #1.”
NO. I mean, really give this some thought, based on your personality and your family situation. What are the underlying reasons you have for wanting a micro-business or side hustle? Is it for little extras like vacations, eating out, or other treats you could give up if the market turned down? Or is it to pay rent or medical bills?
If it just ‘fun’ money, you can choose something that is good in good times and not good in bad times. But if this side hustle is the difference between you making rent or a car payment, you are going to want to give serious consideration to side hustles that will produce income no matter what the general economy does.
Another thing to consider is your family situation and life goals. Do you have kids? If so, what is best for them is going to play a major factor. I’m not trying to be alarmist here, but one of the (several) issues that kept me from every seriously considering using our extra room as an AirBNB was the fact that there was no separate entrance, and I didn’t want strangers in and out of our house when our kids were little.
Another thing that I would love to do is pet sitting. Unfortunately, my husband is allergic to both cats and dogs, so that is a non-started based on our family situation.
Be aware that your goals and situation will change over the years, so don’t try to predict everything that could possibly happen. But don’t be unrealistic about the facts, either. If you have 4 kids under age 4, a Saturday afternoon Mom’s Day Out babysitting service might be a lot more practical than a side hustle that requires hours of uninterrupted concentration.
Some ideas to consider:
Is this going to be ‘fun money’ or is it money you need just to pay the bills?
If you have a significant other is s/he on board?
Is it more important to you to make money right away or to have the potential to grow your income?
Do you need to be able to do your side hustle from home? While watching your own kids? At a certain time of day?
Do you have plans to move to a different city within the next few years?
Are you looking for something that could eventually replace your day job, or do you just want some extra cash on the side?
Is this side hustle recession proof? COVID-19 proof?
There are a lot of great side hustles out there that are only great until the economy goes south or we have another shutdown. That’s why it matters so much whether this is ‘fun money’ or you are relying on it to pay the bills.
If it’s fun money you have a little more freedom to choose based on what you will enjoy doing. If it is essential income, the last thing you want is to choose a side hustle that is super fun, but dries up the second people start cutting back on their own spending.
In the era of COVID-19, it’s also worthwhile to think about whether this is something you can do if your city or state shuts down again. That really limits the choices, I realize. But remember, you don’t have to rely 100% on a single side hustle. You can do Uber AND test websites. You can have a Mommy’s afternoon out where for Stay-at-home-moms AND do VIPKid. But you don’t want to count 100% on a side hustle that will drop to $0 in income with the first blip in the economy.
What side hustles can I pair up to get the best of both worlds?
Let’s look at a specific example. Let’s say you look at the options and decide you LOVE the idea of indexing. It seems right up your alley to be able to read books at home, create an index, and make money for it. (If that sounds like a dream job to you, check out more info here.)
But it just won’t work because you need to make $150 a month to pay your basic expenses. That is non-negotiable. And it needs to start this month, so you don’t have time to wait for the indexing to ramp up. So you think Uber might be better. But you know you can’t do Uber if there is another shutdown. Plus, you hate to give up the chance to create something that you could actually turn into a career in the future.
Newsflash: This ain’t a marriage. You can two-time your side hustles. You can have one to cover the essentials and one to build into the future. So you do Uber until you’ve got th $150 to cover your expenses, then spend the rest of the month on building your indexing side hustle. With luck, the indexing will eventually provide the full $150 you need a month – and more!
This side hustle doesn’t work for me. What else can I try?
OK, going back to that old relationship analogy. No one goes on one date and then dispairs if the person wasn’t Ms. or Mr. Right. Going into the side hustle search with the same attitude – that there will be some things that work out and some things that don’t – makes it a lot more likely you’ll actually be successful.
If you have gone through these steps and really given them some thought, make a list of 10-15 side hustles that could work based on your priorities. You might have to dig deep to get to that number, but sometimes those ideas that you stretch for are the ones that work out.
Here is an example list for someone who wants to work at home, needs to watch their kids at least part of the time, and has some background in art and design: running an in-home daycare, selling crafts on Etsy, flipping items on E-Bay, teaching English online though a service like VIPKid, offering a subscription box service with a focus on art for kids, creating and welling Pinterest templates, doing SEO optimization, testing websites, selling lesson plans on Teachers Pay Teachers, selling photos online, teaching Mom and Me art classes from home or doing calligraphy for weddings.
The important thing is not that you love every idea on the list; it’s that if one idea doesn’t work out, you have others to fall back on. Just don’t fall back too fast. Give each idea at least a couple of months to see if it will work, and longer if it is something that you have to build up, such as art classes or a subscription box.
A final thought: Your priorities will change
Moreover, even if you find a side hustle you love, that doesn’t mean you’ll love it forever. One of my side hustles was selling real estate. Man, I loved it! I’m a real estate addict, and I love talking real estate and helping people find their dream home. It’s totally something I would do for fun even if nobody paid me to do it.
But when I became a single mom, that just wasn’t an option anymore, and I had to say good-bye to that particular side hustle.
In another case, my preschool Spanish classes were really taking off when I realized that our family would be relocating within the next couple of years. Unfortunately, my business model was location dependent. So while I could take what I had learned and start over in a new place, it would definitely be starting over. As much as it broke my heart, I gave up my Spanish teaching business because it didn’t make sense to continue to pour my blood, sweat, and tears into it when it wasn’t portable.
But I didn’t stop. I still love my side hustles. Now I just prioritize options that are location independent.
Like I said, your priorities will change. You are likely to pivot several times before your find your long-term love. Hey, nothing is saying you won’t do the side hustle equivalent of marrying your high school sweetheart. But if you don’t there’s still a happy ending out there for you if you keep on trying.
“Financial freedom” (also called financial independence) and “teacher” aren’t words that most people associate together. Not trying to brag on us here or anything, but “overworked” and “underpaid” are often more the go-to images of an educator than “working because she wants to”. Financial freedom for teachers is just not a trending phrase, despite the desperation of many teachers to get out of the classroom, either temporarily or long-term.
And yet, in some really important ways teachers are in a really, really good position to gain financial independence. So don’t let people tell you it’s impossible. There are more teachers out there who have achieved financial freedom than you may believe, and I’ll be highlighting some of them in a future post. Right now, here are some of the reasons why teachers can indeed achieve financial freedom.
NOTE: this post doesn’t deal with the insurance issue. I’m still researching how insurance fits into the picture. If anyone has decent insurance options, please feel free to comment below. I would love to hear them.
What is “Financial Freedom for Teachers”?
Before we get into the reasons, though, let’s make sure we are all on the same page. What is financial freedom for teachers? Almost every personal finance blogger will have a slightly different definition, so I’m going to just go with mine. When I talk about ‘financial freedom for teachers’, I mean the ability to know that you can teach or NOT teach without money being the deciding factor. So I’m not actually talking about you and your spouse being able to move to Tahiti (although that could be YOUR definition of financial freedom). I’m talking about either temporarily or permanently deciding to go without your teaching income and doing so knowing that the bills will still get paid.
What could cause you to walk away from a job you love? Here are a few things that I can think of.
You have 2 kids under age 3, a husband who travels for work and something’s got to give. You just can’t do a good job of being a mom and a teacher both at this exact moment. (This one happened to me.)
You just had a baby and have only 4 weeks of sick leave saved, so at the end of that time, you have to either go back to teaching or go without income. (This one happened to me.)
A family member becomes seriously ill and needs more help than you can give while teaching full time.
There is a job change that makes teaching miserable.
You are put in a position where standing up for your students or for what is right will put your job at risk. (This one happened to me. Do you see a pattern emerging here?)
You have the chance to move to your dream location and have the adventure of a lifetime, but you don’t know if you will be able to find a teaching job there. (Ahem, you guessed it. This one happened to me.)
And the current winner: Your state and/or district are forcing teachers to return to on-site classes during a global pandemic and it is JUST. NOT. SAFE.
All of these examples have a real impact on your family life and your mental health. And while you might know that you love teaching and you want to return to it someday (Yep. This happened to me!) – or not – financial freedom is the ability to leave the classroom if you need to.
So, with that, here are the many reasons teachers are actually in a great position to achieve that.
Low salary
Yep, you read that right. One of the reasons that teachers CAN achieve financial freedom is that they have a low salary. That sounds TOTALLY counter-intuitive. I imagine you’re thinking, “So you are telling me that it is EASIER to become financially free with a low salary than a big one? Well, Jill, we need to review basic math and basic logic. Which one would you like to start with?”
OK, you have a valid point, but low salary also means teachers don’t have a ton of income to replace. If a doctor wants to quit work, she often has to replace $150K+ or more per year. But the bonus of the low average salary we teachers earn is that many teachers would have to replace only a third of that – $50K or less to replace their income.
(Not) Keeping up with the Jones
That’s not news to any of us, but another aspect of that might be one that you haven’t thought of. Because pretty much everybody knows that teachers aren’t raking it in, they don’t have the same pressure to keep up with those crazy Joneses that people in other professions may.
Let’s go back to that doctor/teacher comparison, shall we? Let’s say a teacher chooses to drive a modest used Toyota Camry. That’s pretty much standard for teachers, so chances are no one would even notice. On the other had, let’s say our doctor – a surgeon – drove the same car. Don’t you think they might feel out of place parking next to their colleagues’ BMWs, Audis, and Saabs? Now, I know I am relying on stereotypes here. There are teachers who drive BMWs and doctors who drive Camrys. But I would say that isn’t the norm.
And cars are only one aspect of it. What about private school? Ski vacations? Family trips to Europe? Those are just part of what most people assume a high-income earner will do. Teachers, while they may choose some of these more expensive options, aren’t necessarily assumed to be tightwads if they opt for cheaper alternatives, either.
Think I’m making this up? No. In The Millionaire Next Door Thomas Stanley and William Danko, who spent years researching millionaires, came to the same conclusion. If you haven’t read it, you’ve got to. It’s one of the best personal finance books I’ve ever read.
Summers
Final thought: summers. I know, you are sick of people saying, “Why do you complain about what teachers make? You get summers off!” But those summers , besides being an essential part of recharging our batteries so we can go back at it the next year, are a valuable resource to begin closing the gap between your income and your expenses.
Say you decide to start a side hustle during the summer. Something you actually enjoy doing, but can also get paid for. And you spend about 20 hours a week on this side job for about 6 weeks of the summer for a total of 120 hours. (For info on side hustles that can earn you some serious money, check out my posts on VIPKid, pet sitting, indexing or other side jobs that bring in great money.) You start up slowly because it takes a while to figure things out, but that first summer, you earn about $2000 dollars, which is absolutely do-able. That works out to between $15 & $20/hour. Not great, but not so bad, either.
Summer numbers – had me a blast
Now that you’ve got the hang of it, you decide you are going to continue it during the school year, but only about 5 hours a week. After all, you chose something you actually enjoy doing, so why not? But now you are better at it, so you earn an average of $20/hr. That’s $100/week, or an extra $400 a month. Let’s say you skip back-to-school month, and two other months during the ten-months of the school year. That’s still an extra $2800 at the end of the school year. You have earned $4800, and you are now almost $5000/year closer to being able to quit teaching.
And if you have used that money to pay off some debt, your monthly expenses might even be going down as your income is going up. You can start to see how this whole thing could actually work. It won’t be easy, but it could definitely happen.
Bottom line is this: if you are determined to find reasons you can’t have financial freedom, you’re right. On the other hand, if you are determined to find reasons you CAN, you’re right, as well. To a large extent, what you believe is possible will actually influence what is possible.
Even if you honestly believe that leaving teaching is impossible for you in your current situation, there are loads of things you can do to make it a viable option in the not-too-distant future: investing in your retirement funds, paying down credit card debt, buying used cars when an upgrade is necessary, and doing more cooking at home, shopping at nice consignment stores instead of. Little things mean a lot, and even more importantly, they put you on a path you want to follow long-term.
Note: This post may contain affiliate links. These links allow me to earn a commission on some really great products or services at no cost to you. I only recommend products that I really believe in, because your trust is worth a lot more to me than a commission.
We all know that life has changed within the past two months. For many of us, our pre-pandemic “normal” is only loosely related to our social distancing “normal” .
Moreover, we are in vastly different situations depending on family situations, job situations, and emotional states. Some people are completely overwhelmed by trying to work from home, learn the new programs and apps, they need to use in their new virtual life, help their kids with online school work, all while keeping themselves emotionally healthy. Right next door, there may be someone frustrated because they have more time on their hands that ever, but no idea what to do with it.
Spoiler alert: This article was not written for that first group. If you are struggling just to keep up with the day to day, don’t put more guilt or pressure on yourself for not being up for something new at this exact moment.
On the other hand, if you are in that second group, OR if you are someone (like me) who deals with stress by producing something and distracting yourself with work, you might be feeling as if you WANT to do something, but just have no idea what to do. Even if your side hustle or micro-business is on hold at the moment because of social distancing, there are a TON of things you can do to make your business and your life run more smoothly-and hopefully produce more income – when life outside the four walls of our houses becomes a reality again.
Obviously, not all of these will work for everyone. Focus on the 1-2 that you think will make the biggest impact. (Or that you have the mental energy to tackle.) Some of these actions are all about setting a foundation for later, while others can actually help you improve your bottom line right now, depending on your business and/or side hustle.
No matter your situation, remember, I believe in you. You’ve got this!
Improve your online presence
Depending on your side hustle or micro business, creating or expanding your online presence could potentially bring in money today, while also increasing your business’s visibility for the future. Here are four ways to do so.
Create or update your website
Yeah, I know it just screams “Let the good times ROLL!” but updating your business’s website, or creating one if you don’t already have one, is a great way to leverage this forced time at home.
I don’t know about you, but I’m actually not a fan of tech stuff. It messes with my head, I have trouble with the plug ins, and all the little fiddly stuff never seems to work. So if you are techie, this doesn’t apply to you. But if you are intimidated by tech, I’m going to give you my absolute BEST tip here: Check out Shannon Mattern’s 5 Day Website Challenge.
I used it for the first time about 2 years ago, and I – yes, the woman who can make a computer malfunction just by walking into the room with it – I built a website in WordPress. But wait, there’s more! Shannon takes you through all the fiddly bits step by step. Plugins and banners and email lists, OH MY! Shannon does it all, and makes it, if not easy, at least completely do-able.
Seriously, if tech intimidates you, but you want a professional looking and functional website, you’ve got to check her out!
And if you have a website, but it is not bringing you the traffic you want, Shannon’s got your back again! For FREE again! She also offers a Free Jumpstart Your Website Traffic Mini-Course that I am actually working my way through as we speak – or um – as we blog. And in case you think I’ve got a girl crush on Shannon (OK, so maybe she is my business crush. Is that so wrong?) here’s why I keep sharing her stuff: I recently paid over $200 dollars for a course. It’s not bad. I’ve learned several helpful tips from it. But Shannon’s free stuff totally blows the paid course out of the water! So if you are taking the time to read my stuff, I want you to benefit from the content creators who are really head and shoulders above the rest.
Create a media presence
Let’s say you aren’t about the headache of creating a whole website. That doesn’t mean you can’t let people know about your talents. If you pet sit, how about starting an Instagram account for your business? Posting pictures of you doing fun and cute things with your pet (or perhaps a borrowed pet) will help your friends and family, and even people outside your circle associate you with pets and keep you top of mind when people once again need dog walkers and pet sitters.
Learn a new social media platform and create a presence
I am NOT a Pinterest girl. But as Marie Forleo says, “Everything is figureoutable!” So I’ve been trying it, and I have to say, it is a bit addictive to see my stats update and trend upwards.
If you have an online presence, but it’s not getting you the traction you want, why not use this time to try out a platform you don’t normally use? Here’s the trick: Don’t try it a week and then give up. Commit to using it every day for at least 2 months. See what happens. Every platform has different algorithms and it takes time to figure out what works and what doesn’t in each different situation.
Build a mailing list…
So you have a website, but you don’t really have an email list, or you have a list, but it is not something you really engage with. Now is the perfect time to change that.
If your website isn’t set up to collect email addresses, you are letting potential customers just slip away. I was terrified by the idea of setting up a mailing list. But again, with the help of the FREE 5 Day Website Challenge, I did it. THEN, I tackled switching providers. I won’t say it went without a hitch, but I will say that I have an actual email list now.
…And use it to create a ‘know, like, trust’ relationship with potential customers
If you already have a list, but you have kind of neglected it, this is the time to turn that list into a real asset for your business. Potential customers are more likely to buy from you if you 1) have a product or service that will solve a problem for them 2) they feel good doing business with you.
As a business owner, this is a great time to provide real value to your customers for free so that they begin you see you as a trustworthy expert in the field. Give some thought to what frustrations or challenges your customers might be wrestling with right now, and provide free resources (to the extent you can) to help them cope. Chances are good, they will remember you the next time they are dealing with a similar issue.
This brings us to our next point.
Create and send valuable content
What does your customer need to cope with this crisis?
If they are a teacher, they probably need someone to cut through the million and one offers they are getting right now and help them figure out what online teaching aids are really worth investing their time and energy into and which are so-so.
If you provide pool service, perhaps they are trying to figure out how to maintain their pool on their own right now without access to their normal pool maintenance technician OR how to manage it on their own long term if their finances have changed.
If they are a parent, they probably need some assurance that they are not alone and that everyone is struggling.
My readers are probably a bit stressed about money, so this is the perfect time for me to promote my free 5 Day Free Money Challenge.
Figure out what you can provide to your ideal client that will massively improve their life at this point, and share it with them. And don’t underestimate your ability to do this. The people on your list are there for a reason. They have some need or desire for what you offer. If you can figure out what they need and how to help right now, you may have a customer for life.
Upgrade your business
In Steven Covey’s famous book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, the 7th habit is “Sharpen the Saw.” In other words, invest in yourself and constantly improve your mental, physical, and spiritual health. Don’t allow yourself to neglect things that are truly important in favor of actions that seem urgent, but don’t move you forward. Here are 4 ways you can use this time productively to sharpen the saw by investing time in business systems and improvements that really are important, but might be pushed aside during more hectic days.
Free online trainings (or paid ones)
There is an amazing variety of online professional development trainings available that will allow you to add to your business skills. Today, you can find both free and paid courses on accounting, coding, marketing, creating online courses, running webinars, and about a thousand other topics that may apply to your specific niche. While you don’t want to waste time or money on a fluff course, reviews make it easier to find the courses that really deliver and the ones that are mediocre, at best.
One thing is for sure: When the economy starts up again, the competition is going to be fierce. Stratigic skills you develop now will give you more options and more credibility with potential customers and clients.
Set up tracking and accounting systems
Blec! Blec! Blec! Yeah, I don’t like accounting either. At. All. But as a small business owner who does her own books, I have to cope with them. So I’m investing a bit of time during these weeks to revamp my budgeting spreadsheets, run through my subscription services to see which ones I really use, and set up systems that will help me stay on track during this coming year.
It doesn’t have to be a weeks-long torture session. Just a few hours a week (with a nice reward at the end – I’m looking at you, Lemon Gelato!) can make a huge difference! Come on and join in the fun. Please? Misery loves company, after all!
Front load the work
Are there tasks you can do to get ahead or to give yourself a cushion in case something comes up and you can’t keep to your normal schedule? As teachers, we often have a folder of “emergency sub plans” just in case we wake up too sick to make plans or have some kind of accident that keeps us from sending work in. They are not the perfect, optimal plans. They are the “just got to get through this” plans.
Your business needs that kind of emergency plan, too. But we are often too busy to just sit down and do it. Have a blog? Write some extra blog posts? Teach private lessons in person or online? Create props or videos for upcoming lessons. Order books, or just pick them and put them in the shopping cart for later. Do you clean houses? Inventory your cleaning supplies, especially the ones you don’t use often so you know what you need and what you have an over supply of.
Figure out 2-3 little things that will make your life easier when it gets hectic again, and focus on those.
Build strategic partnerships
This is a great time to build connections with people who provide different services to a similar clientele. If you teach art classes to preschoolers, you could offer area preschools a video of 5 at-home art projects they can share with their families (who might be struggling mightily to keep those kiddos entertained). If you are a photographer, you could contact local florists or DJs and offer to write a blog post for them about how to pick the perfect wedding photographer or wedding shots you don’t want to miss. They may be willing to return the favor. That’s what we call a win-win.
The point is to think about other businesses, blogs, or individuals whose clients would also benefit from your services, but aren’t your competitors and use that connection to enhance both businesses.
There you have it. So whether you are totally into tackling the entire list, or just counting it a victory to make it out of bed in the morning, I believe in you. Remember, you’ve got this.
When you look at personal finance writers, you are usually going to find people who fall into one of two categories. 1) Those who emphasize increasing income with side hustles or asking for raises. 2) Those who emphasize reducing expenses by eating at home and foregoing the daily latte. It’s not true of every blog and podcast out there, but if you look at the majority of them, you’ll find they lean one way or the other.
People are the same way. Often, we either feel more comfortable reining in what we spend or ‘dream big’ and look for the side hustle or career breakthrough that will shoot our income through the roof and let us leave money worries behind forever.
Team Spend Less
Folks on team ‘spend less’ cite millionaire sports heroes who have declared bankruptcy and the fact that most lotto winners who cashed in to the tune of millions are broke again within just a few years. (True. You can look it up.) Obviously, they point out, all the money in the world won’t fix your problems if you can’t control your spending. So there!
Team Dream Big
On the other hand, team ‘dream big’ points out, you can only reduce your expenses so much, but your income can increase infinitely. Plus, while you’re trying to save $0.07 per serving by soaking your own dried beans instead of splurging on that outrageously overpriced can of beans, your life gets smaller and smaller. That’s no way to live. Mic drop.
Yup. And Yup.
Like most things in life, both are right and both are also a bit wrong. (Imagine that! Nuance. A life lesson that can’t be contained in a 10 second sound byte. Hm, who’da thunk?)
So here’s the short version. No, you can’t save enough to put yourself on sound financial footing if you make $15K a year and have 5 kids. It’s just not gonna happen. But if you ignore the saving side entirely, no amount of money will ever be enough. Just like your income can always increase, so can you always manage to find more things to spend your money on.
The trick – and this is the part that no one can do for you , you’ve got to do it for yourself – is to find that balance, an then stretch yourself just a bit beyond your comfort zone in the area that makes you uncomfortable.
Out of the comfort Zone
I’m naturally a minimalist. I don’t like wasting things and I am NOT a stylish person. So I just don’t spend a lot of money. Interestingly, I sometimes push myself to spend more. I don’t want my life to become small and stunted because I’m trying to save a few pennies. So I try to think about what really matters to me and spend on that. For me, that’s travel. So I make a point to travel, but I also figure out what does and doesn’t matter to me about travel. Fancy restaurants? Not so much. I hit the grocery stores and have myself a picnic on the grass. But yeah, I’ll spend a bit more on a larger AirBNB so my three kids don’t drive me crazy in a tiny studio. (Trust me, it works out better for all of us that way.)
On the other hand, I LOVE side hustles. I have owned rental real estate, worked on the side as a real estate agent, run a blog, taught private language classes, and created an online class. My advice here is to find something you enjoy doing anyway, and then maximize your income from it. Do you love dogs? How about doing dog walks in the summer or even pet sitting for owners who are out of town? Maybe you are into reading. How about doing indexing on the side? And if you are open for some teaching after you step out of your classroom, you can make awesome money teaching private group classes. (Click the links if you want to know more details.)
Like anything in personal finance, it comes down not just to knowing the facts and the numbers, but to knowing yourself. So if you are a spender, try one little way to cut expenses. No one is asking you to go all out. Or if your know deep down that you really need to increase your income, start trying on side hustles to find one you enjoy so much you’d do it for free. Because neither team ‘spend less’ nor team ‘dream big’ can win this game alone.
You’ve played with the idea of starting a micro-business teaching a preschool language class, but it just seems so overwhelming. How would you even get started? Who would you teach? Where would you teach? How would you find student? (When it’s a business, they don’t come to you just because it is on their class schedule.)
A few years ago, I was asking myself those same questions. Because I use Comprehensible Input, I knew I could make language learning much more fun and effective than with traditional methods. As the parent of two preschoolers at the time, I also knew that a lot of parents wanted their kids to learn a second language but didn’t speak one themselves.
There was market for language learning. But how on earth would I get started? Almost 5 years later, I looked back fondly on what accomplished in building the first part of my business, World of Wonders Learning, into a profitable micro-business. If you’ve been toying with the idea of using your teaching and language skills to create a side job that you love, here are some of the most important lessons I learned in the process.
Know your stuff, but don’t obsess over your plan
When I was still dreaming of starting a preschool language class business, I wanted to know what the options were. Online, I found a ton of info about other language classes and how they operated. Even though my situation was very different from theirs, knowing how others were making things work was a huge help in practical areas, such as pricing and scheduling. If you want to look at some similar business models, check out websites for companies that offer science parties, STEM enrichment, language summer camps,Spanish clubs, and soccer.
However, what I had envisioned at first changed as I began to actually take action. I discovered that people in my area were dying for their kids to learn Spanish, but kind of “meh” about French. So I switched. (I speak both, but my French is definitely stronger.) I pitched an after school care location that I thought was WAY out of my league, and they accepted my proposal. Which led to a couple of gigs teaching their staff Spanish for $95/hour.
But none of those things would have happened if I had been hung up on knowing exactly how things would go. I had to get out there and do it in order to learn what I needed to know.
Bottom line: do your research. Know what your first steps are. But don’t stress over knowing the whole path.
Ask for help from experts, but not competitors
One of the most amazing pieces of luck I had was to sit down with the amazing Olivia Roney of Crouching Tigers, who teaches karate in preschools across several states. She was doing almost exactly what I was hoping to do, but not with Spanish. She was so generous with her time and gave me tips that literally kept me from throwing in the towel before I even got my first class off the ground.
So how did I make contact with her? Simple, I posted a message to FaceBook. We lived in the same city, and I thought we might have some friends in common, so I asked my friends if any of them knew her well enough to introduce us on FB. Turns out the wife of the best man at our wedding was on a community committee with her and introduced me.
How I did it
When I contacted her, I gave her some very genuine but effusive compliments. I made sure that I had already learned everything I could about her company so she would know that I really had spent time researching and that I respected the work she did.
However, I made sure to respect her time and generosity. First, even though we were both in the preschool enrichment class space, we weren’t direct competitors. Additionally, her business was already massive, so I was no threat. And even though I couldn’t reciprocate by giving her advice or help, I did drop off a bottle of wine at her office and make sure that I paid when we went out to lunch. Also, I tried to mention her business positively whenever I could, which was super easy to do because she really is a class act.
Bottom line: ask for help, but appreciate the help you are given. Most people who build a business are incredibly proud of what they have created and are willing to talk about it with someone who is genuinely interested.
Educate parents
OMG. This one is huge. Let me tell you a little story here.
When I started my first language class, I was stunned to have 22 kids sign up. I was thrilled beyond words. That month I made almost 50% of my teaching salary doing just a2 hours a week after school. I thought I had this thing figured out.
But the next class cycle, my enrollment dropped almost 50%. When I asked the parents why, there were some kids who had legitimate conflicts and such, but there were other parents who said things like, “I asked them to say something and they couldn’t even say one thing.”
The parents didn’t understand how language learning (especially comprehensible input) works. And it was my fault. I knew what they should expect, but I hadn’t told them.
How I fixed it
Soon, I started sending them e-mails to explain the advantages of the methods I used. I told them that while kids wouldn’t be able to speak right away, they were already starting to actually understand Spanish and they would retain it much better than if we focused on lists of vocabulary. Slowly, I helped them understand how language acquisition works and how to best support their kids as they acquired Spanish.
But wait, there’s more
But there were other perks, as well. First, because I was communicating with the parents regularly and also teaching THEM, the perceived value of my classes went through the roof. Second, I became someone they trusted. No longer was I just some anonymous business. I was Jill, and I was invested in their kids and in helping them to give their kids the best. And the proof was in the numbers. My retention rates went from horrible to stellar, and I very rarely had kids drop my program once they started it.
Bottom line: Don’t expect the parents to understand what you understand. Start from the basics, and explain what they should expect and why.
Hold yourself to high standards, but give yourself grace
My goal was always to leave parents with more value than they were expecting. If I had a parent complaint (and you will, because you are learning), I tried to figure out what I could do to fix the problem. And I always looked at dissatisfaction as a marketing opportunity. What could I do to fix the problem and turn the parent into a raving fan? Of course, it depended on what the complaint was, but my goal was to never leave a parent dissatisfied.
The Hand, Foot, and Mouth Debacle
For example, my daughter came down with hand, foot, and mouth disease. I had to reschedule 2 weeks of classes. Since it is contagious and symptoms don’t’ show up right away, I couldn’t possibly set foot in a daycare center until I knew I didn’t have it. So I rescheduled the classes that we would be missing AND offered parents a refund on those two classes if their child was for any reason unable to attend. I also explained that I wouldn’t normally cancel, but I was doing it in the best interest of their children. I had one parent e-mail me back thanking me profusely for cancelling since she had a newborn and didn’t want to take any chances on him getting sick.
Make like Elsa: Let it GO!
With that said, I also made a point of letting it go when I did make a mistake. I had to give myself the grace to make mistakes without shame. Sometimes I got overwhelmed and didn’t communicate as well as I should have. There were other minor mistakes. Since I’m a recovering perfectionist, I had to really struggle not to let those mistakes get in my head and bring me down. Beating myself up wasn’t going to make me a better teacher or business owner. But learning and changing was.
Bottom line: Do your best, and accept that your best will never be perfect. Talk to yourself like your best friend would. (Assuming your best friend ROCKS like mine does. And if not, I’ll be your surrogate best friend. Talk to yourself like I would. Note: I’m honest, but affirming.)
