Imagine yourself engaged in doing what you really love during your weekend days. You might be working on your wood pieces, developing computer games, programming and so on. For a long time your hobby was the source of escape from your quarterly report and presentation. Now the question keeps popping up in your head: Is it possible to make money on your passion?
Transition from passion to business looks rather scary. Yes, of course. Because you are already dealing with your career and maybe trying to build your social life. But what happens when you start your own business? Fortunately, it does not have to become a crazy adventure. It may become the well-devised business strategy.
Right now, you have amazing skill set waiting to help you. Just take a look at yourself. You always arrange your schedule and meet your deadlines. You are able to develop a project plan. You have the basic understanding of marketing. Besides this, you know what is a profit and loss statement. All this skills are required for you to establish a small business.
Even more important is the fact that you do not start from zero. On the contrary, you have a lot of information which you can utilize for yourself. What you have to do is to change your focus. Not a hobby anymore! Start treating your creative activities as a business.
At first, you should open a bank account for your business. Second, track your expenses. Please do not worry. You will not spend all your spare time dealing with your budget calculator. What you have to do is to start keeping track of all the expenses that are related to your business. It might be a purchase of new guitar strings or shipping fees.
The greatest advantage which you have is your network. Of course, it does not mean any spamming of your LinkedIn contacts. The main point here is to talk about your idea with your colleagues, mentors and other people who you trust. People are ready to help someone who builds something. You would be surprised how many lawyers, accountants, or potters you know.
Now about the money. As we said before, the point at the moment is not to leave your job but to test your concept. The fact that you managed to sell something is priceless. Do not undervalue yourself and sell your products cheaply. No one is obliged to give away his/her work for nothing and pretend that he/she gets payed for exposure. Try to start with such simple platforms as Etsy, Gumroad, or even Squarespace.
Actually, the main obstacle for you is not the competition but perfectionism. It is rather easy to get obsessed with making your logo perfect instead of making a product. The main point in business is timing. Develop your minimum viable product, get feedback from your customers and improve it. Do it again and again.
Time management is your primary weapon now. Your schedule is rather busy. Thus, you have to protect your creative time like any other business meeting. Allocate some hours of your weekend and some days of the week and respect your schedule. Or else you will never do anything outside of your work.
Yes, it is possible that you will not earn a lot of money. According to the statistics you are unlikely to achieve this goal. However, it is not the main point. What you get is the experience, the resilience and new neural pathways. You become an interesting and multi-sided person with some story to tell. You start building your legacy outside your work.