If we were to look back on the last few years, we would see that slowly but steadily, inflation has been on the rise. The same amount of money now gets you a lesser amount of the same product. At the same time, salaries have hovered around the same with prices for common commodities going up. In general, the overall cost of living across the different social classes has gone up. Everything from groceries like milk, bread, and eggs to buying a computer or your place to live. Who is to blame for this is a different debate for a different time but there is a way to inch our way out of this.

In recent times, we have seen a resurgence for the term side hustle. A side hustle is any business or venture you are creating along with your regular job. While working a job, you have a boss to report to. When running a side hustle, you are the boss that runs it all. In a job, you get a fixed salary as compensation for the time you give to the company. With a side hustle, you are the boss and everything depends on you. Building on this, working a job can only offer you so much in terms of compensation. There are designated working hours, and a set of tasks you are responsible for, and you are essentially a cog in a larger machine. At a glance, this may sound like a good deal but in reality, it is a system that is limiting in nature. For all the time, effort, and commitment that you show, the compensation may not be enough. Seeing as inflation has drastically affected our purchasing power, having a side hustle is no longer an option – it is becoming a necessity. 

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The Internet Is Your Best Friend 

Luckily for us, we live in the age of the Internet. Considered one of the greatest innovations of our time, the internet has opened a new world of opportunity. It has never been easier to start a business and make money from it, online, and from the comfort of your home. If an online business isn’t what you want, the internet has paved the way for countless tools to make the process of setting up and running a business easier for you. Spectrum is the perfect internet service that ties all of this together. With many Sspectrum bundles to choose from, there is something for everyone.

To get started with a side hustle, you first need knowledge. Without knowledge, you would be nothing more than a deer in headlights not knowing what to do or how to get around. To gain knowledge, there are countless resources available on the internet. These include different side hustles to choose from, different ways to get started, how to handle payments, what logistics are involved, and so on. In the past, you had to get your hands dirty to learn, now you just need to type a question in Google and you have your answer in less than a second. 

Starting a side hustle in 2023 is a lot easier than we have been led to believe. Having your venture where you are responsible for everything that happens is an experience like no other. In a job, you are only responsible for your tasks, in a side hustle you are responsible for everything. Seeing as it is your own business, you need to remain on top of everything. You are responsible for planning, delegation, execution, logistics, and so on. Once again, the internet has made all of this an effortless process.  

The Tools tTo Get Started 

In a business, there is a lot more than simply creating a product, getting an order, and delivering the item. Before you sell a product, it needs to be marketed so people can see it. A product won’t sell if no one knows about it. In an age where social media is prevalent, you need to ensure you have a sizable social media presence to get as many eyes on you as possible. Once you have their attention, you need a digital storefront since e-commerce is all the craze now. Businesses are abandoning brick-and-mortar stores and switching to digital storefronts of which there are many different tools to set up. 

Once your product and storefront are ready to go, you need to incorporate automation into your workflows. Gone are the days when emails were manually sent, records were manually updated, and so on. AI is taking over the world and automation must be a part of your life to ensure more work is done at a lower cost. Finally, you need to ensure that your digital presence is saying all the right things to the customer. You could have the best product, storefront, and prices but if your customers don’t know what they’re getting into or you lack clarity, conversations will be hard to come by. 

Luckily, we have taken the liberty to compile a list of the 7 tools you need to add more value to your business. Each of them is free to use with paid options opening up more complex functionality but even the basic options are more than enough to get your side hustle off the ground. 

Canva

When we hear design, our mind goes to names like Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator immediately. However, these are paid and have a learning curve. On the hand, Canva is entirely free to use and has one of the simplest interfaces possible. To get started with designing your pamphlets, press releases, advertisements, social media posts, letterheads, and many more pieces of content, Canva is the way to go. The platform has a host of different tools needed to create a design from scratch or use a premade template. You have access to different images, art, and the ability to set custom resolutions depending on what you are working with. For example, creating a book cover for an Amazon Kindle e-book has different dimensions compared to an Etsy digital planner

Once you are done designing, Canva gives you the option to save it in different file formats. Different platforms have different requirements and people generally have a preference. Canva is completely free to use and you can create from scratch or work with files you already have. 

Hypefury

At any given moment, there are billions of people online across different social networks. Naturally, there are tools to leverage the power of social media to help your business. Hypefury combines with micro-blogging giant Twitter to utilize the millions of users on the platform. 

As a business, you need to constantly remind your audience about your product or service. Using Hypefury, you can write the best tweets for your business by taking a look at what the industry is talking about. Use relevant keywords and hashtags to tweet to get more engagement on your content. With Hypefury, you can create a tweet, add a link to your product, and see the two deploy together. This saves you time and effort in manually doing this. Customers can read the tweet and open it to see the item for sale linked directly below it. This feature can be used to link products, services, newsletters, courses, and other content you would like your audience to see. 

This simple process paves the way for growing email subscriber lists that can be leveraged to your advantage. Next, Hypefury will also automatically retweet your most popular tweets on its own. This way, if a piece of content gets good engagement then Hypefury will ensure that more people see it. Finally, Hypefury will also allow you to share your tweets on Instagram for more social media interactions. Users can schedule tweets to be posted to Instagram each time a tweet is posted or they could make older tweets into an image. 

Mailerlite

Emails are a key component for any business. Email marketing is still considered one of the most powerful marketing tools out there in an age where social media dominates all walks of life. Naturally, when you are running your side hustle, you must also leverage the power of email to your advantage. 

Mailerlite is a tool that facilitates exactly this. Using it, you can create email campaigns that are engaging and intuitive. It has a built-in email builder function that lets you craft these emails effortlessly. Once done, you can schedule emails or create automatic email deployment. This is best used when promoting offers or when you have someone making an order. On Black Friday, you can send emails to your entire mailing list reminding them that you have a special sale going on. Each time an order is placed, an email with the customer’s details is automatically sent. If you added items to your cart and didn’t check out, a reminder email will be sent. 

Mailerlite is not limited to email, it also facilitates e-commerce on the platform. You can use the platform to build a store using a template and then use the 30+ design elements to customize it. Mailerlite also gives you the tools needed to leverage social media, pop-ups, and more all while making it possible to review analytics.  

Zapier 

Regardless of industry, automation is a key to competence. In the fast-paced age we live in, delays could be catastrophic, and repetitive manual work can eat through your time effortlessly. The goal with Zapier is to create ‘zaps’ that automate a wide range of functionality to make life easier for you. Using Zapier, you can automate up to 100 different processes that are triggered with a single prompt. For example, each time you generate a lead on a Facebook ad, your slack channel will be updated with the information, and that email address is added to your mailing list. If you have a team working for you, every time a meeting request is made, a custom zoom link is created for said meeting, and a google doc is made for the minutes of this meeting

All of this happens behind the scenes and automatically. From a distance, this might seem small but in the grand scheme of things, this saves time and also allows you to be better prepared for your work. When you receive an email for an event, slack channels are automatically notified of this event, and your calendar is updated. This way, important events are never missed. 

By using Zapier, you can save time on administrative tasks, generate and record leads, and optimize workflows to increase revenue. If your side hustle is freelancing then each time you get a new project, it is automatically updated in a google spreadsheet housing all your tasks. If you are writing blogs, a google doc with that task is created and stored in google drive. The deadline is uploaded to your calendar. Consider downloading this app today! Zapier is best described as modular automation because you can create your automated workflows by adding or removing different blocks to create a workflow.

Hemingway

For all the freelancers out there who want to start their side hustle, it is important to always believe that content is king. Beyond freelancing, having quality content for customers to read can make or break your business. If your business has a website, the last thing you want is content written with grammatical errors, no punctuation, and incorrect spelling. If someone thinks that these things are ignored, you would be surprised at how much of a difference it makes. Naturally, not everyone has the skillset needed to ensure that their written content is in proper condition. 

Enter Hemingway. Borrowing the name from one of the best authors to have ever written, Hemingway is a tool used to correct your content. Upload a text file to Hemingway and it will read the content and instantly let you know what needs to be fixed. Hemingway uses different colors to highlight different issues in the content. Yellow is used to identify long and complex sentences. Red is used to highlight overly dense content with splitting logic. Purple is used to highlight a word that could be replaced with a simpler option. Blue is used to highlight adverbs or weak phrases to replace them with stronger words. Finally, green is used to highlight the passive voice that needs to be replaced with an active voice which makes your content read better. 

Conclusion

In 2023, having a side hustle is one of the best ways to create financial freedom. You can have your own thing going along with your job, making money on the side. Over time, this side hustle can grow and become a full fledge business that makes you more money than your regular job. No one complains about more money coming in. While the process of business requires time, effort, and dedication, having tools that make the process simpler is always a welcome addition. Along the way, having quality internet like the one from Spectrum can elevate your experience further. To join the family, get in touch with Spectrum customer service today!