You love your side hustle and want to throw in your job and go full time. If you put the right things in place before you start, you will be more prepared for success. Read on for the 8 things we think you need to get right, before you throw in your job and scale your side business.
1. Cover your personal expenses
Your salary has always picked up the shortfall when your business isn’t making much money. When throwing in your salary, think about how you are going to look after your personal expenses (like rent/mortgage, food, transport, utilities etc) before you lose a secure income. Can your business sustain it? Have you got enough in savings to cover it if the business won’t?
2. Increased business costs
If you are scaling your business activities up, can you cover the extra costs until your sales start rolling in to pay for it? This is where a business loan may come in handy. Figure out what those expenses are with a cashflow forecast and take that plan to us and we will get the shortfall funded.
3. Is there a market?
You love what you do, but are you sure there is a market for the extra work you can put out when you go full time? This is called “demand”, is there demand for your offer?
4. Marketing plan
Where is this extra work going to come from? Do you have a plan for how you are going to bring in enough attention that turns into paying customers? And have you figured out if the cost of that will be profitable once you pay for everything that needs to be paid for?
5. Refined systems and processes
You need to make sure your systems and processes can handle extra workload. You might have been working from your home office or spare garage space, but is that going to still work when things blow up? What about the labour to get things done? Can they be more efficient so you can get more work done with the same resources? Or do you need to put things in place to handle that volume?
6. Pricing
When you’re earning a salary in conjunction with your business income, profit isn’t quite as urgent. Your salary can cover any shortfall and sometimes you can overlook the viability of your side hustle because it doesn’t hurt financially yet.
Well, if you’re going all in, you need to make sure your pricing is right so that all business costs are covered and that you are earning a profit you can live off.
7. Negotiate with suppliers
If you are increasing your business activity you may be a good candidate for better terms with your supplier. Now is a good time to get on better terms with them. Usually for low volume businesses, you have to pay cash on delivery, but for larger volume clients, pricing can be sharper and payment terms more favourable so in some cases you might sell the product before you have paid for it. This will make your cashflow perform better and keep your business thriving.
8. Surround yourself with the right people
If you are going all in, you need to live and breathe your purpose. No one understands that quite like someone else on the same journey. Make sure you are surrounded with others on the journey and people who build you up. Being self employed has its hard times, and quality people around you will help get you through.
We love all things business in New Zealand, and we want to see you do well. If you need help funding the next stage of your business journey, we would love to help. 0800 774 622