Should You Turn Your Hobby Into a Business?
Many successful businesses are started when friends and family encourage people to start charging for something they are very talented in but only do as a hobby. This can be a great start for many businesses, but for others, it can lead to extreme burnout and big problems down the road. If you have a hobby that you are considering turning into your business, here are a few things to consider first.
Will Being Paid for Your Talent Make You Feel Icky?
This is often confusing at first. You have this thing you LOVE to do and you’re really good at. Getting paid to do that should be like an awesome benefit right? Sometimes - but that isn’t always the case. This is often true for those whose hobby includes creativity or art of some kind. All of a sudden when their income is tied to their craft and this activity they pour their heart and soul into, it takes the inspiration away. It can even feel degrading. Evaluate if this might be true for you by asking yourself if you had to do your hobby with someone else who got to call the shots how you would feel about that. What if you are only allowed to work on the hobby until you’ve put a certain amount of time or money into it and when that is done, you have to stop, regardless of the result? Doing the thing you love to help a business generate sales or when someone else gets to decide what the end result looks like can be disenchanting.
Will Doing Your Hobby Every Day Make You Hate It?
This is the same concept of eating your favorite food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. If you have to do it all the time, will you still enjoy it or will you lose your inspiration and become bored with it? Doing what you love all the time might actually end up making you hate it. This is a recipe for burnout and all of a sudden having a business that you want nothing to do with! Plus, if your hobby was a way for you to relieve stress, and now you are using that hobby to make income, you will need a NEW way to relieve stress.
Working with Clients May Be More Challenging
Let’s say you just finished a project and delivered it to the client, but they say they aren’t happy with it. Or worse, they say you charged way too much for what they got. Or worse still, they say they want you to completely re-do it. If you struggle with confidently setting boundaries or tie your self-worth to your creativity, then providing a service that is something so close to your passion for clients is going to be harder. This can definitely be overcome by working on these skillsets. But because you are so passionate about what you do, it may cut extra deep when a client voices a concern or questions your prices. This creates an extra challenge for you to be able to do this as a job, because as a business owner, customer service and communicating with clients is part of the deal.
Still want to start a business, but decided that using your hobby isn’t a good call for you?
Evaluate Your Skills
If using your hobby isn’t going to be a good fit for you to make an income from, you still have options! Take a quick stock of your skills. What comes easy to you? What do other people seem to struggle with that you just do naturally? What are things that you don’t think twice about but when someone sees it, they are amazed?
These are your unique opportunities to serve others with your expertise. It may seem like nothing to you, but for others who haven’t found this solution you’re using, it can be life changing. And that is a great thing to build a business on.
Ready to get your next freelance client?
You can find support, resources, and guidance in our Facebook group Purposeful Scaling Freelancers as well! This is a free community of people committed to starting or growing their freelance business to support their ideal lifestyle, bring them purpose, and provide an income.
