When you first start your side hustle, things can feel a little scrappy. But that’s often how it’s meant to be. When you get started, it can be on a whim. You’ll find yourself getting to work on your idea in the time that you have – and when you’re excited, you’ll just want to get things up and running without meticulously planning or giving it too much thought. This is often a good thing, however. Because you were able to get things underway without thinking too much into it or giving in to perfectionism. This is often how you get things to work out and to become what you want them to be. But at some point, you may find that you’re ready to expand and take things to the next level. This can mean that you have to approach it all in an entirely different way.

In most cases, it doesn’t matter what kind of side hustle you have – because there are set things you can do to expand what you’re doing and see success. You might have a blog and want to turn it into a magazine, be a freelancer and want to start an agency, sell items online and want to expand, or anything in between. The whole idea here is that you’re able to turn your side hustle into a bigger-scale legitimate business. So in this blog post, we’re going to take a look at what you can do to make that happen!

The Way to Approach it

First of all, you might be wondering how you should go about this. And while you’re very much entitled to do things your own way, you may also find that it helps to go into this with the right mindset and approach. If you know that you really want to expand and create a big business with your efforts, you need to look at what you’re doing through the lens of a CEO. From here, you’ll then be able to ensure that everything goes the way you want it to.

Why You Need to Map it All Out Before You Begin

If you just got started with your business idea when you first began your side hustle, you may be tempted to do the same now. But, it’s important to remember that strategic planning has many benefits. If you’re able to take the time to think everything through, you’ll often be in a much better place. You’ll also be able to make better decisions that will support you in getting the business to where you really want it to be.

10 Steps to Turning Your Side Hustle into a Bigger Business

From here, you’ll then want to get things underway. So below, we have added in ten different steps you can take when you want to be able to elevate what you’re doing and really transform your side hustle into a bigger-scale business. Here, you can look to pick and choose the options that speak to you the most. But if you follow the list of all ten in order, you should be able to get the results you’re looking for. So let’s get started.

1. Create a Business Plan

Now that you know the importance of planning, this is where you’re going to want to begin. So here, make sure that you start by creating a business plan. This could be a document full of your own notes or it could be a full business plan template that outlines everything you’re going to do. Doing so is going to help you make sure that your business ideas and plans for growth are viable and will allow the business to be profitable.

2. Arrange the Finances

This may not apply to everyone, but you may find that you need to iron out the financial side of things. If you have been bootstrapping up until now, you may want to continue on doing the same. But, you may also find that you want to take that to the next level. When that’s the case, you may need business financing in order to execute your growth plans. So this is something you need to sort next.

3. Consider a Physical Location

The next thing you’re going to want to work out here, is whether or not you want to get a physical location for your business. When you are side hustling, most of the time it will be from home or working in cafes. But as you start to consider expanding your business, you may want to think about getting an office space or retail unit. Here, you’ll want to research places to rent, considering the renovation work that needs doing and get in contractors and commercial painters, as well as set up all the costs that go along with it. This can often be the first step in physically taking things to the next level!

4. Hire Some Help

One of the things that many people start to focus on when they’re ready to grow is hiring help! It might be that you want to get an assistant in place to help you with some of the daily activities, or even specialists for different business areas. This could be a salesperson, marketing specialist, graphic designer, or even HR executive. Think about the roles you need and start recruiting.

5. Outsource to Experts

Alongside that, you might also want to consider bringing experts in. While there will always be people that you want to bring in-house, such as an assistant, there are some areas of the business that you might want to outsource. Once you have your key staff in place, you can consider delegating and outsourcing key business functions to marketing experts or accountants. This can help the business to really thrive while you focus on other things.

6. Elevate Your Operations

At the same time, you should also start to think about the operational side of the business. If up until this point it’s just been you running things, that may need to change. After all, if you’re expanding, your operations are going to need to expand too. Here, you may find that bringing the right tech in to streamline your operations will be a huge help. It’s important to make sure that everything behind the scenes of the business – from communications to project management to staying compliant and even keeping finances in order – is running smoothly!

7. Up Your Marketing Game

Most of the time, you’re going to take what is already working for you and just expand upon it. But at the same time, you might need to up your game if you want to see better results. This is very much something you’ll want to do with your sales and marketing if you’re looking to increase sales and drive more revenue through the business.

8. Think About Automations

To coincide with that, you should also be thinking about the different automations you can bring into place. When you want to be able to grow, it’s essential for you to have everything running like clockwork. Bringing in key marketing automations can make a huge difference for you here. It’s all about putting functions in place within the business that help you to get in front of your audience a lot more, scoop up extra sales, and keep things running on autopilot.

9. Focus on Building Your Brand

Then there’s also building the brand up for the business and starting to establish more of a personal brand for yourself too. Here, you’re going to find that it’s important for you to be able to drive awareness of what you do and get more eyes on the business as a whole.

10. Be in it For the Long Term

Lastly, you then need to make sure that you’re looking at this as a long-term thing. If you know that you want to make this into something incredibly successful, you need to see it as an opportunity to build a business that stands the test of time. For this, long-term thinking comes in handy. It will help you to make decisions today that are in line with where you want to be. It’s this kind of attitude and approach that will allow you to grow and actually get there in time.

Final Thoughts: Building the Business of Your Dreams

Ultimately, what you’re really trying to do here is take your business to the next level and create the career of your dreams! When things are already working out for you, this is always going to be the most exciting next step. But here, you’ll want to make sure that you’re approaching it in the right way, have the right attitude, harness the right tools and experts, have a plan for growth, and are in it for the long term.

So with all of this in mind, it’s time for you to pick out some of the options on the list, put them into practice, and see where it all takes you. Before you know it, you’ll be ticking off your goals and your business will be where you want it to be. Good luck!