How to Turn Your Hobby into a Profitable Business

 

Every single one of you reading this has a hobby. You’ve probably spent quite a bit of time daydreaming about turning that hobby into a profitable small business. Before you do that, you need to get the facts so you know if it’s a wise decision to create a business around your hobby.

 

Decide if your business will be online or offline

 

For some of you, you’ll know immediately if the business you’ll start is best suited for online or offline sales. If you’re into scuba diving, you obviously can’t become an online scuba diving instructor. You’ll need to have an offline business because you can’t teach someone how to scuba dive in a blog post or a video.

 

Some hobbies can go either way, such as kite flying. You might be someone who loves to make and fly custom kites. You can sell your handmade kites online, and it might be a better option than trying to open up a retail store.

 

What you’re trying to do here is determine which is the best outlet for your business. The upside to starting an online business is that there are very low startup costs. You can be a one-person show without having to invest every penny you own, and that means there’s far less risk of financial devastation if your business doesn’t succeed.

 

Study online communities to find pain points

 

It doesn’t matter if you are starting an offline or online business; you still need to understand what the customer’s pain points are. Pain points are things that pose a problem for customers that you can exploit to your benefit.

 

If your hobby revolves around knitting, you can study the biggest challenges and issues that others who are into knitting have. Maybe the biggest pain point they struggle with is finding different colors of yarn that aren’t what the big box stores have. If they’re into crocheting, maybe they have difficulty finding specific types of hooks that aren’t available locally or rarely online.

 

If you fully understand the pain points of other people who enjoy your hobby, you can address them and make money. You could start up an online store for people who want off-the-wall colors of yarn that they can’t find at their local store. You can then take it one step further and ask people in Facebook groups, Reddit, or other online communities what their current struggles are.

 

You don’t have to talk to people in these online communities, but you do need to follow what they say closely. What you’re trying to do, above all else, is understand what needs aren’t currently being met and how you can meet them. It’s these areas where you will make most of your money because you’re supplying people with products that they need.

 

Don’t overlook the profitability of digital products

 

What are digital products? Here, we’re talking about courses, PDF files, or any type of files that you can deliver online. Let’s say that you’re into growing rose beds; you could start an online course teaching people how to start their own rose beds.

 

Digital products have a super high-profit margin. You make the digital product once, and that’s it. So, if you write an ebook about how to travel the Orient with a small budget, you can make money off of it for years to come.

 

YouTube can also be turned into a business

 

You might be the type of person who wants to make money directly with their hobby. Meaning you want to do what you love and make money at it. You don’t want to start a store or sell products. You want to do what you love in your hobby, and that’s it.

 

If you want to just do your hobby and nothing else, the best way to make money off that is by starting a YouTube channel. You can cook up a storm in your kitchen and invite people to watch. Sure, you’ll have to talk and guide people through the video, but it sure beats working a 9 to 5 job sitting in a cubicle all day long.

 

Conclusion

 

A hobby can be much more than something you do to kill time on the weekends. You can turn it into a side hustle or even a profitable business. It does take a little bit of business savvy to make money doing what you love, but if you’re passionate about your hobby, it’s possible. So, the next time you’re playing with your model trains, maybe think about turning your love of the locomotive into a way to make some cash.