Since our childhood, we all have been asked this question at least once: “What are your hobbies?”. From playing with friends and watching television to photography, gaming, writing, binging movies, etc., our hobbies have witnessed a paradigm change. Although our hobbies have changed, we do still have hobbies and thinks our hearts want to keep doing all the time. Whether you are doing a 9 to 5 job or studying academics at school, your hobbies will always be something you’ll want to do.
Living in the 21st century, people often say that nothing is impossible. That is true to quite some extent; people are curing cancer, developing skills to overcome the impossible, and whatnot. So, why not turn your hobbies into full time jobs? Yes, that IS possible! Therefore, in this blog, I’ll be telling about 5 common hobbies you can make money from. Let’s go!
Turn Your Hobbies into Potential Jobs
Are you unemployed? Even if you don’t have a job, you at least have a hobby. With the internet so ubiquitous in modern society, everyone has a shot at gaining the attention of the masses. Once you have someone’s attention, your intention should be to convince them they need your service or product. Whatever you’re into, there’s an audience for it–all it takes is a little resourcefulness.
Everyone could use a little extra money, whether it’s because you’re saving up for something important or because you just want a little extra breathing room. Unfortunately, there are often limits to how much you can make in the workplace–you can’t exactly come out and ask for a bonus, and your employment contract may forbid you from taking on another job. Putting in extra hours may not net you any extra income, and even if they did, it may not be worth your sanity to do so.
That’s where hobbies come into play. Innocuous, non-invasive and fun, your hobbies can give you something relaxing to do in your spare time, relieving stress and occupying your mind, and if you choose the right ones, they can even make you a bit of extra income!
We have several hobbies, some which we may think aren’t good enough. But some of these hobbies, if we’re willing to take them seriously, can be turned into a stream of income. Depending on how you direct your talents and interests, you can get anything from free stuff to extra spending money to a full-fledged business or platform for marketing your own or others’ products—all by doing something you might’ve done anyway.
Hobbies You Can Convert to Jobs
Here are 5 very common hobbies that you can make easy and good money from: –
1) Writing
Writing and publishing online has the potential to offer you a lot of practical value outside of being a mere hobby. You can use it to further your career and establish yourself as an expert on a topic. You can build a platform for sharing your ideas. Or you can rent out your skills.
The most obvious way to make money writing is to sell it as a service—freelancing on sites like Upwork or Fiverr, or reaching out directly to blogs for paid gigs. Good content writers with niche expertise are usually in demand. However, if you have the discipline and know how to write a good blog post, then you can create your own blog-based business by picking a niche and building an audience over time.
If you love blogging, a blog site is the best way to earn. You can blog about almost anything, as long as you can generate a following of loyal readers–in fact, you can even combine it with anything else on this list to potentially double your sources of income. Starting a blog isn’t difficult at all these days–there are tons of free template sites you can grab, and from there all you have to do is start posting. Get social, share with your friends and family members, and after enough time and consistency in your posts, you could build a dedicated readership. This is what Wait By Why has done, the popular blog by Tim Urban, which has generated over $11,000 in recurring monthly pledges from Patreon.
2) Illustration or Designing
Like writing, illustration and design are skills that you can offer as a freelancer. Fiverr in particular is where a lot of newer artists with a variety of illustration styles find clients in need of their skills, whether it’s for marketing projects or custom portraits.
But if you’d like to maintain control, you can put your own art on things, from t-shirts to posters to canvases and sell those instead. It’s important to understand that in order to turn your art into a product, you’ll need to cater to a specific market or build a unique brand. The former is usually easier.
Hate Copy is a good example of a business that was started by an artist putting their art onto things that people can buy. And you don’t need to front the money for inventory either. Print-on-demand services offer a low-risk way to monetize your art by selling apparel and home decor. You just need to create mockups of your products to list online. Once you make sales and know what designs and creative get the most demand, you can consider investing in your own inventory.
3) Gaming
Call of Duty? Fortnite? FIFA? I love these games too, but you can even earn money by gaming! Why would anyone want anything else?!
The video game industry is huge, and it’s growing rapidly. Esports are rising to prominence, and live video-streaming of gameplay with commentary is becoming very popular, very quickly. Twitch is leading the live-streaming industry, where anyone can set up an account, and with the proper equipment, live-stream gameplay of any video game they choose. Viewers of the stream can send “tips” to users, much like a pianist at a dueling piano bar makes tips from his or her audience. Depending on your popularity and the quality of your performances, you can make a nice side income from simply playing video games and being interesting or entertaining while doing so.
Video game blogger Brittney Brombacher of BlondeNerd.com started her brand by blogging, which has since evolved to include visual media, and has recently started a Twitch channel where she live-streams gameplay while chatting with her viewers. “Twitch allows me to produce great content while simultaneously engaging with my fans, and of course, while doing something I love,” says Brombacher. “The fact that it’s possible to make a side income while doing so is just the icing on the cake.”
4) Programming
Few people who pursue programming only as a means of making money are successful. You have to be passionate about logic and problem solving to be good at it, and even more so to enjoy it. Still, if you like logic problems and working things out, the ability to program can allow you to pursue fun and profitable side projects.
Try learning an object-based language like Python or Ruby if you’re new, and integrate yourself into the community. After a few months, you’ll be able to start picking up small projects you can do in your free time for some extra cash (just don’t bite off more than you can chew). Try setting up a profile on Upwork.com to find companies who are looking for part-time or contract-based programmers.
5) Travelling
If you find yourself gripped by wanderlust, a list of countries to visit dominating your bucket list, then here’s a good excuse for you to engage in more frequent flying.
According to Sarah Owen, senior editor of digital media & marketing at trend forecasting firm WGSN, traveling the world as a lifestyle choice is on the come-up, and so influencers are increasingly sharing content that represents a well-travelled life, rather than just the clothes in their closet in the saturated fashion niche.
In a more indirect way, pursuing a “digital nomad” lifestyle can help you fuel your own wanderlust as you travel the world. Not only can you make connections and bring your products to new markets, an online business can be run from anywhere you can get a Wi-Fi connection. Greenbelly Meals and Minaal are great examples of businesses where the founders are living that digital nomad life.