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Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

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Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#41

Post by jetti »

RenRav wrote: post #35

Not software related, but my sister makes and sells simple candlesticks online for that much each month. I also resold earbuds/earplugs online for a years to get $1000-1500/mo. Seemed like a viable side project only taking up an hour or so every night to prepare packages, and then an extra 20 minutes to swing by the post office each morning. Like others said, it's always a good idea to reduce your spending and try to…

That is interesting about your sister. I've been thinking of doing something similar, do you know if she uses a platform like Etsy to sell her stuff?

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#42

Post by corporate_shi11 »

batt4good wrote: post #23
corporate_shi11 wrote: post #2

If you just care about hitting the $2000 mark, optimizing for time and effort, I'd say just find a product to sell on Amazon and market the hell out of it on Facebook and Instagram. Run paid ads and make up for small margins with high volume. Try to offer your product at the lowest price among your competitors.

I've always been curious what avenues you use for advertising / how much you spend on advertising to see results in sales? Most of my side-businesses have been marketed entirely on forums or by word of mouth. Overclock.net back in the early 2010's had an insanely deep customer base and industry contacts!

Paid ads on social media are interesting because sometimes you get lucky with an ad and it goes viral/attracts a lot of sales, but often it doesn't. You have to experiment and know your market.

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#43

Post by trcollinson »

Rerarom wrote: post #39

I have a question to everyone in this thread: how do you deal with the bureaucracy (taxes and stuff) that comes with a side business? (I'm curious also about how it varies between countries)

I hire a good tax professional. That's it, as simple as that. I have a gentleman that I have used since 2014 who I pay about $350 to make sure everything is filed correctly. He helps me with tax planning. He helps me with the forms. The IRS is happy with me. I spend maybe a total of 2 hours a year thinking about it (I am fairly organized with my receipts though, which helps).

I also have a good attorney and a good insurance broker. All in all, very simple. If I spend half of a day per year on any of this stuff, I would be surprised.

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#44

Post by ryanmercer »

rwmurrayVT wrote: post #16
soneca wrote: post #12

I think the safest way (i.e. no downside, no money spent, small time investment) is negotiating your salary. In your current or new job.

Very location dependent.. The vast majority of the workforce couldn't negotiate a $24k a year raise from their employer.

A lot of us can't negotiate a salary period, people outside of tech don't seem to realize this Major corporations have very concrete pay scales, you start at the bottom of that scale and you climb your way up it year after year with very rigid and defined maximum pay increases based on arbitrary factors in an annual merit increase and not by going "gee boss, I think I deserve a raise!".

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#45

Post by neuroticfish »

CoffeePython wrote: post #14
neuroticfish wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How? In the freelance developer space you're either competing with people in developing countries who work for peanuts, or your potential clients have have the money to throw at high quality work which means you're competing with the top 1-5% of freelance developers.

By finding a niche and looking for work in that niche. I picked NLP in the financial space and have been able to find work within a couple weeks every time I look. If you search for freelancing threads here on HN you can find some great info on getting freelance work.

>I picked NLP in the financial space

This sounds like something that requires a masters degree. How did you manage to prove that you were knowledgeable/skilled in NLP when you got your first job in that space?

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#46

Post by soneca »

ryanmercer wrote: post #44
rwmurrayVT wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very location dependent.. The vast majority of the workforce couldn't negotiate a $24k a year raise from their employer.

A lot of us can't negotiate a salary period, people outside of tech don't seem to realize this Major corporations have very concrete pay scales, you start at the bottom of that scale and you climb your way up it year after year with very rigid and defined maximum pay increases based on arbitrary factors in an annual merit increase and not by going "gee boss, I think I deserve a raise!".

You can change jobs with a raise though. This in software development of course, as there is a lot of demand almost everywhere and it is easier to change employers than other companies

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#47

Post by danieka »

neuroticfish wrote: post #10
CoffeePython wrote: post #5

Find 20 hours of freelance work at $100/hr. Sounds reductive but I’ve had good success with this when looking for additional income. Probably the easiest and most likely to work path if you are already a developer.

How? In the freelance developer space you're either competing with people in developing countries who work for peanuts, or your potential clients have have the money to throw at high quality work which means you're competing with the top 1-5% of freelance developers.

You should take a look at Toptal, I use it for just this, working around 20 extra hours a week. Can't give out my rate there, but it's fair.

Easy to get gigs once your in, the clients I've worked with have been good. Very little mental overhead since they handle invoicing, getting customers etc.

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#48

Post by Rerarom »

ab_testing wrote: post #40
Rerarom wrote: post #39

I have a question to everyone in this thread: how do you deal with the bureaucracy (taxes and stuff) that comes with a side business? (I'm curious also about how it varies between countries)

If you are in the US, it is a straightforward form Schedule C. Depending on how your business is setup, Quickbooks or any other software will easily generate a form Schedule C for you.

But how does one register the business before it begins activity?

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#49

Post by CoffeePython »

neuroticfish wrote: post #45
CoffeePython wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By finding a niche and looking for work in that niche. I picked NLP in the financial space and have been able to find work within a couple weeks every time I look. If you search for freelancing threads here on HN you can find some great info on getting freelance work.

>I picked NLP in the financial space This sounds like something that requires a masters degree. How did you manage to prove that you were knowledgeable/skilled in NLP when you got your first job in that space?

Full time job is for a consulting company. Got brought on for some greenfield work that happened to be in the space. Got to learn on the job. Leveraged that experience to land freelancing clients.

Re: Ask HN: How to make an extra $2000 monthly?

#50

Post by matt_the_bass »

One option is to try and monetize a hobby you want to do anyway. I’ve just started to do this with my woodworking/cnc/making hobby.

I make art piece wordclocks[0]. I’ve Sold a few with almost no marketing effort. My goal is to sell two per month.

Part of my marketing effort is improving visibility on Etsy and so I’ve started selling much less expensive items on Etsy too[1]. They are not so much for the revenue as for the traffic, ratings, and learning how to best use Etsy. These secondary products are all based on things I’ve designed and made for/with my young kids.

Two observations:

- I’ve really enjoyed the path of developing better processes of how to fabricate things more efficiently

- I’ve really enjoyed getting my kids involved with making. It’s fun to observe them thinking about how to make stuff and working with them to figure things out (they are 3 and 6).

By monetizing my hobby I can also write off tools I’d like to have. Note that I started pretty low cost using tools at my local makerspace[2].

[0] http://www.finewordclocks.com

[1] http://www.etsy.com/shop/FineWordclocks

[2] http://www.as220.org

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