Many can answer the question of what their hobbies are, but when it comes down to coming up with a million-rand business idea, brain-freeze often creeps in. What if the two did not need to be apart and you could cash in on that very thing that you so dearly love and regard as a hobby?
Steve Jobs, Co-Founder and CEO of Apple did it. So did talk-show hostess Oprah Winfrey and Mark Zuckerberg (Co-Founder of Facebook). They got fame and made lots of money from their passions for technology, programming, talking a lot and being somewhat of a social media addict.
If you look at successful entrepreneurs and how they managed to make a living out of their hobbies, these five factors pop up in almost all of them.
Master your hobby
Whatever you are doing – whether it is selling sweets, singing, writing, counselling, baking, riding a bike or acting – you need to work to the extent that you are a master of your own passion. It will take mucho’ sacrifice, putting in many hours, reading up, practising, experimenting and so forth, but you need to strive for a level of expertise that others will look up to.
Get a mentor
Find someone you can confide in. Ideally that person should be “wiser” and have gone through a similar journey. It can be your coach or an older business person that you look up to. Ask them to mentor you in your journey and then do your “homework” so that you can keep getting better and better”.
Develop a business plan
Business is not intuitive and you will need a viable strategy and business plan to help you map up a guideline of how you are going to go about monetizing your hobby.
Have eyes that see
Many startups fill a niche by solving problems. You need to train yourself to be a problem solver. The catch is that many are not able to spot problems and development areas.
Passion
Love, love, love what you do.
Once you are secure in, and a master of your own hobby you can then consider exactly how to go about turning what you know into what you earn. For example, you could make and sell a particular product for your hobby; teach others the business of your hobby; tell others by speaking or writing about your hobby, or you could even fix or repair items connected to your hobby. Alas, we can’t all be masters of our own passions like Chad le Clos (swimmer) or Suzelle (Youtuber), but give yourself the opportunity to express what it is you love doing, as you never quite know where it might take you.
