How to Turn Your Hobby into a Thriving Business

Turning the hobby you truly enjoy into a thriving revenue generator can be one of the most exciting, generative and truly satisfying experiences. The exciting news is that you can turn your hobby into a profitable business if you are willing to make the transition from an employee to a business owner and the CEO of your own life. Businesses take commitment and skillful management to make them successful, so your love for your hobby will provide the generative energy it will take to create your new business and make it a successful one!

Moreover, the only way to create a sustainable business is to do great work. And the only way to do great work is to do what you truly enjoy and to sincerely love what you do. Again, your hobby provides this.

Doing something you deeply enjoy as a business has the great potential to create a sustainable income faster than any other wealth-producing strategy. But how, exactly, do you turn your hobby into a thriving business?

There are five simple ideas to start turning your hobby into a business. So, if you already have the willingness to be and do something different, here’s how to get this transformation underway:

1. Look at the objective and the rationale behind turning your hobby into a business. Ask yourself why you want to own your business, what is your primary aim for turning your hobby into a business, and what do you truly want to create. Will it be a full-time or a part-time venture? Do you want to create a part time business to supplement your income from your job, or maybe you would like to make it a full time business venture? That’s the starting point.

2. Look at your priorities and big picture. Do you have a big picture of the way your business can be integrated into your life and living? Your ability to see the big picture will expand your awareness to greater possibilities. Ask yourself these questions: Would turning your hobby into a business be enjoyable, generative, fun and satisfying? Would you be able to draw at least a living wage from the business? Would you be able to gain some benefit beside cash flow from your business? Would you be able to generate a long-term sustainable financial future from this? Does the business have capital growth potential?

3. Take stock of yourself and your current financial state. If you would like to develop your business to be a principal source of income for you and your family, then you need to know how much money your business needs to generate so you can live the life you desire. There is no more essential precept for turning your hobby into a business than to start by taking stock of yourself and your finances. You must know what it costs you to live the life you desire and to run your business, so you can see what kind of money would be required to be generated by your business.

What really matters are what targets, both financial and nonfinancial, you would require your business to achieve in order to generate the kind of life you want to lead.

4. Develop your strategy. While you may be good at your hobby, before you jump in and start charging for the products or services, you need to research and develop your business strategy for greater success. By business strategy, we mean positioning yourself now to create growth into the future.

You can start your business strategy by outlining the key priorities of your business into the future. The strategy must provide the details of your business, including the services you offer, what you want to achieve, what does your business stand for, how you’ll differ from the competition, financial projections, marketing strategies, what specific objectives do you want to achieve – both short and long term.

5. Move from strategy to action. Once you've formed the business strategy (and it can be on merely one page), the next step is to physically actualize it. To ensure your strategies are brought to life, there needs to be specific action plans for each of the strategies set, and the necessary steps to get you there in an agreed time frame. This is vital to the success of your business. Without a realistic set of incremental steps, overarching strategies are not likely to form in the way you would like (if at all).

Powerful strategies are made from the right building blocks─and a willingness to act. If your action plans do not support your key strategies, there is little to no chance that you will successfully realize the strategies to create different possibilities for your business. And be prepared to change strategy if it's not working for you!

One of the greatest gifts you can bring to your business is to have more than one point of view of how it might look—and be willing to change when change is required.

By Chutisa Bowman

Seeds for Success - Generative Woman Media