I was working on this post even before the 2020 Pandemic that has changed things for a lot of people. I started it because I realized that I’m not the only mom working (or needing to work) in unconventional ways. More kids are home now because of decisions to homeschool or school systems doing virtual classes right now and for the foreseeable future. Whatever your reason, there’s plenty of us (moms or not) who need a side hustle, side gig, or other ways to make money.
So I give you Moms who Hustle | Unconventional Ways to Make Money in Today’s World
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Flexible Jobs
The last few years have brought flexible jobs that redefine what we previously thought a flexible job is. These jobs have no overhead for you and you can literally create your own schedule, working as little or as much as you need too. These are valid ways to make money.
Shipt
Need to make some extra money? Sign up and get paid to shop with Shipt! Shipt is a service that bring the grocery store to your door! And it is expanding rapidly. When services like this first started coming out, I thought, “Well that’s nice but I live so far away from the city they won’t possibly reach me.” Well, they proved me wrong. Shipt operates in 158 major metros throughout the U.S. That’s more than any other grocery service that delivers in as soon as an hour! You can make money if Shipt is in your area! Check it out today!
If Shipt isn’t in your area you can check out:
Dog Walking
Got a sweet spot for pups? Rover and Wag let you earn money taking other people’s fury friends for walks.
Ride Sharing
Driving for Uber and Lyft is another flexible job you can make work around your schedule.
Working Online Jobs
Another side hustle I do that I rather enjoy is captioning videos and transcribing audio clips through Rev. It’s freelance work from home, it’s flexible and the more you work and the better you get at it the more the pay increases.
Humantic is a company you can work freelance for – you review call recordings (you know when you make a customer service call and it says “this call may be recorded for quality purposes”? Those calls really do get reviewed!)
Side Hustles
There are some jobs that are legit side hustles. You have to be looking for them or know someone that knows someone. Pre-pandemic, I dealt Blackjack for a party company that specialized in casino-themed corporate and fundraiser parties. True story!
I’m a member at a large church and they have paid nursery staff positions for services and special events. I’ve been doing that on the side for a year now.
So those are just matter-of-opportunity side hustles. But there are others that are a little easier to find.
If you have a degree you can often snag a side gig teaching English online to foreign language speakers! Check out VIPKid, Magic Ears, QKids and more!
Check out Clean Lots and start your own parking lot cleaning business! Or you can clean houses or businesses – you’ll need to check and see if you need any licensing or insurance in your state. I’ve actually started cleaning houses myself! You can may full-time money working part-time cleaning houses!
Donate Plasma – this is a legit way to make some cash and the bonus is you are helping to save lives too! Look up Biolife, CSL Plasma or Octapharma Plasma centers near you! New donor bonuses are pretty good so even if you do it for just a month to rake in the new donor incentives, you’ll net between $500-$700 for a few hours of your time.
Filling a Need / Using your skills / Creating a Career
Fiverr® is the world’s largest marketplace for services starting at $5. Fiverr is the home for digital, creative and professional services, providing a one-stop shop for millions of digital services. YOU can be the one that provides those services. If you can make/edit graphics, slideshows, videos, and other digital content, you can make money on Fiverr.
Sewing: I know people that sew that started making and selling masks this year. They had a skill and filled a need. Boom.
I have plenty of friends that do Photography on the side. If you have an artistic eye, a good camera that you really know how to use and are good with people this is your gig! Studio photography has really gone down over the last decade and I think it’s because of the rise of moms with good cameras that’ll take your baby or family photos in your home, or outdoors on location somewhere pretty or special to you.
In-home childcare: This is a tricky one but a lot of moms make it work! Check with your state’s requirements for in-home childcare. Often if you keep it under a certain number of children there’s no state oversight or regulation. A lot of people are needing childcare options right now!
Teaching: I know people with teaching degrees that were unable to get a job this year because of everything that have created a career for themselves either as a private tutor for a family with kids home trying to do e-learning while parents are at work or as the leader of a “learning pod” (basically an in-home teacher for a small group of same grade students.) Obviously, there’s a little legality involved in this so definitely check that out before you start!
Blogging
It’s pretty clear that blogging is one way I have created a side hustle for myself that turned in to my main job. Blogging is NOT EASY. And it can take a while to make some revenue. And there are upfront costs. It’s hard to make money with a “free” blog (one that’s not costing you anything to have) because you can’t run a lot of advertisers on a blog you don’t “own”. BUT bloggers do make money once they’ve built a following. If you think you have a great niche idea or the life experiences others would want to read about, check out All the Ways Bloggers Make Money.
A lot of bloggers also hire virtual assistants. Google “virtual assistant jobs” or look up groups on Facebook that will help connect you to that. This is a great option for someone that has office assistant experience and is very task and detailed oriented and is a self-starter.
Podcasts and YouTube Channels are also revenue streams for bloggers or as stand-alone businesses.
Direct Sales / Small Business
Think you could cut it in direct sales? You’ve no shortage of options. There’s the classics like Mary Kay, Avon and Pampered Chef. But your options don’t end there. Like fashion and jewelry? There’s Stella & Dot. Love kids books? You can become a sales consultant for Usborne Books. Like Essential Oils but don’t like the multi-level marketing structure of the top companies? Check out Simply Earth. I don’t want to spend to much space talking about just one company, but I have a whole post on Simply Earth and their no MLM setup here.
I have some friends out there who have had success with MLM companies but I’m not a fan. They’re out there (DoTerra, Plexus, BeachBody, Young Living, etc, etc) but I’m not going to give them a lot of space. It takes just the right kind of person to be successful at that and they all come with upfront costs.
Cash Back Apps / Creative Shopping
Saving money can be it’s own side hustle. If you cut your monthly expenditures by $200, $300, $400, it’s the equivalent of working a job where you made that much money!
Shopkick
With Shopkick you can earn gift cards. The way that it works is you get points–called kicks–just for scanning barcodes of certain products in stores and for making purchase (it works for online purchases, too)! You even get kicks in some stores just for entering a store! Shopping basically turns into a fun scavenger hunt for points when you are using Shopkick.
There are other ways to earn kicks too, like watching videos about products within the Shopkick app! Soon you’ll earn gift cards to a place like Walmart and Amazon. Shopkick users have earned an insane amount of money in gift cards, to the tune of $78 million total.
Swagbucks
Earning Gift Cards
In the same vein as Swagbucks, there are other ways to earn gift cards to stores, restaurants, Amazon and even Paypal cash! Check out all the ways to earn Amazon gift cards (I generally use these for Christmas shopping but you can use them for essentials. And in some cases, you could cash out for Paypal cash instead or other store gift cards – doesn’t have to be Amazon).
Creative Shopping
Don’t underestimate the importance of SAVING money when you need to make money. Creative shopping, couponing, cash back apps can all help you drive your expenses down.
Here’s what you need to know about coupon and cash back apps.
This is by no means an exhaustive list of ideas. Your creativity and skill set may open other opportunities to you.
Think about what you enjoy and what you do well. That’ll give you a starting point for what kind of side job you can find or create for yourself.
What side gigs have you done and enjoyed? I’d love to hear your ways to make money!
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