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The Gig Economy: Side Hustle tips for Professional Musicians

The Gig Economy: Side Hustle tips for Professional Musicians

As musicians, we’re often forced to choose one of two paths. We can either work a traditional 9-6 job that allows us to pay rent and buy gear, or we can pursue music full-time, but sacrifice any potential financial security. Sure, once you “make it”, you’ll have enough money to buy your dream Fender, but until then you’ll be the stereotypical struggling musician.

At least, that’s how it worked 10-years ago before we started to adopt the “gig economy” mentality.

Nowadays, even if your band makes it, you will have no guarantee of financial security. You might be thinking that if you moved to the UK to the USA, things are different. That by moving to another country, you have a better chance to make money in music. But alas, that is not the case. Many of Britain’s top rock bands still need to maintain day jobs to support their music career.

But not everything is as bleak as it may appear at first glance. We are in the middle of the fourth industrial revolution, and that has opened up new revenue streams that did not exist 10/15 years ago. These new revenue streams have given rise to the gig economy, where people do small, freelance jobs instead of pursuing a career in a traditional office environment.

The Side Hustle

Taking on a side hustle or two is the ideal solution to anyone who wants to pursue music full-time, while still earning a living wage. Ideally, you want to take on a few small jobs that have flexible working hours.

You should avoid anything that requires you to work night shifts, or that requires a firm, set-in-stone time commitment. After all, as a musician, your schedule can often be erratic.  So while being a bartender or restaurant server used to be the kinds of jobs musicians would take, there are options that offer superior flexibility available to you.

There are two types of side hustle you should pursue; passive income and active income.

The Passive Side Hustle

Passive income requires you to do a fair amount of initial set up to establish your pipeline. Once you’ve got everything running, you should be earning a monthly income without you needing to intervene too much. Sure, you might need to take care of some admin, but if you’re spending an hour or two a day on your passive income stream, it’s not very passive.

One thing to remember is that a passive side hustle seldom brings in enough money to live by. But if you perfect your model, you could establish multiple passive incomes to run simultaneously.

The Active Side Hustle

Active side hustles generally earn significantly more money, are also take up a lot more of your time. With a passive income stream, you can almost set-up and forget about it.

An active side hustle, on the other hand, usually pays you by the hour, or by completed projects and workloads. If you’ve chosen the right side hustle, you will have the flexibility to work whenever you want, but you will still need to put in the work.

The Ideal Mix

So passive income doesn’t earn much, and active income requires you to dedicate a few hours a week to produce work. Some people might be thinking at this point, which one to pursue. The answer is simple; do both.

One of the joys of the gig economy is that you are not tied to one employer. You are free to mix and match your revenue streams to match your time constraints and interests. So, if you’re interested in making enough money to live without a housemate, you should consider taking on a mix of passive and active income streams.

15 Ways to Side Hustle

1) Teach music (active)

Becoming a music teacher is one of the most obvious ways that a musician can earn something on the side. Either travel to people’s homes or set up some online lessons via Skype.

2) Cover Band (active)

Just about every wedding and many corporate functions will book a band for the evening. The rub is that in many cases, people want a cover band over a band that plays original music.

If you want something a bit more stable, you can also play for a theatre like the Barnyard. This is ideal if you’re a day time musician (studio work, writing new material), but is far from ideal if you want to tour or play shows. Remember, flexibility is king.

3) Blogger (active + passive)

Blogging is an excellent revenue stream, as it can be both active (when your writing) and passive (through ad sales and monetised traffic).

If you want to try your hand at blogging, there are several sites which will pay you for your contributions. Travelista club, for example, pays $40 per piece they accept. They’re a travel blogging site, and as musicians, we’re often on the road. Why not turn your experiences into hard cash?

You can also establish a blog of your own. If your content is good, and you take care of your SEO, you can drive traffic to your blog. You can then join Google’s display network or any number of other as networks who will pay you to place ads on your site. This will generate some passive income for you. You might only get a few hundred Rand a month from this exercise, but if you have multiple streams that create small amounts of money, that will all eventually add up to earning a living wage.

4) Become a YouTuber (active and passive)

Find something you are passionate about, and start a vlog. Thanks to things like the Roland Go:Mixer, all you need to start recording professional quality videos is a Smartphone with a decent camera.

Just like with blogging, a small YouTube channel will not generate a significant income (unless you get to PewdiePie levels of viewership), but every small amount helps.

5) Affiliate Sales (passive)

Now that you’ve got your blog or YouTube channel established, it’s time to make more money from it. Find a brand that aligns with your content, and sell their products on their behalf.

There are many ways to do this, but the most common way is to link to the online store of the brand you are aligned to. You will get a unique tracking link so that you can see how many sales you have generated, and you will then get a commission off of your sales.

6) Sponsored content (active)

We all hate ads. Most savvy internet users will have an ad blocker in place to stop seeing ads, so to get around the ad blocker generation, brands have resorted to sponsored content. This YouTube video is the perfect example.

7) Work as an Extra (active)

Working as an extra is a great way to earn some extra money. Not only will you be paid by the hour, and usually for 8 – 12 hours at a time, you will be fed while on set, and you will have the flexibility to accept and decline roles based on your free time.

8) Focus Groups (active)

Marketers around the world rely on the information they gather from focus groups, and as such, there are focus groups for just about everything. A focus group will usually run for 1 – 4 hours and pays cash on the day.

9) Join Patreon (passive)

Creatives all around the world are joining Patreon in the hopes of making some passive income. The idea is that you create your art as you usually would, and you get your fans to send in small amounts of money every month. You can use incentivised tiers to encourage your fan base to pay more, but the overarching idea that you’d create your art either way.

10) Drive for Uber or Bolt (active)

If you have a decent car, drivers licence, and some free time, nothing is stopping you from becoming an Uber driver. Some of the drivers in Cape Town are earning over R7k per week driving! Of course, these guys treat Uber like a full-time job and often drive for 8 -10 hours a day, but if you’re looking to earn a few hundred bucks here and there, Uber and other ride-sharing companies like Bolt are an ideal solution.

11) Sell services on Fiverr (active)

All around the world, people need mundane tasks done. Things like backlink building in SEO or data capturing. Thanks to sites like Fiverr, you can sell your skills and time and earn dollars. So while to an American citizen earning $5-$8 an hour might seem pathetic, thanks to the exchange rate that comes to ~R75 to ~R120 per hour! Considering that a few jobs pay that per day for unskilled labour, there is no reason for you not to explore Fiverr.

12) Social Media Manager (active)

Learning how to manage a social media account is easy if you have some time. Take a course on Udemy or Shaw Academy, and offer your services to small businesses.

A professional agency will often charge upwards of R12k per month just to run a social media page. Most small companies cannot afford that. So if you offer your services to 2 or 3 companies, and sell your services for R1k – R2k per month, you should be able to generate a decent income in just a few months.  

13) Secret Shopper (active)

Becoming a secret shopper is as simple as filling in a form online and taking a simple test. Once registered, you will be contacted a few times a month to go to a store and perform specific tasks. You can get paid anything from $15 – $100 per job, but the work is erratic at best. So if you pursue this avenue, think of it more like a once in a while bonus than a reliable income.

14) Become a TEFL Teacher (active)

If you have a decent grasp of the English language, you should consider becoming a TEFL teacher. Most of us know at least one person who left the country to teach English, but thanks to faster internet in developing countries, you can now be a TEFL teacher from the comfort of your home.

15) Surveys and Answer Sites (active)

Do you have strong opinions about certain things? Do you want to get paid for those opinions? Then you should join a paid survey group or become a member of JustAnswer.

Conclusion

If you use your imagination, there are countless revenue streams available to you. These are just some examples to help you get your creative juices flowing.

The best way to identify new income opportunities is to look at your hobbies, and see where you are spending money. If you can somehow turn that into an income stream, you could find yourself a niche market and open up new ways to earn.

To quote Thomas Edison, “Hell, there are no rules here. We’re trying to accomplish something.”

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