Misc
How to Grow Your Side Hustle Into a Successful Business
Decades ago, launching a business meant risking your life savings to rent a storefront or to buy inventory – but today, technology enables many new ways to ease into a startup lifestyle without the chance of losing your shirt.
Ambitious people can use the gig economy to tackle opportunities in their free time, and developing a side hustle outside of your day job is a way to get a taste of entrepreneurship, as well.
Grow Your Side Hustle
But for some, a side hustle isn’t enough. Instead, they want to take that side hustle – their true passion – and grow it into a real career or business.
Today’s infographic from Quid Corner gives 10 steps on how to make that transition a reality.
Taking your passion and converting it into a successful venture is not an easy move – otherwise everyone would do it.
Instead, it takes hard work, knowledge, tenacity, and patience. Here are some key points worth considering as you grow your side hustle into something bigger.
10 Steps to Consider
1. Cover Monthly Expenses
It’s hard to replace your full monthly salary at the start, so aim to have your side hustle replace a set of monthly expenses at first. This will take some of the pressure off, and allow you to grow things organically.
2. Network
Meet with other side hustlers and learn from them. Develop strong relationships with the people that inspire you.
3. Find a Mentor
Studies show that small businesses with a mentor are twice as likely to succeed over a five year period.
4. Register
Eventually, register your business officially. This separates your personal and business assets, and it makes your side hustle more legit in the eyes of customers.
5. Pareto’s Law
With a new venture, there will be plenty of tasks to do. Pareto’s Law states that concentrating on 20% of these tasks (the most important) will generate most of your outputs (80%), so prioritize accordingly. See more on this mental model in a previous infographic.
6. Delegate
Delegate daily tasks outside of your core skillset. This will allow you to focus on your passion and what you uniquely bring to the table.
7. Automate
Use apps to automate repetitive tasks. You can schedule social media posts, track leads and conversions, run payroll, and manage inventory with apps – and much more.
8. Focus on Cash Flow
A whopping 82% of small businesses fail from cash flow problems. Therefore, this should be an important focus for any business owner.
9. Set Goals
Set long-term goals, and short-term objectives to achieve them. Use the SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Timely) framework to set near-term objectives.
10. Stop, Collaborate, and Listen
Collaborate with businesses that share your values, and learn from them at the same time.
Technology
Charting Grand Theft Auto: GTA’s Budget and Revenues
Dive into the GTA budget through the years, with GTA VI set to be the most expensive video game of all time.
Charting Grand Theft Auto: GTA’s Budget and Revenues
Over 10 years since the launch of Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V), the second most-sold video game in history, Rockstar Games has announced its sequel GTA VI will be “coming 2025.”
As the anticipation only grows for this next big entry in the franchise, we take a look at the GTA budget through the years. How much have the last two games cost to make, how much have they earned, and how do they compare with the latest entry?
Data for this visualization comes from Statista, TweakTown, and Twitch Metrics.
How Much Has GTA VI Cost to Make?
The GTA franchise has grown enormously in scale from humble beginnings as a top-down, 2D video game in 1997. Fifteen installments later, the upcoming release, GTA VI, is estimated to be the most expensive video game to be made yet.
Here’s a look at how much GTA VI and the last two major releases cost, and how much revenue they’ve earned as of August 2023.
| Year | Title | Production Costs ($) | Revenue ($) | Copies Sold |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 (est.) | GTA VI | $2B (rumored) | N/A | N/A |
| 2013 | GTA V | $265M | $7.7B | 185M |
| 2008 | GTA IV | $100M | $2B | 25M |
In 2008, GTA IV cost around $100 million—already a budget that rivalled big Hollywood releases. However with 25 million copies sold, the game earned nearly $2 billion—a five-fold return on its production cost.
Five years later, GTA V (2013) cost more than $200 million to make—twice GTA IV’s budget. A decade after its release, GTA V has generated close to $8 billion, with hundreds of millions in annual revenue from subscriptions and in-game purchases—a model that its successor is sure to follow.
In fact, subscription fees and in-game purchases represented 78% of Take-Two Interactive’s (parent of GTA developer Rockstar Games) revenues in 2023.
Analysts estimate the to-be-released GTA VI’s costs at $2 billion, including marketing and other expenses. A massive open-world (set in the Miami-inspired “Vice City”), cutting edge graphics, and a reportedly brand-new game engine are all reasons for the game’s outsized budget.
For comparison, the current most expensive games to have been made include Red Dead Redemption 2 (also by Rockstar) and Star Citizen, both reportedly with a $500 million budget.
Meanwhile, Take-Two Interactive shares are up more than 50% for the year.
-
Markets1 week agoRecession Risk: Which Sectors are Least Vulnerable?
-
Revenue2 weeks agoRanked: The Biggest Retailers in the U.S. by Revenue
-
Globalization2 weeks agoThe Top 50 Largest Importers in the World
-
Maps2 weeks agoMapped: Which Countries Recognize Israel or Palestine, or Both?
-
Education2 weeks agoRanked: America’s Best Universities
-
Countries1 week agoRanked: Share of Global Arms Imports in 2022
-
Countries1 week agoRanked: Share of Global Arms Exports in 2022
-
Globalization1 week agoCharted: The Industries Where Asian Companies are the Strongest