Atomic Essays

Planning For Your Side-Gig To Generate 6-Figures Is A Mistake – Do This Instead

9 months ago   •   2 min read

By Ernesto Gutierrez, MD
Photo by Austin Distel / Unsplash
Table of contents

Having a big, audacious goal when starting your first  online business is what overwhelms you.

Every book, course, and "guru" out there will tell you to first plan what you want to accomplish. Set a goal. Dream big. Don't worry about "how" for now.

And I agree with that – to an extent.

A 6-figure business is a serious business.

Despite what you might hear or read about, nobody builds a 6-figure business by accident.

Such businesses require skills, systems, strategies, and often, a team. Most of which you don't (yet) have. What is more, many of which you are not yet ready to have. Which is why so many "first time founders" who get venture capital for their startup end up losing it…

So where should you start?

When starting out, you don't know what you don't know.

I am a strong advocate for setting unrealistic goals.

But then I'm also an advocate of breaking them down into distinct phases. Each phase teaches you something you need to know in order to continue growing towards your goal. So, if you want to build a 6-figure business, it is counterproductive to want to do that right off the bat before you develop the skills required.

So what should you aim for?

Give yourself some easy wins

Instead of aiming for $10k per month, choose a few bills you pay every month and make a plan so your business pays for those bills.

Here is my list from the time I began building my side-gig seriously:

  • Car payments: $400 = 1.3 Coaching calls
  • Daycare: $600 = 4 Coaching calls
  • Cell & Internet: $150 = 1 Coaching calls
  • Virtual Assistant: $500 = 3.3 Coaching calls
  • Software: $350 = 2.3 Coaching calls

At the time, I was charging $150 for 1:1 coaching.

And yes, my goal was to eventually build a 6-figure business (which I've done), but creating this perspective made it easy to get some wins under my belt and build momentum. Not to mention the peace of mind from knowing all these bills were paid for!

Remember, you don't need a 6-figure business for your life to improve:

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