Could you launch a million-dollar business this weekend?

You might remember Noah Kagan from Episode 237 about brainstorming and validating business ideas.

Noah is a serial entrepreneur and founder of AppSumo, The Noah Kagan Youtube channel, Noah Kagan Presents podcast, and several other successful ventures.

His new book is Million Dollar Weekend: The Surprisingly Simple Way to Launch a 7-Figure Business in 48 Hours.

Throughout our conversation, we brainstormed numerous side hustle business ideas that listeners could pursue this year.

Noah also shared his insights on idea validation, launching quickly, and much more.

Tune in to Episode 595 of The Side Hustle Show to learn:

How to quickly validate and launch a side hustle idea
Multiple promising side hustle concepts to pursue in 2024
The importance of pre-selling a product idea before building it
Why services businesses make for promising first side hustles
Actionable tips for overcoming “analysis paralysis” and launching faster

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Validating and Launching Shrimp Breeding

I asked Noah how he comes up with some of his unique business ideas like shrimp breeding.

Noah explained that many ideas come from simply paying attention to the content you consume and products you use.

For example, there is a guy called Dustin’s Fish Tanks, a YouTube channel by a guy who reviews fish tanks and now makes over $1 million per year.

He began by reviewing fish tanks, but it soon turned into him making his own and selling them.

The key is to reverse engineer where current trends and interests lie based on how you spend your time and money. 

You can also review your credit card statements to spark ideas. AppSumo was born out of Noah’s desire to get deals on tools he was already buying.

Listen-Option-Transition

Ultimately, the best test for an idea is to validate it directly with paying customers. Noah outlined a simple process for doing this:

Listen to the customer’s needs (ask questions to understand needs/frustrations)
Suggest an Option to solve their problem
Transition to asking for the sale or next step commitment

For example, Noah is exploring a DocuSign alternative (which is valued at $11 billion) because e-signatures cost him $30 monthly.

His team vets ideas using these criteria:

Virality – Does it lend itself to word-of-mouth growth?
Subscription Competition – Are people already paying subscriptions for this regularly?
Excitement – How fired up are you personally about the idea?
Million Dollar Potential – Is there a path to $1M in profit over the years?

This framework led them to create “AppSumo Originals” which are tools like:

SendFox (MailChimp alternative)
TidyCal (Calendly alternative)
KingSumo (Gleam alternative)

Rather than reinvent the wheel, model what already works and make it better like Noah does.

If the customer says no, you can ask for referrals to find better qualified prospects. Stick with one idea initially until you have 100 paying customers. Don’t jump around constantly chasing shiny objects.

Launching Side Hustle Ideas

Here are some other key takeaways from Noah on quickly validating and launching side hustle ideas:

Don’t overthink ideas – The best idea is the one you start. You’ll inevitably repeat.
Look at trends – Monitor Google Trends and other sites to assess demand. Avoid dying or declining industries.
Estimate the market size – Check Facebook audience sizes and spending data. Ask ChatGPT for estimates of customer counts and spending on competitors.
Practice starting – Challenge yourself to start something new daily, even if tiny. Example, ask someone for $1 just to get used to taking action.
Deliver first, then expand – Resist the urge to constantly change course. Stick to an idea once it gains initial traction.

It’s important to avoid analysis paralysis and just put yourself out there. Build momentum around ideas that show early promise.

Building Your Dream 10 List

You may have a great business concept, but how do you efficiently validate whether real customers actually want it?

Noah recommends creating what he calls a “Dream List” as the first step in testing demand.

The Dream 10 is a list of 10 ideal customers who would highly benefit from your offering. This forces you to get clear on your target customer profile beyond “everyone.”

Some easy ways to build your list:

Inbox Mining

Scroll through the past couple years of emails in Gmail or Outlook and flag any contacts related to your concept.

For example, if you had a document signing service, you’d search for instances of DocuSign.

Service Providers

Note your professional services providers like lawyers, accountants, agencies etc. and contacts who could validate demand.

The key is quickly compiling a list of 10 people receptive to your idea to reach out for feedback rather than trying to validate more broadly. It may feel uncomfortable reaching out at first, but it is necessary to overcome assumptions.

Starting with Services

When diving into a new business idea, our natural inclination is to start building a product like a mobile app or web software platform.

However, most successful side hustlers take a more strategic approach initially by offering services first.

Some benefits of kicking off with services:

Lower Barriers to Entry

Offering one-to-one services like consulting, freelancing, coaching, etc. has far lower startup costs than engineering a complex technology product from scratch.

You may only need a website, scheduling software, and marketing materials to get started.

Faster Revenue

Because services are sold on a recurring basis (hourly, monthly retainers, etc.), you get paid continually as you deliver value rather than waiting months or years for product development.

This positive feedback loop also helps fund product creation down the road.

Better Customer Insights

Every client you work with gives future product insights from their unique problems and desired outcomes.

Over time you can identify common themes to integrate as features that meet the widest range of needs.

Pre-Selling the Idea

Before spending significant time or money building a product, entrepreneurs should pre-sell it.

Noah shared an example where his team spent 6 months building a Klaviyo alternative called MeetFam. But after launching, they struggled to attract customers.

That’s why he recommends first selling the product concept before ever building it. He outlined 3 options to test demand:

Pre-Sales Outreach – Directly pitch your network through outreach.
Marketplace Listings – Post the product for sale on platforms like Craigslist and Facebook to gauge interest.
Paid Ads – Create a landing page and run ads promoting the product.

Noah prefers the first approach of pre-sales outreach because it’s faster and you get real money in your pocket.

His goal would be to secure $2,500 in pre-sales to confirm the concept and cover initial development costs.

Customers understand you need time to deliver the final product after payment.

I noted this “pre-sell then build” approach has proven successful for many entrepreneurs and big brands. For example, Tesla sold reservations years before ever manufacturing their mainstream vehicles.

Overcoming Service Business Growing Pains

Transitioning from solopreneur to having employees is tempting but tricky.

Noah highlights Adam Gilbert who bootstrapped My Body Tutor, a 7-figure online fitness coaching company, as proof it’s possible.

Adam coached all his clients personally for many years assuming nobody could match his level of service.

Despite assumptions that no other coach could match his level of personalization and results, Adam finally decided to test hiring help a few years back.

By finding coaches with similar values, My Body Tutor was able to expand its customer base dramatically.

Now Adam is able to focus more time on fine-tuning the company’s training processes and team rather than direct client delivery.

The key is finding team members who share your vision rather than complete replacements.

More Side Hustle Ideas

Here are more side hustle ideas that listeners could pursue:

Become a Software Consultant

Build an agency around popular platforms like Notion, Shopify etc. You can sell training and custom implementations. Thomas Frank earns over $2 million selling Notion templates.

Visa Services

Help people maneuver and expedite cumbersome visa processes, especially for popular digital nomad destinations.

Christmas Lights Installation

Provide Christmas lights installation, removal, and storage services for homes and businesses.

Upscale Nanny Placement

Place qualified nannies with families seeking childcare. Focus on reliability and trust.

DocuSign Competitor

Build a cheaper alternative to the $11 billion e-signature company DocuSign. Pre-sell it first to prove demand.

Guest Booking for Podcasts and Shows

If you have a way to book high-profile guests, Noah is willing to pay up to $20,000 to land certain billionaires.

Accountability Goal Services

Help clients achieve personal and professional goals via financial incentives and accountability coaching. A good example is HealthyWage’s monetary goal achievement model to encourage people to lose weight.

Pre-Mixed Coffee Protein Drinks

Launch pre-made coffee mixed with protein powder or collagen to simplify morning routines.

I’m energized by the sheer range of promising concepts Noah shared off the cuff. It reminds all of us not to fixate on any one rigid approach to side hustling. Opportunities abound if you experiment broadly.

Noah’s #1 Tip for Side Hustle Nation

“Now, not how.”

Final Takeaways

Are you chasing mice or antelopes? Don’t put the same effort into small payoff activities versus big vision projects.
Piggyback on rising interests and platforms like TikTok, Shopify, Notion etc. rather than reinvent the wheel to drive demand.
Pre-sell a minimum viable version of your idea before expending months of effort attempting to build a perfect finished product. Let the market guide your priorities.
Initially provide hands-on services to start making money faster, gain expertise, and better understand customer needs. Worry about packaging them into products later.

Episode Links

Side Hustle Show Episode 237
AppSumo
The Noah Kagan Youtube channel
Noah Kagan Presents podcast
Million Dollar Weekend: The Surprisingly Simple Way to Launch a 7-Figure Business in 48 Hours.
Dustin’s Fish Tanks
DocuSign
AppSumo Originals
SendFox
TidyCal
KingSumo
Klaviyo
My Body Tutor
Thomas Frank
HealthyWage

Serious About Making Extra Money?

Start Your Free $500 Challenge. My free 5-day email course shows you how to add $500 to your bottom line.
Join the free Side Hustle Nation Community. The free Facebook group is the best place to connect with other side hustlers and get your questions answered.
Download The Side Hustle Show. My free podcast shares how to make extra money with actionable weekly episodes.

Making an extra $100 a day through side hustles might seem out of reach for many people. So how did one side hustler earn over $10,000 in just 100 days?

Jaclyn “Jackie” Mitchell (@jaclynmitchell) set out to save for a down payment on a house by breaking a big goal into bite-sized daily targets.

By earning $100 every day over 100 days, she ended up netting a total of $10,972.

How’d she do it while working a full-time job?

By relentlessly testing quick-hitting remote side hustles, working in public to hold herself accountable, and opening herself up to unexpected income from building an audience.

Tune in to Episode 594 of The Side Hustle Show to learn:

how to break down big goals into small, daily actions
how to leverage communities for advice and accountability.
how to look for passive income opportunities
how consistency compounds over time

Sponsors

Notion – Try Notion AI for free!

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Squarespace – Start building your professional website today!

Jackie’s Backstory

Jackie is no stranger to the side hustle game. She started strategically earning extra cash in college through sites like Swagbucks. At the time, she’d cash out earnings from promotional offers and simple activities to treat her boyfriend (now husband) to occasional nicer dinners.

While rewarding, those early side gig days didn’t push Jackie to fully commit to making side income a daily habit.

Fast forward to when Jackie and her husband were gearing up to buy their first home. They found themselves facing a $10,000 savings goal for their down payment fund.

Rather than find that big number daunting, Jackie broke it down into smaller goals. She sized her target to $100 per day, with the intent to hustle for 100 days straight. Even better, she decided to document the entire journey on her TikTok account.

The $100 a Day Challenge

When Jackie shared about her challenge on TikTok, she gained 50,000 likes overnight on the first video. Clear interest from the community upped the stakes—now she was committed not only to herself but to any followers seeking inspiration or proof that side hustling can stack up.

@jaclynmitchelll

the way I calculated wrong and didnt realize I hadn’t actually hit $100 until this morning when I did the voiceover 💀 guess I have a $6 worth of make-up work today! #budgeting #savingmoney #challenge

♬ original sound – jackie mitchell

Throughout the 100 days, Jackie provided ongoing transparency into what she was trying, how much she was making, little successes along the way, and occasional frustrations as well.

The motivation was part personal goal tracking, part public accountability, and part helpful education for anyone motivated enough to take notes.

Top Revenue Streams

Of all Jackie tested, a few key side hustles emerged as consistent contributors in making that $100 a day threshold doable:

Swagbucks

This popular rewards site ended up being one of Jackie’s go-to daily drivers thanks to their lucrative game testing offers. For hitting certain levels or milestones within mobile games, Swagbucks pays out handsomely.

One game may reward just $5 for an introductory level, but reaching the top tier could pay $160 or more! Jackie mentions a $218 payout for one game, which is not too shabby at all.

She notes a subreddit called r/SwagBucks as an invaluable resource here. The Swagbucks subreddit often features detailed guides on the best strategies to hit those top reward levels without spending real money on in-app purchases.

This allows earning decent chunks pretty easily. Jackie says she can just set the games to auto-roll and grind up levels while binge watching Netflix!

Prolific

Next up is Prolific, her favorite survey site because of its boosted hourly pay rates. Prolific pays participants to take part in research studies.

Studies range from quick 5-10 minute surveys to more in-depth questionnaires taking around 30 minutes. Thanks to their academic nature, hourly rates are higher than many survey sites.

In Jackie’s experience, she averaged $10–$30 a day on Prolific when there were open studies matching her demographics. The sign-up process involves a waitlist, however, as researchers want balanced pools of participants.

Check out our full Prolific review to learn more.

Focus Groups

In contrast to consistent money from surveys, focus groups represent infrequent but high-value side income. Groups discussing products, brands, etc. pay out $100 to $250 for just 1–2 hours of your opinions.

The limitation here is qualifying for relevant paid focus groups as they arise.

Sites like FocusGroup.com allow you to join not just online surveys but also through personal discussions, web chats, video diaries, product tests, telephone conversations, and more.

Check out our full FocusGroup.com review for more.

Over time, Jackie confirms building a nice bank of focus group checks every couple months. It’s so easy once you land a qualifying group!

My other top paid research picks:

User Interviews – Make $50-150/hr providing feedback on upcoming products. Full review here. 
Respondent – More of a tech and industry professional focus, but I’ve earned almost $400 here. Full Respondent review.
Rare Patient Voice – Patients and caregivers can support medical research and earn $100+ per hour. 

Data Annotation

If you’re willing to put in some serious hours, DataAnnotation offers pay ranging from $15 – $25 per hour. This involves training AI systems in various ways like editing, content flagging, grammar checks, and more.

It’s admittedly grueling work, but can be a good way to make money online for beginners.

Additional similar sites in this space include Remotasks and TaskVerse. Both await Jackie’s further testing in future side hustling adventures!

Check out our full Remotasks review to learn more.

Other Income Streams

Part of what makes Jackie’s story so compelling were the unexpected income streams unlocked along the way.

The beauty of documenting this entire challenge publicly became evident in the third income stream that emerged organically—her growing audience itself.

TikTok Creator Fund

As her TikTok following grew, she qualified for the platform’s Creator Fund, which pays users a small amount per view and traffic. Her daily recap videos provided helpful accountability… plus consistent ad revenue.

Brand Sponsorships

Brand sponsorships also started trickling in to have Jackie showcase or test products for fixed fees or free products. Dedicated review videos or subtle integrated mentions in her regular content let her easily earn a few hundred dollars.

User Generated Content

By having authentic creators like Jackie demonstrate real-life use of products, audiences find reviews more relatable than company marketing. Depending on factors like audience size, UGC posts can command $100 or more each.

Reselling Clothes

Beyond digital streams, Jackie cites reselling clothes as her effortless seasonal hustle. Listing items you already own on websites like Poshmark or Depop turns stagnant closet clutter into cash without upfront costs.

It takes more sourcing and time investments to make serious reselling money, though.

Jackie cautions that the incremental costs around inventory, shipping, and more make scaling selling activities tricky. Without expertise, reselling works better as a side supplement than primary hustle.

Amazon Storefront

Jackie created an Amazon associates storefront to earn affiliate commissions on a handful of recommended products. As her audience clicked through to buy items like her favorite heated blanket, this turned into a small passive income stream.

Other Hustles Tested

Jackie tried her hand successfully at quite a few other ideas you may have also seen online and wondered about:

Amazon Mechanical Turk – Amazon’s marketplace for quick online tasks pays very little.
Cash back apps – Fetch and Ibotta pay you to scan your grocery receipts, but won’t add up to much.
Instacart – Delivering groceries to others helps…if you can swipe orders lightning fast in a crowded market. Too much luck-based competition. Here’s our full Instacart shopper review to learn more.

A Day in the Life

At first, Jackie estimated needing 5+ hours per day to earn her $100 while juggling her regular full-time job. This included both active hustling time plus an hour or more editing footage and tracking challenge metrics.

But as certain earning channels became more automated, that number dropped to 2–3 hours a day toward the end. Passive income like TikTok ad share and sponsored content gave her breathing room.

When asked if she managed to get any sleep, Jackie laughs but confirms she remained committed to rest and sanity as well! Her background working multiple demanding jobs during college prepared her for this hustling sprint.

Through unwavering determination, leveraging pockets of time on lunch breaks or evenings to chip away at that $100 became almost second nature no matter how tired from a long day’s work.

Achieving Big Goals Through Small Steps

By pushing herself to stack $100 incremental wins day-by-day, Jackie proved large goals become reachable through small, consistent actions. Publicly posting the process also kept her accountable while attracting brand opportunities.

But most importantly, the transparency resonated hugely with her audience. Followers connected with seeing someone work through building earnings from square one without filters. They became invested in the human element by living the ups and downs with her.

What’s Next for Jackie?

Upon completing her initial challenge, Jackie gained many more TikTok followers as well as credibility via demonstrated proof. Rather than ramp up claims more and more, she’s chosen a more balanced path.

@jaclynmitchelll

snow calls for naps, I don’t make the rules! #budgeting #savingmoney #challenge #oneyearofextraincome

♬ original sound – jackie mitchell

Ongoing in the year ahead, Jackie makes sure to post regular updates on her income streams—both larger sums now from indirect sources as well as nitty-gritty daily workhorse side hustles requiring active hours invested.

Viewers can follow along day-by-day on TikTok as she’s committed to earn and document consistently.

By spotlighting various methods, answering follower questions, and reporting out earnings, Jackie leads by the same example that’s built such a strong foundation. She continues focusing on the core audience that related to her circumstances just recently.

If along the way partnerships or speaking opportunities stem from such a rapport, so be it. But Jackie strives to remain cautiously grounded against the trapping of many who perhaps misrepresented side hustle concepts through assuming an air of having “figured it all out.”

Follow Jackie on TikTok

In just 100 days, Jackie earned $10,972 through grit and determination. She offers inspiration that’s possible for regular folks without huge projects or followings already.

By being radically transparent about side hustles that work (and those lacking), she builds trust with viewers who can take away tangible ideas.

Now in her second year of documentation centered on earnings, Jackie continues balanced leadership. Join her ongoing journey by following @jaclynmitchell on TikTok.

The openness and care for her community that captivated huge early attention remain—perhaps the most important driver sustaining consistent growth beyond viral peaks alone.

Jackie’s #1 Tip for Side Hustle Nation

“Do your taxes.”

Episode Links

@jaclynmitchell
Swagbucks
r/SwagBucks
Prolific
FocusGroup.com
DataAnnotation
Remotasks
TaskVerse
Poshmark
Depop
Amazon Mechanical Turk
Fetch
Ibotta
Instacart

Looking for More Side Hustle Help?

Start Your Free $500 Challenge. My free 5-day email course shows you how to add $500 to your bottom line.
Join the free Side Hustle Nation Community. The free Facebook group is the best place to connect with other side hustlers and get your questions answered.
Download The Side Hustle Show. My free podcast shares how to make extra money with actionable weekly episodes.