12 Part-Time Business Ideas You Can Start Today

What if I told you that you don’t have to leave all your responsibilities or wait for the right time to pursue your dream business idea? Nowadays, there are many ways to turn your passions and talents into a new business venture that’ll make you extra income.

In this post, we’ll explore just some of the part-time business ideas you could start today to become your own boss. Let’s get started!

1. Print-on-demand

Print-on-demand (POD) is one of the best small business ideas to start. If you’ve ever dreamed of becoming one of the small business owners selling custom clothing, accessories, or lifestyle items online, this one is for you. 

By partnering with a POD provider you can customize and sell various products with your own designs. Starting a POD business requires low startup costs, as all orders are made on-demand. This business idea saves you time and resources because you don’t need to worry about inventory management and order fulfillment. Only when an order from your store is made, your POD provider will fulfill, pack, and ship the orders directly to your customers.

Source: Printful 

While your POD provider takes care of the operational side, to create a successful online business that earns you passive income, you need to drive sales from your online store. Whether it’s an Etsy storefront or a Shopify website, a strong brand image accounts for a huge part of success. Therefore, after perfecting your designs and listing products for sale, make sure to think about promotional strategies that’ll attract customers and increase order volume. 

Does that sound interesting? Check out the best-selling print-on-demand products to sell in 2024. 

Valuable read: Surprisingly Creative Merch Ideas + Examples

2. Dropshipping

If you want to start selling products online but creating product designs isn’t your cup of tea, dropshipping might be the right business idea for you. It’s a business model that involves selling products from third-party suppliers under your own brand. Similarly to the POD business model, the advantage of dropshipping is low startup costs. When a customer places an order from your store, it’s automatically sent to the product supplier, who packs and ships it to your customer. 

Source: Printful 

Your responsibility as a dropshipping business owner is developing a business strategy that involves creating a strong brand image, high-quality product images and descriptions, optimizing your website, and ensuring other effective marketing efforts. 

To start a dropshipping business: 

1. Select your niche

2. Choose your supplier/outsource fulfillment provider

3. Create your brand

4. Open an ecommerce store

5. Curate a catalog with trending products

6. Start selling

3. Social media influencing

Becoming a social media content creator is a great part-time business idea for those who like to express themselves online. Social media influencers with a noticeable following have turned their accounts into profitable revenue streams. 

Many brands use influencer marketing as one of the strategies to promote their products or services through sponsored posts. The value of the influencer marketing market is only expanding every year, making social media platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok evolve into reliable marketing channels. 

Source: @Charlidamelio’s Instagram

You can become a social media influencer and start posting on these platforms today by using just your phone. To reach your target audience and gain the following: 

• Discover your niche of content (fashion, beauty, lifestyle, fitness, etc.)

• Post authentic quality content

• Engage with your audience through captions, comments, live streams

• Monitor insights (likes, saves, accounts reached, etc.) 

• Be consistent

4. Social media management 

Social media management is a great business idea for those who know how social media works. If you don’t want to be the face of the account you can manage social media accounts for other companies. 

Today, almost any business has social media accounts as they’ve become one of the main sources for business promotion. To find your first client, a smart idea is to check in with local businesses in your area and see if they have open positions for this role. Or perhaps you know local business owners who don’t have social media accounts. Whether a nail salon, bakery, or dry cleaners, everyone can benefit from active social media accounts that help to connect with their target audience and drive sales. 

The main tasks of a social media manager include:

• Developing a strong social media strategy

• Creating engaging content materials

• Writing post captions

• Developing a posting schedule

• Managing the accounts

• Running advertisement campaigns 

• And more

Once you’ve gained working experience with different brands, remember to promote your services by creating your own business accounts or a portfolio website. 

Source: Summer Zhou

5. Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is a performance-based business model that can be combined with your full-time job. Unlike dropshipping, affiliate marketing involves selling and promoting products or services from other brands. Many companies, like Fiverr, Nordstrom, ASOS, and others, offer affiliate programs that work on a beneficial partnership model—you earn a commission on every affiliate sale.

As an affiliate, your role is to generate traffic to the company’s website through your unique affiliate link to maximize the amount of referrals that lead to sales. To do so, you can recommend the company’s products through your blog, social media accounts, or other online content. 

To become an affiliate, choose a company in an industry that’s familiar to you and carefully research the company’s affiliate program rules. To make the process easier, there are affiliate marketing networks like Rakuten Advertising that help to connect you with brands, apply to their affiliate programs, and find the best commission deals.

Looking for an affiliate program in the ecommerce niche? Learn more about Printful’s Affiliate Program.

6. Photography

People seek out photographers for various occasions like weddings, baby showers, birthdays, or engagement shoots. If you have a passion for photography turn it into a profitable business idea by capturing precious moments for other people.

A crucial part of starting a photography side business is developing an attractive portfolio with your artwork. Consider creating your own website with pictures you’ve taken, and don’t forget to promote it on your socials. 

Source: Tilly Rose Creative

7. Crafts

Selling handmade crafts can turn your hobbies and talents into your own part-time business. For example, if your talent is pottery, stop hiding your creations on your shelf and start selling them online. With ecommerce platforms like Etsy and Shopify, you can easily open up your own online store to showcase your products and process sales and payments. 

Source: Bread and Badger

When’s the best time to start selling crafts with your side business? Now! The value of the arts and crafts market is expected to reach US$ 74457.88 million by 2031. When thinking about how to price your handmade art, define your production costs and consider doing a competitor analysis to see what other people are currently paying. 

8. Freelance writing

Source: Unsplash

Freelance writing is needed by many companies that need help with creative writing. Whether blog articles, website content, or editing, these tasks can be fulfilled from the comfort of your home. 

Freelance writers can combine writing with their full-time jobs as they can choose when to dedicate their time to writing. Whether it’s working with one company or partaking in multiple creative writing projects, becoming a skilled freelance writer provides you with a profitable source of a second income that can also be turned into a flexible full-time career. 

If you have a strong passion for writing and feel like it could be put to use, explore various freelance writing positions through Upwork, Fiverr, or other job offer websites, and find projects/vacancies that best align with your interests. 

9. Virtual Assistant

Source: Unsplash 

Most of the companies that exist hire virtual assistants to help them with business-related tasks from a remote location. A virtual assistant can step up to various customer service roles, such as:

• Answering phone calls

• Replying to emails

• Managing calendar

• Assisting with orders

• Data entry

• Providing information about a product/service

• Helping customers navigate through the website 

• And more

What’s best about this role is that you can choose your own working hours and do all of the tasks from your home office. You can find available virtual assistant roles on networks like Fiverr or Upwork. However, if you don’t have previous experience in office administration or customer service, the beginning of becoming a virtual assistant can get time-consuming because you’ll need to study the industry you’ll be working in. 

10. Live streaming

In recent years, the number of platforms that offer live streaming has skyrocketed. It’s become a popular entertainment source, and anyone with a smartphone, microphone, and internet connection can do it. 

Source: Pinterest 

People livestream about various topics. Whether they’re educational or solely for entertainment purposes, it’s gone beyond just a way to pass your free time. People with different follower counts transformed their passion for live streaming into a profitable part-time business, providing them with a second source of income. 

How? Live streamers can earn money by going live on these platforms:

• Patreon. Viewers pay monthly subscriptions to access your live streams and other content. 

• Twitch. Viewers can send donations to support your live streams and content creation. 

• TikTok. Viewers can buy and send you gifts that live streamers can convert to real money. 

• YouTube. YouTube, as a platform, pays a rate for the amount of viewers on a stream. 

• And many others.

Additionally, live streamers can earn extra money from partnering with brands or using ads in their streams. However, becoming a successful live streamer doesn’t happen overnight. You’ll need to put in effort to attract viewers and create a base following that supports you. But nothing happens if you don’t start. So pick your niche, sign up for one or multiple streaming platforms, and go live. 

11. Tutoring

Tutoring is another part-time business idea you can practice along with your full-time job. If you have expertise in a particular subject, have a passion for teaching, and want to make a positive impact on some student’s life—start giving private lessons as your side business.

The global tutoring market has shown a growing trend over the recent years and is expected to be worth $62.08 billion in 2024. Whether online or offline, one-on-one or group sessions—sharing your knowledge and helping students achieve academic goals can lead you to extra income. 

Source: Pixabay

What’s best, there are multiple advantages of becoming a private tutor. For example, you’re in charge of your own schedule and lesson materials, as well as setting your own rate and managing your side business earnings. 

12. Online courses

Another clever part-time business idea that can generate side income is creating online courses. Luckily, there are no rules and you can create an online course about absolutely anything. If you have a special talent or you’re a field expert with valuable skills to share, consider this side business idea. 

Source: DOMESTIKA 

For example, if you’re a fitness coach you can develop online personal training programs to help your customers achieve their fitness goals. Or, if your hobby is painting, share your skills and knowledge about different painting styles, develop step-by-step tutorials for beginners, and more. 

But keep in mind that developing high-quality online courses can require an investment of time and resources, including researching and preparing course materials, writing content, and creating visuals. Once the online course is completed and effectively marketed, it has the potential to generate passive income with minimal ongoing effort. 

Time to get to work!

Those were just some of the profitable small business ideas you can consider diving into. If any of these examples sounded interesting to you but you don’t feel skilled enough to turn them into your side business, it’s never too late to learn the necessary skills. 

Practice makes perfect, and we believe that you have all that it takes to turn your passions into a successful business! 

Read Next: How to Make Extra Income While Working Full-Time: The Art of Balance