Make Your Website a Business, Not a Hobby

When you look at starting a new website, are you planning on treating it like a business or like a hobby? Let’s look at some of the differences and see what is the better way to do it.

A hobby is something that you do in your spare time.
A business is something that you work at with a specific goal in mind, usually financial, that you are trying to achieve.

A hobby is something that costs money, not necessarily something that makes you money.
A business is intended to make you money.

You can put off working on a hobby and it doesn’t really matter, you’ll get it done eventually.
A business is something to be worked on daily so you can reach your goals.

I could probably keep going with these comparisons, but I hope you’re getting the idea of what I’m trying to say.

Each week I work with a lot of people that are trying to set up an online business. In the end though, its up to them if they are going to turn it into an actual business or not, but I recommend to all of them in our conversations to take their website seriously and give it the time and attention that it deserves.

One of the key differences between treating your website like a business or a hobby is the concept that a hobby costs you money but a business makes you money. When was the last time you made money from doing hobbies such as building a model plane, working out, or fishing? Yes you can make money doing these things, but that’s the difference between treating it like a business/profession or a hobby. Its the mindset and the approach to getting better and becoming a pro versus doing it for fun.

Let’s talk about a few things you could be doing to treat your website more like a business and less like a hobby (even if you’re doing it unintentionally):

Planning and Goal Setting

Do you have goals for your business? Not outlandish, “I’m going to make a million dollars my first year goals”, but realistic, progressive goals like how soon your site is going to be up and how often you are going to be doing marketing activities. You should also set realistic financial goals. Once your goals are set you should work hard to make those things happen. As far as I’m aware, there isn’t an ‘Easy Button’ for a website that will automatically bring the money rolling in. Its going to take work and its going to take some planning for it to happen.

Working Your Plan

You should be trying to do something to move your site forward about every day. (Personally I take the weekends off, but that’s what is planned into my plan) What happens if you don’t go to work at your job several days a week? Well, given enough time you’ll probably be fired. Don’t mentally fire yourself from your business. Work it seriously and you’re more likely to get good results. Try to do something every day (or at least every weekday) to move your business forward.

Find Answers to Your Questions

Too many people give up when they get lost and don’t immediately find an answer to their question. This is more of a hobby mentality than a business mentality. In a business or in your job, when you have a question you do what you have to in order to find the answer. This can be doing your own research or asking other people more experienced for more information. Don’t be afraid to ask for help!

To sum up what I’m trying to say here, take your website business seriously. It may not have all of the standard features of what you might think of as a business like a physical location, specific work hours, etc. That’s one of the reasons why its great - there is a lot of flexibility. But that’s also one of the reasons why a lot of people can have a hard time making it online. They don’t bother to set up a real structure for themselves and treat it like a business. Don’t become one of those people. Take control and keep taking action.

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