Written by: Natasha Zo, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Do you enjoy craft hobbies such as knitting, sewing, or woodworking? Have you ever thought about monetizing your hobby by turning it into a passive income stream? It may be easier than you think. Our expert is Jav Sid — a digital entrepreneur who started her business being a school girl on borrowed WiFi and reached a 6-figure income working less than 20 hours a week.
Jav Sid didn't have an easy childhood. She was born in Saudi Arabia and came from a modest background. Despite that, she attended private school and dreamt of entering Ivy League College. But life brings changes, and Jav has chosen a different, but not less challenging, way to reach her goals. Her first steps as a digital crafter were made when she learned to design digital sewing patterns all by herself. Eventually, selling those patterns on her blog led to a subtle but consistent income stream.
Being a self-made crafter, Jav experienced a lack of professional knowledge, so enrolling in an online blogging course was one of the best decisions of her life. With some professional help, Jav could develop her sewing blog to make significantly more money right away.
Jav's experience and business intuition allowed her to catch the moment and redirect the effort to selling SVG files for cutting machines. In fact, it was her Cricut blog and SVG shop that made this remarkable lady rich. Jav Sid says: "If I could do it back then, anyone can do it," — and helps crafters to become wealthy and free.
Here are her top tips on how to turn your craft hobby into a source of passive income.
Take inventory of your time
Before you start, assessing how much time you have daily to devote to your craft business is crucial. This will help prevent you from taking on too much and burning out later. As busy crafters, it can be easy to add more and more tasks to your to-do list without realizing how quickly time is flying by.
Whether you are a busy mom, student, or working professional, it is important to oversee your time to make the most of your business. Setting realistic goals and prioritizing your tasks can ensure you don't get overwhelmed or distracted from what's really important. With careful planning and self-discipline, you can succeed as a busy crafter while maintaining a healthy work-life balance.
Find out what's in demand
In order to run a successful craft business, it is essential to do market research and determine what products are most in demand. This will help you identify gaps in the market that you can fill with your own creative and high-quality products. Whether launching a brand new business or looking to develop an existing one, staying up-to-date on current market trends and consumer needs is key to success.
So spend some time carefully researching current trends so that you can give people exactly what they need and want. Then, with the proper market knowledge, you can create products that truly meet the demands of your customers and build a thriving craft business that generates income and satisfies your audience.
Learn the skills you need to succeed
Once you have found where you want to stand and what you want to do, it's time to master the skills required to create professional-quality digital products that will lead to high demand and lucrative opportunities. This can be done by finding an expert in the field and learning from them so that you can avoid common mistakes and move forward with confidence.
Whether you are interested in a specific niche or in creating high-quality digital products that will lead to success, an expert can teach you the strategies and techniques you need to master. It can be a blog, a coach, a mastermind group, or an online course – find someone with the skills you need and learn from them to create amazing products that will set you up and capture the hearts and thoughts of your audience.
Double down on SEO
What is a value of a perfect product if no one can find it? Proper SEO is crucial for driving traffic to your site and getting customers to discover your offers. Whether you're just setting up your shop or have been running it for a while, be sure to focus on strong SEO practices that can help you stand out from the clamorous crowd.
This involves adapting your site with the right keywords and incorporating other best practices, like using relevant meta tags and creating quality content optimized for search engines. Do not be scared of tech words — it isn't that bad in practice — with the right roadmap, time, and effort, you can build strong SEO into your store, driving more visitors and increasing sales over the long term.
Don't forget social media
Once your shop is up and running, it's crucial to use social media's power to increase your store's traffic. You need to bring in as many people as possible. Whether you're posting on Instagram, collaborating with popular accounts on TikTok, or sharing your creations on other platforms, there are many ways to get your shop in front of a large and engaged audience. Use people's curiosity to your advantage by finding ways to show them the process behind what you do, which will, in turn, bring more traffic to your site.
With some careful planning and effective use of social media, you can build an involved following that will help grow your craft business and make sales. So start focusing on creating great content, engaging with your audience regularly, and leveraging the power of social media to drive traffic and build a thriving business.
The right mindset and approach make everything possible. So read up on these tips from Jav Sid and try them out for yourself – you never know what magic may come from it!
Natasha Zo, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Natasha Zo is a former journalist from Siberia turned international media relations specialist. She is a founder of Cosa Famosa media – a boutique PR agency on a mission to amplify messages of conscious leaders, health, and wellness entrepreneurs through earned media. Known for her connector skills, she guided a number of authors to Amazon bestseller status, booked national TV, top-tier media, and over 400 podcast interviews.
