How side Web Projects help in money & sense of direction with Jason Vance – SWC 25
February 25, 2019 February 25, 2019 /
Side web projects are very important to keep the creative interest intact while doing the online work. These can be very helpful in adding more money to your business and even refine the future work direction.
Jason Vance shares his amazing journey of numerous side projects in the online world. Besides the much needed creative satisfaction, how these have resulted in money, refined ideas and fruitful partnerships.
01. Starting side projects
- I am going to quote you here “technically, my business is a side project”. What is your backstory behind the “story of side projects” getting bigger and bigger in your work life?
- Side projects are fun but this can be actually fun when you have base income coming from some other source. Like in your case being a pastor. Is it right to assume for a beginner, side projects can wait till you have base income sorted?
- Which different type of side projects have you started in the last few years?
02. Figuring out Money Making
- Do you plan about the money aspect on how a new side project will generate money down the line or is it an afterthought?
- What about setting up a minimum or maximum limit for investment in side projects?
03. Side Projects & Overall Goals
- Do you match specific side web project with your overall business and professional goals or are mostly for fun and involve a random type of work routines? For example, the majority of my side projects are related to web tools, education, and content creation.
- What about partnering with someone to execute a specific side web project? I did one side project with a partner and it turned out really well.
04. Managing side projects
- Side projects is an outcome of our creative outburst. If it was humanly possible, I would create a new side project every week? So, how is many side projects is too many for you?
- What about the allocation of time between various side projects?
05. Ending side projects
- There are projects that are past their prime. How do you identify their dying stage and time to close a side project and move on to something new?
- Do you actually close website in the case of web side projects or let it die slowly by itself?
06. Measuring Success
- How do you measure the success of a side project besides of course the money it has generated over a period of time?
- Has any side project become the main project for you over a period of time?
07. Promoting your new thing
- Besides creating a side project, how do you plan for the project promotion and getting fresh eyeballs in the beginning?
- Do you leverage your existing projects to market your new side projects? I do that very often, build your tribe and share your new thing with them.
Jason Vance’s ToolBox
- Trello to stay organized with various things in the business.
- Using Beaver Builder for layouts for a long time, also got Elementor.
- Love using paper journals to keep track of a lot of stuff.
- Use Cloudways Web Hosting for all side project websites.
- For all email marketing requiements, use Mailchimp service.
About Jason Vance
I love side projects. Technically my business is a side project. I used to be a pastor at a small church and that’s where I learned to design and web site development.
During my job, people would ask me for logos, business cards, websites, and videos. This helped me learn and also make some money. During that time I made a lot of videos, clothing and a 24/hr a day internet radio station.
It was doing those side projects that made me realize I loved to create and needed a career change. In 2004 my wife got pregnant and so we moved cities to have a family and that’s when I went full time. My wife and 12 months of maternity leave and I had to build my business in that time-frame, well I did and have been doing it full time since.
But what I really love is creating and doing side projects lets me do that. I’ve started clothing companies, media sites, event sites, done live events, other digital agencies. I’ve given my business away 3 times, which they all came back to me.
More: Agency website / Personal website
