Interview with Amol Chavan, A Side Hustler Making Decent Money After Leaving High Paying Job [S-8]

Hello Awesome Bloggers, I hope you are enjoying the interview series and getting the knowledge and tips to grow your blog or business. Till now you have seen the interview of a blogger who is on Blogging Niche.

But In today’s post Interview with Amol Chavan, I have invited a blogger from a different niche. He is a side hustler and teaches people to start their online business. Here you will learn how to start and get the benefit of a side business while doing a full-time job.

I have started this series to learn the best and proven tips and strategies to improve our blog performance. So, today’s guest is Amol Chavan and here, he is going to share their experience and tips to start your side hustle and live like a boss.

Everyone has a dream to make massive money by starting a blog or any kind of online business. But due to a lack of knowledge and not getting perfect guidance, they faced failure in their online business.

But am quite sure that after reading Interview with Amol Chavan you will get your solution. Here Amol Chavan has shared many proven and valuable tips to start an online business and build a strong base while working 9 to 5 jobs. 

So, without wasting any time let’s start Interview with Amol Chavan and see their opinion-

Interview with Amol Chavan: Founder of GrowthFunda.com

You will know more about Amol Chavan and his profession in his words. But before we start this interview let me tell you something about him.

Amol Chavan is a popular side hustler and works on GrowthFunda.com. On completion of his Study, he started a job which is high paying of 80k per month. But he is not satisfied with the working environment and he wanted to live like a boss, so he left that job. 

After leaving the job, he tried many online businesses like Flipkart seller, export-import, real estate, etc. but he did not get any success in it. Although he lost a huge amount of money in the above business, he learned many skills from their failure.

So, he decided to Create a platform where he can share their experience and skill to help people who want to start a side hustle/ online business to live like a boss. 

So, let’s move ahead and see an interview with Amol Chavan where you will find the tips and Ideas to start a side hustle business and get success in this.

1. Hello Sir, first of all, welcome to my blog, can you please tell me a few words about yourself and when you started your online journey?

Thank you, Archana, I am glad to share my interview with your readers.

My name is Amol Chavan, founder of Growthfunda a Side Hustle Blog that helps folks to start a side hustle and take new steps towards freedom.

I am living in Pune, Maharashtra – India. I am a Software engineer by profession and a blogger, and internet entrepreneur by passion. Actually, my side hustle journey started in 2015 while working full-time in the IT industry. 

Over the years of working in the IT industry, I have experienced so many ups & downs, high work pressure, monotonous life. This scenario started changing my view of looking towards jobs and the Industry. Therefore, I started figuring out what I can do apart from my Job. 

I wasted my time finding ideas for work, reading, learning, attending business seminars, and all that. 

Later subsequently, I failed in the four business attempts and lost money but still, my burning desire to do something along with my job did not vanish. In 2017 Dec, I got to know about the Online Industry and then I never looked back.

To cut a long story short, I failed in four businesses while working in a full-time job, and later in the Year 2018 Jan, I launched my first blog Growthfunda.com. 

The aim of this blog is to familiarize busy working professionals and all others with side hustles along with the job. The Growthfunda creates content on Side Hustles, Online Business, and Be Your Own Boss.

That is all about my journey.

2. As we all know that your Niche is not Blogging. But can you tell us Why have you chosen this Niche and what is the Scope available?

I picked up a different Niche as a ‘Side Hustle’ because:

• Nowadays I can see that 90% of blogs are around the same saturated niches like Blogging, Make Money Online, and Technology.
• I wanted to create awareness about what are the opportunities available apart from Jobs to make a living out of it.
• I can see major working folks running in the Rat Race and feeling stagnant in their careers. Therefore, they are looking for a way to Side Hustle along with their current work.

So, considering all the above, I thought to share my knowledge and add value.

About the scope, see all niches are good with a huge scope in this Digital world, it is just how to scale and provide value to others.

This niche is Global and the majority of the blogs in this niche are from countries like the US and UK. In India, due to the current Covid-19 scenario folks have realized not to depend on the Job hence nowadays everyone is looking for extra Side Hustle opportunities.

Therefore, I can say the scope is huge in the upcoming days.

3. Any start-up is filled with challenges, what are the problems you have faced at the beginning and how did you get rid of them?

Initially, in 2017, I did not know anything about how to start Blogging. To learn, I watched so many YouTube Videos on how to design Blogging Websites. 

Another challenge, initially I have not spent money on premium tools, & due to that, I wasted almost 9 months finalizing my blogging website design, trying and learning CSS coding, etc.

However, after learning from pro bloggers, I realized initially it is so important to launch than investing time in the look and feel.

Therefore, without wasting time, I launched my first blog Growthfunda in Jan 2018.

However, I faced the next challenge of choosing a niche.

For the first year, I was not sure about my niche. At that time, I was writing on any random topic related to business, growth, saving money, etc. So later, I figured out about my blogging niche i.e. Side Hustle.

Post this; one more challenge was to find more time for blogging and other online business while doing a full-time job. To overcome this, I changed my schedule & now I am focusing only on one thing at a time.

4. Everyone has some inspiration, what is yours and why? Which Are Your Most Favorite Blogs in Your Industry and Why?

My inspiration is all the folks who are Hustling and Hustling already to live a FREEDOM lifestyle. Actually, the list is very huge but here are a few of my inspirations

E.g., Pro Bloggers like Ankit Singla, Digital Deepak, Sumit Bansal, etc.

In addition, my friends like Santosh (BloggingCosmos), Sumit Sao (BloggingLift), Shantanu (BloggingJoy), Chayan (SimpleFactOnline), and all emerging bloggers who are nailing digital space.

My favorite blogs in my industry are SideHustleNation and SideHustleSchool.

5. If anyone wants to start a website on your Niche then what they should keep in Mind. Give us some pro tips from your experience?

Rather than giving pro tips for my niche, I would love to give pro tips, which are applicable to all the niches, so here are those:

1. Initially, do not invest too much Time and Money in the Website’s look and feel. Getting started and publishing is more important.
2. Before launching the website, finalize the Blogging Niche. Do not write on multiple topics. It would be great if you could even pick a micro niche. Some of the best niches to work in are Health, Technology, Blogging, Making Money Online, Finance, investing, etc.
3. Network with your blogger’s friends to grow fast.
4. Do competitors analysis to grab the Blog post ideas.
5. Create a SILO structure and group the blog post accordingly. This boost to SEO gives you more authority and eventually traffic.
6. Focus on one thing at a time.

6. As we all know, time management is very essential for any Task, can you tell me how you manage time to run your website efficiently?

I am a part-time Side Hustle Blogger, so here is how I manage my time: –

• I try to start the day early, around 6 am.
• Post that straight I head to the blogging activity & morning rituals.
• After that, I start my office work around 10 am and work until 7 pm.
• Later in the night, I try to spend 1-2 hrs. on the Side Hustles activities.
• Over the weekend, I focus on Content writing, Promotion, and experimenting with new Side Hustles opportunities.

This is how I manage my time.

7. Would you like to share some Experiences and Tips to get success faster in Online Business?

• Do not focus on multiple things at the beginning. Work on one Online Business Idea, scale it, and then start a new one.
• Leverage the power of social media and do the Influencer’s marketing, and roundups within your online business niche.
• Do not run behind quick money-making Online Business ideas. 99% of those are the SCAM and you will end up wasting your time.
• Collaborate with Brands, Marketers, and Bloggers to grow fast.
• As Video consumption is growing day by day, add a Video content strategy to reach a bigger audience. Facebook Lives, Videos, and YouTube are the best ways to do Video Marketing.
• Invest in Learning and sharpen your skills.

8. What are the best strategies and tools you are employing to improve your Growth and to make your work Easy?

• WPX Hosting – One of the best and Blazing fast Hosting plans available at an affordable price.
• GeneratePress Premium – #1 Selling Lightweight and SEO Optimize for fast-loading WordPress Theme.
• PublerPromo Republic for Social Media Management (Or any other free tool is also fine initially)
• Plutio to manage the entire Online Business. Plutio is best for all freelancers, agency owners, bloggers, marketers, and all. It helps in managing the To Do list, Client Contracting, Team management, Invoicing, Communication, and many more things.
• Trello to manage the To Do list.
• Elementor Pro- Lightweight Page Builder which is Compatible with any WordPress Theme. 
• ActiveCampaign, and MailerLite to grow email lists.

9. In your opinion what is the Best (1) 9 to 5 Job (2) Online Business or Side Hustle business is more Effective?

Both have some pros and cons.

As per my experience, Online Business is better than traditional jobs as you grow faster and get many more growth opportunities.

The initial phase of any Business is difficult but once you scale then you need not have to look back.

Online business Side Hustle gives you FREEDOM to work from anywhere so you can spend more time on the things which you love.

Therefore, I would suggest getting stagnant in a 9-5 job, working parallelly on the Side Hustle ideas, and growing it.

10. I hope you are doing well and making massive money. Can you share some proven tips to increase growth and share some earning proof to motivate us?

I am not a Money focused person when it comes to blogging. And I think money should not be a motivational factor but what value you provide to others and what success they get from it that’s what matters more.

Proven tips:

• Focus on recurring revenue.
• Do not depend only on one source of income.
• Build community.

11. What is the best way to grow online business and drive organic traffic on the new side hustle business? What are some best ways to promote it?

The best way to grow Online Business is

• Networking
• Social Media
• Community
• Content Marketing

The majority of the folks are focusing too much on SEO but as all know, SEO is a long-term game. 

In addition, in Online Business if you are waiting for SEO success then your competitors will steal business opportunities. Therefore, along with SEO, I suggest focusing on the ways mentioned above will help in the long run.

12. Which is the best way to increase Authority and create backlinks as well as build a Genuine Audience/ Email List for new business?

To build authority, focus on one Niche & consistently provide value to the audience. Your social media presence, products, and website designs also add up to the authority.

Talking about the backlinks, I think one should not run behind creating backlinks but rather focus on how to get natural backlinks. These days Google gives more importance to topical authority than backlinks.

However, yes, you should focus on getting backlinks from big authority sites that will boost your website authority.

Email lists can be built by sharing freebies like eBooks, checklists, Guides, Webinars, and Courses. There are many lead magnet formats that you should try to grow your email list. 

Another pro tip to grow email lists is to do expert roundups and collaboration.

13. What are the main sources of your income and what is the secret behind your success?

• Affiliate Marketing
• Display Ads
• My salary

Continuous hustling is my secret to success.

14. What is your biggest Failure in your hustle business and What you have learned from it?

My biggest side hustle failure is offline Real Estate hustle. I lost time and huge amounts of money in it.

However, that failure helped me to learn 

• Human behavior.
• Offline marketing.
• What actual real estate businesses run. (From Sales & Marketing perspective)
• Digital marketing.

15. What have you set the goals for 2023 and what new things are you going to start in 2023?

The goal that I planned for 2020:

• Focus on networking: Ongoing
• Launch Info Products: I launched an eBook and launched a premium course: Side Hustle Beta.
• Provide as much as value to the audience: Ongoing, via social media, My Facebook Group, and Email list.
• Keep adding quality content: Ongoing
• Scale blog: Ongoing 

For 2023, I have yet to set the goals.

16. Any Guru Tips for BloggingTry Audience to improve their Online Business and performance of their website?

ProTips: 

• Networking
• Do not focus on multiple things at the same time.
• Do not depend on only the source of income and website traffic.
• Do Guest Blogging on Authority sites than multiple small websites.
• Grow social media following.
• Invest time and money in learning Copywriting.

17. Any Suggestions for my blog to Improve Performance and drive organic Traffic?

• Host Websites on the best Web Hosting providers like A2Hosting, and Nexcess.
• Do not install too many plugins.
• Keep the Website clean.
• Implement SILO structure and SEO.
• In addition, Guest blog on high authority sites.

Now Your Turn

So, friends, that is all in the interview with Amol Chavan. I am quite sure that you have enjoyed and learned many new things to kick-start your online business. If you want to learn more about side hustle then you must follow GrowthFund.com.

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 Kindly show some positive responses and write your questions and feedback in the comment box to push me to do better. 

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