When you start a new business, you’re bound to make mistakes. It’s a fact of life and isn’t necessarily a bad thing, if you learn from the mistakes you make. I’m going to share with you the biggest mistake I’ve made while building my online businesses. Hopefully you will learn from my experience and not follow in my footsteps.

Actually, my biggest mistake was two-pronged. The first part was thinking that multiple streams of income meant multiple businesses. The second part was thinking I needed to start them all at the same time.

Now, before you jump on my case, let me explain a little first. Multiple streams of income CAN mean multiple businesses. In fact, in many cases, it does. But not when you are first starting out.

When I first looked into starting a business that I could grow into a full-time income for our family, I kept coming across the advice to have “multiple streams of income” and “don’t keep all your eggs in one basket.”

What I did (and you shouldn’t)

I took that to mean I should have multiple businesses, so being the overachiever that I am, that’s what I did. I started an Etsy shop with handmade leather notebooks, an Amazon FBA business, this blog, and another business that I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do with, but that eventually became a personal finance blog.

Yes, I was busy and stressed out and always behind. Worse, because I was spread so thin, none of my businesses progressed and grew as fast as they could have if I’d focused on just one of them at a time.

Now, I had reasons for starting all those businesses at once, and even six months ago I was standing by those reasons. Now, though, I’ve finally accepted that I shouldn’t have done it that way.

How I’m fixing things

While it’s taken some time to fully realize all the ramifications of my decisions, I have made some changes to correct my mistakes.

A year ago I decided to quit my Amazon FBA business. (I’ll talk about why I did, but why it might still be a good fit for you, in another post.) That decision alone lifted a huge amount of stress from my life, but I was still working on three other businesses.

Over the holidays I was at a crossroads with the personal finance blog. I wouldn’t have voluntarily shut it down if it hadn’t been forced upon me, but it’s been a good change. (TL;DR I lost everything when moving from one host to another and my files didn’t save properly. I could have tried to re-write everything, but ultimately decided not to.) I’ve been incorporating some of the info I wrote for that site into this site, which took some initial work, but now I have much less work and stress.

So now I’m down to just two businesses. It’s still a lot to handle, but I need the creative outlet of making things with my hands (I’ve learned this the hard way), so I’m not dropping my handmade notebook business. And then there’s this site, which I’m also not shutting down anytime soon.

How to do build your business right

When you’re first starting out, it’s better to focus on one thing at a time. Then, as you grow, add streams within your first business before branching out to a new business. Avoid the overwhelm, frustration, slow growth, and even burnout that comes from trying to do too much at once.

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So what does it look like to build one business with multiple streams of income?

Any business you start will have different ways you can bring in additional income. Do some research and see what others are doing and don’t be afraid to get creative! As an example, let’s look at how this would look with blogging.

You start with your website, which doesn’t bring in money by itself. So you put up ads and include affiliate links in your posts. Then you might do some sponsored posts (a company pays you to write about a topic). Next you might write an ebook or two about your topic and sell them through your website. Then you sell a course or membership to teach others about your topic.

From there, you could start a podcast or YouTube channel. You can have ads, sponsors, affiliate links in the show notes, and so on. If you haven’t already written an ebook or two, you could do that and offer it to your audience, along with your course or membership.

If your blog and podcast or YouTube channel are related (and they should be to keep your stress levels manageable), you can cross-promote. Point your readers to your podcast or YouTube channel and point your listeners or viewers to your blog.

At some point while you’re growing those, you could also add in some merchandise. Offer your audience items with your logo on them (free advertising!) using print-on-demand services or standard printers. T-shirts, hats, and so much more can be customized to advertise your business while also bringing in additional revenue. Custom stickers are an easy and inexpensive way to dip your toe into merchandising.

Print-on-demand companies will handle inventory and shipping for you while taking a larger cut of your revenue. A standard printing company will take a smaller cut of your revenue, but you will be responsible for storing inventory and shipping orders.

Starting with a print-on-demand company will allow you to gauge your audience’s interest in your products before you jump into minimum order requirements, keeping stock on hand,  and handling shipping.

Depending on your topic, you could also sell downloadable printables or other digital files.

So if you’re a visual person, that would look something like this:

• website

  • ads
  • affiliate links
  • sponsored posts
  • sell an ebook
  • sell a course or membership

• podcast or YouTube channel

  • ads
  • sponsors
  • affiliate links
  • sell an ebook
  • sell your course or membership

• merchandise

  • print-on-demand (or not) shirts, hats, stickers, etc
  • downloadable printables

Do you see all the streams of income feeding into your business? Those are what help you grow and remain profitable even when one stream dries up because the algorithm changed or Google changed something or whatever.

This is by no means all the streams of income you could have when blogging, but it should give you a good idea of what you can do to get started. Any type of business you have will have different ways that you can bring in money.

If you have a brick and mortar store (or even just sell at craft fairs and farmer’s markets), consider selling on Etsy and Amazon handmade. You could even start your own online shop using Shopify or a similar platform.

Once you feel like you have your first business running smoothly with all the processes and procedures in place, then it’s time to think about starting a second business. There are so many options for side hustles that you can use as income streams.

You could look into real estate investing, running an AirBnB, renting your RV to others, selling teacher lesson plans, selling on Amazon or eBay, or teaching others a skill you have, just to give you a few ideas.

Be patient, play to your strengths and knowledge and over time you’ll be able to successfully build multiple streams of income.

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What is the worst mistake you’ve made while building a business?