$10K Challenge: Joining Free Money Finance's Hunt for Side Income

I thought about writing about how the world of child stars (modeling & dancing) has knocked at my door with promises of large contracts for my children's childhood. (No deal! Child stars like Britney Spears and others scare me.) It would have been an entertaining post, but totally TMI (too much info).

Instead, I read Free Money Finance's post about hunting for an additional $10,000 in side income and I found my topic. His post is excellent, with a fixed number and a concrete plan.

Building a larger emergency fund has been on my mind this week and I've written a few posts on the subject. But my plans have lacked two things: 1) a specific number and 2) a definitive strategy.

Free Money Finance, on the other hand, crunches the numbers and calculates how many articles @ $400 each he has to write to hit his target. His post also includes links to other helpful and insight articles.

I think a goal becomes more real if you name the target. To say I want to enhance my three to six-month emergency fund lacks the emotional authority of this statement:

I want to add $10,000 to my emergency fund over the next 12 months.

In Winning by Jack Welch (with Suzy Welch), the Former CEO of GE, makes that same point about goal-setting. Spend time, Welch says, setting real-time, real-money goals.

Therefore, I will join Free Money Finance's $10K challenge with the following plan:

1) I will learn how to drive and turn my efforts into a story that I will sell to a national women's magazine. (One has already approached me. The catch: I have to drive first.) My sale Target: $500 to $2,000. I will also try to work on more magazine assignments.

2. I will broker my content through a national chain of family-friendly print magazines. They pay --I recall--less than $40 per story, but the chain accepts recycled material. It's a self-syndication plan. If only 10 magazines from that large chain pick up one of my stories, that's a few hundred dollars with minimal effort on my part.

I will find the link to that site and post it within a week. I'm annoyed with myself for losing the info.

3. Package myself as a speaker? I could register at one of the national speaking bureaus. Featured speakers at conventions and other corporate gatherings make a few grand per appearance. Maybe I can earn a few hundred by talking to smaller groups.

So that's my list. Thanks to Free Money Finance for creating the challenge.
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