People in big companies have side jobs, and the end is to leave the blogger?

In this era where everyone is a self-media, young people working in large companies as side jobs and resigning bloggers have become the most crowded self-media track in 2024.

9 out of 10 people working in large companies want to have a side job. Now, these young people working in large companies with side jobs are flocking to their own apps.

Amy has been in charge of operations at ByteDance for five years. Her main job every day is to teach merchants how to shoot videos to sell goods. In August last year, she wanted to explore a side business and opened a Douyin account, hoping to use the skills she learned in a large company to sell goods.

But Amy soon realized the gap between theory and practice. When operating projects in large companies, most of them were assisted by the platform's traffic promotion. Now it was her turn to operate the project herself. The theoretical traffic logic of "starting an account in 7 days and selling out in minutes" began to fail. Even if she invested four or five hours a day in her side job, she still did not do well.

At the same time, resigned bloggers have become the most crowded self-media track in 2024. Among the resigned bloggers who gather on Xiaohongshu, there are also Xiaohongshu’s own employees.

Upload a photo with the "Little Red Book" logo at the office door, mark the coordinates of "SOHO Fuxing Plaza, 388 Madang Road, Shanghai" (Little Red Book headquarters), and add the title "I resigned from Little Red Book" and the text of my past resume... Evan has finally stepped into the track of resigned bloggers.

Due to the company's business adjustments, Evan's current work is contrary to his long-term plan, and this situation has lasted for half a year. One of the reasons why Evan decided to resign was because of his side business that he had been working on for three years.

"The income from my side job exceeds ten thousand yuan, which can cover the expenses during the transition period." Compared to running his side business in a "secret" manner when he was still working, now that he has resigned, he not only openly reveals his identity, but also adds two new paid services to his side business in addition to "job hunting tips": "operational guidance" and "workplace tips".

Internet social platforms are flooded with resignation posts

Source: Screenshot of Alphabet List

Employees of large companies used to be very successful and were the representatives of high salaries. Although they had to work overtime, they had the advantage of holding stocks. Once they cashed in, school district housing and luxury cars were no longer a dream. However, in recent years, the stock prices of large companies have been halved or hit bottom, the promotion channels have been narrowing, cliff-like layoffs have become common, and the 35-year-old "graduation red line" is gradually approaching.

Diversifying their income structure has become the only option for people working in large companies to deal with career crises. More and more people working in large companies are starting side jobs.

Unlike ordinary people, young people in large companies use a mind map in their left hand to analyze and lock in their side business projects, and an OKR table in their right hand to manage goals and results. They also have to calculate ROI (return on investment) from time to time to correct the direction of their side business.

Therefore, they develop workplace services based on their personal work experience, rely on large company platforms to integrate resources and develop community services, sell goods through live streaming based on their understanding of the traffic distribution logic of live streaming and short videos, outsource their personal skills to take on projects, and monetize their personal hobbies to become self-media bloggers... People working in large Internet companies have developed a variety of side jobs.

Communities such as Xiaohongshu, Xianyu, Douyin, Zhihu, Bilibili and Douban have been targeted one by one by people from big companies who are involved in "sideline businesses". The understanding of their own Internet products, or the familiarity with the general logic of Internet products, together constitute one of the confidence of big companies in opening up the sideline track, and they hope to use this to unlock the traffic code.

In order to enrich the content, platforms have also opened their arms to embrace young people with side jobs. In an era where everyone is a self-media, not only Xiaohongshu and Douyin have become new battlefields for young people to make money from side jobs. Recently, Xianyu also launched the "Xianyu Resume" function, which allows users to display their personal idle time, hobbies, experience and skills, and commercialize their skills by publishing side job products.

However, as people have become demystified by the big Internet companies, the side jobs of young people working in the big companies have also become less easy.

01

Young people in big companies who do side jobs often feel like they are "stealing". After all, no one wants to be interviewed by the company's HR.

From the moment she decided to start a side business, Amy's top priority was not how to quickly cash in, but how to avoid being discovered by the company. "In fact, most of my colleagues have side businesses, but they are basically carried out in secret because the contract stipulates that no other businesses can be developed. In particular, the more relevant it is to the main business, the better the confidentiality work will be done."

Amy, who uses her own business advantages to teach merchants how to shoot videos to sell goods every day, quickly locked in the Douyin account positioning of "special effects without showing the face of the plot account". "As long as the account is established, I can help other merchants sell goods and collect commissions."

Even though she doesn't get home until 10pm after get off work, Amy still takes three or four hours to work on her side business, and it's normal for her to go to bed at one or two in the morning. Because of her sharp-tongued personality, Amy set the plot scenes in the daily life of her roommates, using special effects to change her face and play multiple roles.

“This is definitely not the fastest way to create an account, but it is the best way to avoid being discovered by the company.” Amy is full of confidence in account operation. After all, she teaches merchants how to create and operate accounts every day. She understands the logic of platform operation better than the average person. Having a side job is nothing more than putting theory into practice.

Once upon a time, Evan, like Amy, was working on a side job that required the halo of a big company - "resume optimization and interview coaching", while at the same time being secretive about his identity on social platforms.

There are many posts on Xiaohongshu about resume modification

Source: Screenshot of Alphabet List

In his profile on Xiaohongshu, Evan listed his work experience at several Internet giants, how many teams he had led, and how extensive his resources and connections were. But he avoided talking about his current company.

During the consultation process, some people asked Evan to show his work badge right away, but he rejected them all. Evan's solution to the user's doubts was to have a 10-minute free discussion first, and then proceed to the paid consultation if the other party recognized his professional ability.

However, recently, he, who has already resigned, has appeared generously in his account, which has suddenly attracted many colleagues and acquaintances. Of course, Evan did this more to attract merchants and pave the way for the monetization of his own operation courses.

Although he has experience and resources, Evan is well aware that he is not unique or scarce, and there are many bloggers who are engaged in "resume optimization and interview coaching". However, he has been hiding his side business because of his status as an employee.

Compared with charging consulting fees from job applicants, charging business operating fees is obviously a more cost-effective deal. But Evan knows that such a business is more dependent on the creation of personal IP. After half a year of business adjustments, Evan finally decided to quit his job to do what he likes, and also wanted to try whether his side job could become a startup.

Compared to Amy and Evan, Wang Xinran, who does tarot card reading as a side job, is less concerned about her status as an employee of a large company. "Many of my colleagues know that I can read tarot cards, and they even encouraged me to do this as a side job." Wang Xinran has liked tarot cards since junior high school. When she was in school, she helped her friends with tarot readings, and after she started working, she helped her colleagues with tarot readings. People who are familiar with her basically know her skills in tarot readings.

Because reading tarot cards is time-consuming and laborious, colleagues would usually treat her to coffee or a meal to express their gratitude, and they would recommend Wang Xinran to their friends because they thought she was accurate. It was under such a coincidence that she began to develop her own fortune-telling sideline, charging 200 to 600 yuan per reading, and if a resolution was needed, there would be an additional charge.

Because of his interest and the ability to increase extra income, Wang Xinran started to run his own Xiaohongshu account in 2022. After successfully predicting the promoted contestants of talent shows several times, he accumulated the first batch of fans and started counting cards online. "From finding the card array, counting the cards, opening the cards, and then answering the cards, it takes about an hour to count once." If calculated by ROI, Wang Xinran's hourly wage from his side job is far less than his main job, and he doesn't even earn as much as working overtime in the office.

02

The more turbulent the environment, the more prosperous the sideline business. Under the pressure of internal competition, layoffs and the "35 red line", young people in large companies either use sideline businesses to increase passive income in case of emergency, or use sideline businesses as a "stone" to test the waters. But for people in large companies who rely on skills and resources to monetize, almost every conceivable sideline track is crowded with peers.

Evan is deeply touched by this. As early as 2021, Evan started a side job of "resume optimization and interview coaching" with the halo of a big company employee. At the highest point, his monthly income was close to 20,000 yuan, not including the rewards given by the company after successful internal referrals.

Over the past decade, the Internet industry has expanded rapidly, and the demand for talent has also increased. The new product of internal promotion in large companies has also been turned into a business by people in large companies.

Having worked in many large companies, Evan has accumulated a wealth of interview experience, HR resources, and peer connections. In order to develop this sideline, Evan hangs out in various school forums while managing his own Xiaohongshu account. At the same time, Evan often invites HR friends and colleagues from large companies to dinner to understand current recruitment needs and accumulate internal referral opportunities.

In terms of fees, Evan also makes money from both ends. He does not charge for internal referrals separately, nor does he promise that the job will be hired. However, Evan can help job seekers with career planning, interview coaching, and even modify resumes according to different positions according to the needs of large companies to increase the success rate of internal referral interviews. The fees for this part range from 100 to 1,000 yuan, and the charging standard is determined by the time and energy invested.

At that time, the internal referral rewards in Evan's company ranged from 5,000 yuan to 20,000 yuan. That year, Evan received a reward of nearly 50,000 yuan through internal referrals.

But now, almost every Internet company is laying off employees, locking HC (suspending recruitment plans) or reducing recruitment, and it is almost impossible to make money through internal referrals. At the same time, Evan also felt that more and more people are doing job search consulting business, and the prices are getting lower and lower. "In 2021, I charged more than 1,000 yuan for consulting fees, but now the same type of consulting fees range from tens to hundreds of yuan. Basically no one will pay for the high price."

Compared with his previous side job income of over 10,000 yuan, Evan's side job income before leaving his job was only half of his previous income. "This is still based on the reputation accumulated before. Many of the paid consultations are regular customers. Recently, a colleague came to me for advice and said that he only made 300 yuan a month."

Amy, who only started to develop a side business in August last year, also felt the difficulty of monetization. Although there were successful practical cases in the past, they were all platform-based projects, so they could easily obtain the platform's traffic tilt.

When she independently operated her own live streaming account, various problems came one after another, and Amy began to constantly question her ability. Amy was a small leader in the company, and her career development had been relatively smooth, but now at the age of 32, she is facing the approaching "35 red line" and has to think about the cost-effectiveness and sustainability of this path of working.

"Will I still be able to make money independently if I leave the platform?" Amy has been thinking about this question since she turned 30, but she has been wavering on the answer.

Therefore, the side job became her "stone" to test the waters. But the feedback now makes her retreat even more. One year has passed, and the number of followers of the account has just exceeded 1,000, and it still has no monetization ability. Not only did Amy not make any money, she also spent more than 3,000 yuan on investment.

Wang Xinran's metaphysics sideline also has off-peak seasons, and orders increase during the job-hunting season. "Can I get an offer from a big company in the near future?" "What should I pay attention to during an interview at a big company?" "Should I change jobs?" "How was the interview result?" ... Even "Should I go to the company where I successfully interviewed?" and the year-end bonus coefficient are all popular orders during the job-hunting season.

During the peak season, Wang Xinran would work until 1 or 2 in the morning to take orders after get off work, and his income easily exceeded 10,000 yuan, while his income during the off-season would be one-third less. "Although this side job is not cost-effective, just as metaphysics is regarded as a spiritual pillar by young people, for me, helping them read tarot cards and answering their questions is also a way to relax."

03

Young people who love to make money have long regarded side jobs as a "must have". The "2023 Young People's Side Job Report" released by Houlang Research Institute shows that 45% of young people have done side jobs, and more than 50% of young people have the idea of ​​doing side jobs.

In the Douban group "A Day When Side Jobs Failed", nearly 280,000 people are discussing their experiences and thoughts on side jobs. Among them, being a self-media person has become the most popular side job choice for young people. Some young people have also monetized their skills in video editing, design and translation. Interests such as tarot card testing and manicure have also become online part-time jobs for young people to take advantage of the Internet.

As more people flock to the sideline, anxiety about sideline jobs is also coming. In a survey by the Houlang Research Institute, 15.4% of young people did not make money from their sideline jobs, nearly 70% of young people had a monthly income of less than 3,000 yuan from their sideline jobs, and only 12.6% of young people had a monthly income of more than 10,000 yuan from their sideline jobs.

Because they have access to more industry information and resources, young people working in large companies once thought they had the "wealth code" for side jobs. However, when they personally got involved, most people were greeted with not flowers and applause, but more likely reefs and setbacks.

Amy leads a team in the company to teach merchants how to create accounts and receives frequent successes every day. However, when it comes to her side business, it is difficult to increase the number of followers for a small account and there is no prospect of monetization. Amy constantly questions her own abilities and examines her true value after leaving the platform's empowerment.

In the company's evaluation system, Amy's abilities are recognized. Although she is trapped in a cycle of "new projects, strategy, and performance" with her team every day, Amy is satisfied with her management ability, strategic operation ability, and business insight, but these still cannot offset her concerns about future uncertainties.

In her experience with the side job, Amy's worries were magnified again. "It goes without saying that the daily work is stressful and involuntarily involuted, but repeating the same thing every day makes me feel that my growth in the past two years has stagnated." Before trying the side job, Amy even thought about quitting her job to start her own business, but the tepid side job now poured cold water on her.

Now, Amy has begun to look for "real problems" in her repetitive main job. She no longer outputs methodologies from a high position, but is more down-to-earth about the problems encountered by merchants and shop assistants in the process of account operation, and provides targeted solutions. The sideline account just happened to become Amy's test field, allowing her to truly transform the platform's empowerment into her own ability.

Unlike Amy's anxiety, Evan's side business even gave him the courage to quit because he had entered the market early and had reaped the benefits of the side business. Seeing that the side business track was becoming more and more competitive, more and more bloggers who had resigned from their jobs also rushed in to grab a share of the pie. While Evan was actively involved in the market to take advantage of the traffic of bloggers who had resigned from their jobs, he summarized his three years of experience in side business and launched relevant courses to teach bloggers who had resigned from their jobs how to do side business, enriching his own product line and making full use of the closed-loop habits of people in large companies.

In addition, after leaving his job, Evan started to build his personal IP and compiled his many years of content operation experience into courses. "Although the sideline income from resume services has decreased, there are many businesses and individuals who need account content operation coaching." In a previous note, Evan revealed that he had many years of account content operation experience. Therefore, in addition to workplace consultation, some businesses have also asked Evan to help them with account diagnosis, etc.

This is also what Evan has been doing and what he likes to do. Therefore, in the face of the company's business adjustments, Evan decided to resign and go all in on his side business. In addition to the workplace consulting section, he added account diagnosis and operation guidance and started his own business using the skills he learned in a large company.

"With the previous accumulation, I am not worried about monetization. When more successful cases are incubated, the product pricing can be raised." Currently, Evan's monthly income from his side job is just over 10,000 yuan, but it is enough to cover his daily expenses. "If it doesn't work out, I will apply for another job in my favorite field and continue to work." Evan is not worried about the gap during this period of time at Gap. In his opinion, the successful accounts he guided during his side job are the best cases in his resume.

The more uncertain the times, the better the business of Wang Xinran's sideline business of metaphysics. "Whether they are from a big company or not, young people hope to grasp some certainty in uncertainty." In Wang Xinran's view, this is true for metaphysics and sideline business.