Latest / The Side Hustle Career Podcast with Fexingo: Second Income, Freelancing While Employed / How a Librarian Built a 12K Side Hustle in Metadata Consulting
Transcript
- Lucas: So Luna, I was digging through some freelance job boards last week, and I kept seeing these listings for something called metadata consultants. Not for tech giants or data scientists, mind you — but for small e-commerce brands, content creators, even a few museums. And the rates were eye-watering. Like two hundred dollars an hour in some cases. Luna: Wait, two hundred an hour? For what exactly? I mean, I get that metadata is important, but who’s paying that much for it? Lucas: That’s exactly what I thought. So I started chasing the story, and I found this fantastic case. There’s a public librarian — I’m not going to use her real name, but let’s call her Sarah — who built a twelve thousand dollar a month side hustle doing metadata consulting. And she’s not a tech person. She’s a librarian with a master’s in library science, working full-time at a county library. Luna: A librarian. That’s brilliant. I mean, librarians literally spend their careers organizing information. But I never would have thought that could translate into a high-paying consulting gig. Lucas: Right. And here’s the twist: the skills she uses every day — cataloging, classification, taxonomy design — are exactly what companies need to make their product data readable, both for humans and for algorithms. She just had to reframe it. She calls herself a 'metadata consultant' now, but she’s essentially doing what she’s always done, just in a different context. Luna: So how did she get her first clients? Did she just put up a website and hope for the best? Lucas: Not exactly. She started small. She was already helping her local library with some digital collection projects, and she noticed that the vendors they worked with — the companies that provide e-books and digital resources — had terrible metadata. So she reached out to one of them, offered a free audit of their catalog, and that led to her first paid project. A three-thousand-dollar contract to reorganize their product tags. Luna: That’s a smart move. Instead of cold-calling strangers, she leveraged a connection she already had. And that first project probably gave her a case study to point to. Lucas: Exactly. And from there, she started branching out. She bought a domain, set up a simple one-page site, and started posting on LinkedIn about what she does. Not in a salesy way, but more like 'here’s an interesting problem with product metadata, here’s how I’d solve it.' That attracted a few e-commerce founders who were struggling with exactly that. Luna: So what kind of problems is she actually solving for these e-commerce folks? I’m guessing it’s not just about renaming a few product titles. Lucas: No, it’s deeper. Think about a Shopify store with two thousand products. If the metadata is messy — inconsistent sizes, colors, materials, missing attributes — then customers can’t filter properly, and more importantly, Google can’t understand the pages. So she builds custom taxonomies for these stores. She defines the attributes, standardizes the values, and sets up the structure so the site can actually perform in search. Luna: I see. So it’s not just about tidying up — it directly impacts discoverability and sales. That’s why they’re willing to pay two hundred an hour. Lucas: Precisely. And here’s another layer: with the rise of AI, metadata is even more critical. Large language models need clean, structured data to train on. If you’re building a content library or a product database that’s going to be used to fine-tune an AI model, you need someone who understands classification at a deep level. Librarians are exactly that. Luna: That’s a great angle. She’s basically a knowledge architect. So what does her typical week look like? Is she doing this after hours? Lucas: She works on it evenings and weekends, but she’s strict about her time. She takes on only two or three clients at a time, because each project requires deep focus. She told me she uses a simple Kanban board — nothing fancy — to keep track of deliverables. Most of her work is asynchronous: she’ll get a batch of product data, map out the taxonomy, send it back with recommendations. Occasionally she jumps on a call to explain the structure. Luna: So it’s not a huge time commitment. How is she charging? Retainer? Per project? Lucas: Mix of both. For e-commerce stores, she typically charges a one-time setup fee — anywhere from five to ten thousand — for building the initial taxonomy. Then she offers a monthly retainer of around two thousand for ongoing maintenance. For content platforms, she charges per project. Her twelve thousand a month comes from three retainers plus a couple of one-off projects. Luna: That’s impressive. But I have to ask: is there a conflict there? She’s a public librarian, using skills she developed on the job. Is she allowed to do that? Lucas: That’s a really important question. Her employer doesn’t have a clause in the handbook that explicitly bans freelance work, but she’s careful. She uses only her own time, her own equipment, and she’s never touched the library’s proprietary systems for any client work. She also made sure her side hustle doesn’t intersect with the library’s vendors — she isn’t consulting for any company that the library contracts with. Luna: So she’s drawing a clear ethical line. That’s good to hear. I think a lot of people worry about this when they start a side hustle that uses their professional skills. Lucas: Yes, and it’s worth checking your own employment agreement before you go down this path. But her story shows that with a little caution, you can monetize your expertise without jeopardizing your day job. Luna: So what’s the one thing she’d tell someone who’s thinking about doing this? I mean, not everyone’s a librarian, but everyone has some specialized knowledge. Lucas: Her advice is to start by looking at the pain points in your current industry. The problems you see every day that seem obvious to you but are probably invisible to outsiders. That’s the seed of a consulting practice. She also recommends doing one free audit — just to get a sample of what you can do, and to build confidence. And then, charge a real rate from the start. She underpriced her first few projects and regrets it. Luna: That’s solid advice. And it’s a good moment to mention that, between you and me, this podcast exists thanks to a small group of listeners who chip in a few bucks a month on buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. That’s literally what keeps the lights on and lets us keep making these deep dives without ads. Lucas: Yeah, and we genuinely appreciate it. It’s a nice way to know that what we do matters to people. But let’s get back to Sarah. There’s a great detail I want to share about how she handles the business side. Luna: Please, go on. Lucas: She has a simple discovery call script. She asks three questions: what’s the current structure, what’s broken, and what are the sales goals. That’s it. She said most consultants overcomplicate this, but those three questions give her enough to pitch a project. Luna: That makes sense. It’s all about understanding the business outcome, not just the technical fix. Lucas: Right. And she also shares templates and checklists with her clients after each project — partly as a nice deliverable, but also as a subtle way to show what ongoing maintenance would look like. That’s how she converts one-off projects into retainers. Luna: Clever. So she’s building a relationship, not just doing a transaction. That’s something we could all learn from. Lucas: Absolutely. And one more thing: she’s very selective about the types of clients she takes on. She turned down a cannabis company once because she didn’t feel comfortable with the ethical implications. She says her reputation is worth more than any single paycheck. Luna: That’s a good filter. So, if someone out there is listening and thinking, 'I could do this,' what’s the first step they should take today? Lucas: I’d say start by auditing your own workspace. Write down the recurring problems that waste your time or cause errors. Then imagine charging to fix them. If you can’t think of anything, ask a friend in your industry what their biggest headache is. That’s your first potential client. Luna: Great advice. And who knows — maybe you’ll be the next Sarah, building a twelve thousand dollar side hustle from a skill you already have. Lucas: Exactly. And if you do, we’d love to hear about it. Until next time.