The Future Belongs To The Creators

Recently, I’ve been going through the courses and books I had about online business, monetization, and marketing again (since I’m building a new product) and today I wanted to share what I’ve learned about:

• Monetization (products or services)

• Marketing

• Nurturing your audience

So buckle up, and go make your favorite drink cuz this is gonna be a long value-packed newsletter.

And before we start, yes this is the email I tried to write last week.

The education system has turned its back on the newer generations.

Schools and universities are treated as businesses. The rich are getting richer by taking money from the poor.

The rich are enjoying life

• Private jets

• Yacht parties

• Gold watches

• Driving supercars

And the rest are left fighting for scraps.

People no longer trust traditional education and jobs to secure their future.

The internet has changed the playing field of wealth generation.

With the internet (social media) people (content creators) are fighting back. There are people who are free from the modern-day slavery.

Those who value self-education, are self-accountable, and try to become someone of value will succeed in the next decade.

In the next few decades, everyone will become a content creator – whether you like it or not.

In fact, you’re already a creator but on a much smaller scale.

Think of all the text messages you wrote, the conversations you had, and the books you read, all fall under the umbrella of you being creating content but you’re not aware of it (yet).

I strongly believe that we’re still in the early stages of the creator economy. Most people aren’t aware of it (it’s good for us, it means we get to enjoy the early success when other people are still sleeping on it).

So let me ask you a question:

Would you rather wait 10+ years to start your creator journey (that is bound to happen) and start learning all you can about becoming a successful creator?

Or

Would you rather start now, get a head start, and enjoy all the benefits of being an early adopter?

I rest my case.

Now let’s talk money.

A typical advice I hear (and most probably you heard as well) is that you should start a consulting/coaching service and have that be your monetization strategy.

It’s a good short-term monetization strategy to have, but if you have it as your main long-term strategy then you’re going to be very disappointed.

Matter of fact I didn’t have a consulting offer for 9 months (I monetized my brand through digital products, but more on that in a bit).

The reason people tell you to start a service-based business is because you can make more money now.

But “more money now” is only half the picture. 

It suits marketing consultants to talk about it because they’re on the clock – they have to show they can bring you a high ROI before you stop working with them

With consulting work, you’re still trading your time for money which means you’re limited by the number of hours you work.

But there are a few ways to increase your leverage and earning potential.

Leverage (as Naval says) comes in 4 forms labor, capital, code, and media.

Labor leverage: It is when you have other people doing the work for you and it frees your time to focus on bigger and more important tasks. Think of agencies for this example. They hire people to deliver the service while you focus on more important tasks (i.e. landing more clients).

Capital leverage: This is self-explanatory, it’s when the money you invest makes you even more money – a common mistake I see people make is that they focus on capital leverage first when it’s the last thing you should focus on (only when you have so much money that you don’t know what to do with is when you should consider capital leverage as a viable option).

Code Leverage: Apple, Google, Facebook, Telegram, etc all of them are leveraging code. They built software that millions of people depend on. Tech companies have so much power that governments are starting to get concerned with all the leverage they have (you can see with all the Supreme Court cases that these companies have gone through).

Media Leverage: This is my favorite form of leverage for several reasons. It’s the most beginner-friendly form of leverage. Media leverage (social leverage) is when you leverage your audience to open up opportunities for you.

Think of all the social media “influencers” they’re not special or anything.

The reason why most of them are “successful” and are making bank is because they have built an audience and brands are willing to spend $10,000s to have their products put in front of those millions of people.

In other words, influencers became the modern billboards.

This is why you see a lot of people sell “how to build an audience” courses and mentorships (they do it for many reasons but let’s save that for the future).

They sell these courses because they’re selling you the idea of what you could (possibly) do if you had a large audience.

Side Note:

Never take advice from an IG model who is making $1M a year with 3M followers.

Instead, listen to the advice of the small creator who makes $100,000 a month with 10,000 followers.

Because the “small creator” knows something that allows him to punch way above their weight class.

So how do you increase your coaching service’s leverage?

• Cohort

• Workshops

• Group coaching calls

• Hiring other people to do the coaching for you

But there’s a better and easier way to monetize your brand… 

Digital products.

Why digital products?

Having a digital product allows you to:

• Focus on improving your skills — instead of being swamped with client work

• Establish authority as a creator — The more products you have the higher perceived authority you gain

• Start earning with your mind, not your time — Gain true freedom

• Help more people — not just the people who paid you for 1:1 coaching

• Educate people on real-world problems and help them be more competent — unlike schools where they teach outdated information with 0 real-life application

Digital products are the highest form of leverage you can think of.

• No cost to replicate

• Doesn’t have an expiry date

• Instant delivery to the customer

With digital products, you stop trading time for money.

The only time you spend is during the creation of the product, but after it’s done you can go on to sell 1,000s of copies with 0 effort.

With digital products, your earnings depend on how well you attract an audience, market, and sell.

If you’re a creator then it all depends on how well you can write. 

The better you write, the better your content will be.

The better the content, the more people you can attract.

The more people you can attract, the more eyeballs you can get on your offer.

The more eyeballs you can get on your offer, the more you can sell and make money

This is why writing is the most valuable skill you can have as a creator.

Your entire business depends on your writing.

You’ll soon realize that writing is the foundational skill to all other high-value skills.

Creating Your MVP

Your first offer is going to suck. No matter how much market research you do.

Would you rather spend months of researching, creating, and once you finally launch your offer realize that nobody wants it?

This is why I like the idea of building an MVP product. Minimal Viable Product.

The idea behind it is speed. Build quickly. Launch fast. Iterate and make it better.

“I don’t know what to offer/sell.”

The worst thing you can do is to try and build something that nobody wants.

You’ll make 0 sales, waste your time, and get depressed.

I learned this the hard way. I’ve built 3 products that never got to see the light of day because nobody wanted them.

A better approach is to build something that’s already selling but introducing a unique angle.

Look at creators who are doing what you want to do.

• What is their niche?

• What are they selling?

• What is their unique angle?

• How are they delivering their product (Notion template, written course, video course, etc)?

Take inspiration from existing offers, and build something similar but under a different “Why”.

Your first product should be a beginner-level product.

The idea behind a beginner-level product is to attract a broad audience (to grow your audience and keep selling your product) and then educate them on your selling skills.

I started making $500 per month when I had 400 followers with 1 digital product.

The course was about writing online and attracting an audience (the idea was validated before because Kieran Drew, Dan Koe, and Justin Welsh were all selling something similar).

“But why would people buy from me when they can buy from bigger creators?”

Because buyers buy again.

I’ve probably bought 5 different writing courses and 10+ books about business.

Most of them had the same information just presented differently.

And the typical advice of “niching down” and talking about 1 niche only, ignore it.

It’s useless and outdated.

There are millions of creators who are posting valuable content and have great products.

What will make people choose you over other people is if they can relate to you.

Sharing your interests, wins, losses, beliefs, and opinions is how you create this bond between you and your audience.

Since 95% of your audience are beginners, your MVP should provide a simple solution to their problems.

 This newsletter is getting too long and still, I haven’t covered how to build an audience and market your product. 

I’ll stop here, let these thoughts sit for a bit and I’ll see you in the next newsletter.

PS:

Let me know if you enjoy reading these longer deep dives or if you prefer the shorter ones.

Cheers,

Hussain