I’ve always had the goal of making a living talking about things I love (doesn’t everyone?)

I followed the path that everyone follows for a bit:

• Went to college and studied engineering

• Started learning skills on the side

• Started building my personal brand with the skills I’ve learned

Graduated college but I was too scared to go into the workforce and be average like everyone else

So I decided to go back to college and get my MSc in engineering

Up till this point, I had made a whopping $0 online.

I thought to myself “Maybe it’s time to be realistic and get a 9-5”

That’s until a few weeks later when I was in the gym hitting a PR on squats when I heard:

Cha-Ching

I just made my first $20 online selling templates (it might have been a sign from God to stop skipping leg day).

That’s when I knew that it was possible to do this full-time.

I started taking writing seriously.

Impressions went up. Engagement went up. Followers went up. Sales went up.

Everything started to click.

Why is writing so important?

The 2 Moving Parts of The Internet

The internet 2 parts: the frontend, and the backend.

The backend is code, the frontend is media.

If you want to code you need to:

• Go into debt

• Spend 4 years in college

• Hope to land a job in top companies

Or…

Learn how to write.

Writing As A Skill:

• Tweets → Writing

• Threads → Writing

• Newsletter → Writing

• Cold Emails → Writing

• Marketing a product → Writing

• Videos → Better when done with a written script

Now let’s dive into how you can do it as well

The 7 steps to start a profitable writing business:

1. A Topic You Can’t Shut Up About

If you’re going to build a writing business you better make sure you love what you write about.

Write down:

• Your favorite books

• Your favorite Creators

• What you would write about if you had $100M in the bank right now

Good writing isn’t about being a professional writer, it’s about the vibe you’re sharing

2. Come Up With A Unique Perspective:

Everything that could’ve been said, has been said online.

Novelty is how you catch people’s attention and stand out from the crowd.

How do we create a unique perspective?

Brainstorm

• Problems

• Goals

• Benefits

• Roadblocks

• Personal experiences you had

About the topic you have selected.

All that is left to do is to talk about how you would do [x] as if you’re talking to a friend.

3. Start A Writing Challenge

At first, most people will suck at writing.

How to get better?

You get better by writing a lot.

Challenge yourself to write 1,000-word newsletters a week.

It’s not hard to do if you know how to structure it.

Here’s how I write a 1,000 (effortlessly):

• Describe how the problem is affecting someone’s life

• Relate the problem to a personal experience you had (that’s how you build a connection)

• Give them a step-by-step solution on how you solved it

Every creator you look up to starts off giving actionable advice.

It’s how you provide value and build authority.

4. The Creator Funnel:

As a writer, you don’t need a fancy funnel.

I use the same funnel as Dan Koe, Justin Welsh, and Kieran Drew.

I like to call it the 1-2-3 funnel:

• 1 newsletter a week

• 2 threads condensed from the newsletter

• 3 tweets a day

5. Start A Newsletter:

The greatest asset a creator isn’t:

• The number of followers he has

• The products that he has created

the greatest asset is his email list.

Why?

• Platforms die

• Algorithms change

• You can get banned out of nowhere

But the emails you have will stay with you.

In your emails, it’s the best place to showcase your authority.

Authority is built on 2 things:

• Depth

• Expertise

If you only write tweets you’ll have a hard time building authority and making sales.

If you aren’t an expert on the topic you chose, then you have to prove yourself through threads and newsletters.

You can use different newsletter providers, but to keep things simple here are some of the best:

• Beehiiv

• Convertkit

• MailChimp

Research them and choose the one that fits you best.

5. Repurpose Your Newsletter

The most beginner-friendly and best tool for social growth is actionable advice.

Everyone online is looking for solutions to their problems—if you can solve it for them then they’ll keep coming back to you.

Don’t try to sound like a smart ass when you’re just starting out (you look dumb doing it).

This feels like the appropriate time to sell you something.

If you want to learn how to build a profitable online business from scratch then you’d want to consider getting Roadmap 3.0.

It has 31 modules and it covers social media platforms like IG, TikTok, and YouTube, and it also teaches you how to create a successful blog.

Unlock Roadmap 3.0 here.

6. Network & Grow

The idea of being “self-made” is a lie.

If you think you don’t need people to be successful then you’re playing the wrong game.

You need to get eyes on your content.

You need people to talk about your content.

If you think posting good content is enough to make you grow then you’re going to fail miserably trying to do so (that’s what happened to me at first).

• Find creators you enjoy

• Talk to them

• Be genuine

Social media is called ‘social’ for a reason.

7. Turn Ideas Into Tweets

From your newsletter and threads, you should have many ideas for short and punchy tweets.

my way of doing things:

Create How-To and List tweets

They are easy to write and people love them.

It’s a win-win.

Bonus: Create a Writing Process

• Open Notion (or whatever you use for notes).

• Start analyzing people’s contents

• Start studying writing

• Create a writing process

• Test it and refine it whenever you face a problem.

Having a system will make your writing 100x easier.

TL;DR

If you have a product or skill and write for 2-4 hours a day you can build a profitable writing one-person business.

Here’s what we covered:

• Choose a topic

• Create a unique perspective

• Start a 1,000-word writing challenge

• Post your writing to your newsletter

• Turn actionable parts of your newsletter into threads

• Meet new creators

• Turn threads into tweets

• Create a system

That’s all for today. Thank you for reading!

- Hussain

Whenever you’re ready, here’s how I can help you:

Roadmap 3.0: Learn how to start a successful online business from scratch and gain access to a private community of over 39,000 like-minded people.

Write To Impact: Get My ridiculously underpriced course for writing online. It’ll go over the basics of nailing your niche, the type of content that people want to see, mistakes to avoid, and how to make your sentences sing.