I Quit My Masters Degree in Medicine. Entered My Fastlane Journey.

[knz]

And so it started in June 2018. My journey as a fulltime entrepreneur officially began. But, the decision wasn't made just there and then. Let me shortly take you back to where it started and use this first post in this progress thread as an introduction. I have read many threads on this forum and it's time to start my own.

Hardstuck in the slowlane
My father used to say: ''School is important. But what you do outside of school is just as important.'' Oh, he was so right. I was never the entrepreneurial type, I thought of becoming a doctor and was doing a good job getting there. I was the good student: always making my homework, always studying hard for tests, always attending all classes making notes. I was unknowingly hardstuck in the slowlane and didn't even thought of getting out of it. It 'just so happened'. Or, well, that's what it felt like when the hockey stick effect kicked in.

A rolling ball
1. In 2007 I became a contracted professional gamer after my parents signed the contract. This gave me the opportunity to travel to events and, unknowingly at my young age, build a network.
2. Thanks to this I got my first interview on national TV in 2014.
3. This led to many more interviews (300+ nowadays) after which a popular TV channel picked me up in 2016 as they wanted me to host a show.
4. This resulted in a speaker agency putting me on their website in 2017.
5. The media attention and my work resulted in companies approaching me in 2018.
6. Simultaneously, I started giving educational workshops in 2016 as I noticed I could help people with my experience. This then led to launching an online educational business in 2020 and being the author of a book launched in 2020 with a great publisher and co-author.

I couldn't work with the businesses or dedicate enough time to my educational business due to being in medschool from 7am to 7pm every day. Choice : stay in medschool and know I'll study till 35 and stay inside the walls of a hospital, or try to follow my own path and see where it leads me? After a short holiday I came back on Sunday. Walked into my first day of the internship 'Surgery' on Monday, had some conversations, and never looked back.

I did have a safety net. I was allowed to go back to medschool and continue where I left off if I couldn't manage to make enough money in my first year to sustain myself. This was 4.5 years ago.

Sidenotes to put things in perspective
- I hosted the show for free from 2016 to the end of 2018. In 2019 I got paid 75 euros per broadcast (1 a week). I quit the show in 2020 to focus on other activities.
- My first speaking gig was in December 2017. The first year I earned enough money to sustain myself from solely speaking income was 2022. The years prior I also needed other income
- My book launched during the lockdown. This was not planned for of course. All bookstores were closed, which happens to be a big influence in my country. We did not have this form of marketing/sales and missed out massively. Still, it didn't do too bad and is still selling on a consistent basis.
- My educational business is still very much a startup. I'll explain below.
- I have never had to be proactive in business, business always found its way to me. This can also make you 'lazy'. What I mean with this, and how I now changed some of my ways, will be clarified in a future post.

So, what do I do today and how will I structure this thread?
I will make sure to always update the thread on 3 topics : my speaking, my educational business, and 'other'. I will share fails and mistakes, learnings, things that really helped me, tips and more. I have quite a lot to write about in this thread.

1. Speaking (Fastlane? Better than slowlane. But not CENTS)
I don't have much control as an event needs to invite me for an event or accepts me to speak there. It is also bound to my time, as I am my own product. I can only leverage my pay per gig. Hence in 2022 I had the goal of being contracted to global agencies. This happened, and I now had 2 global speaking gigs so far. These pay 10x the amount of local gigs for the exact same.

2. Educational business (Fastlane potential & CENTS)
This business is an educational platform and launched in 2020 with two cofounders. It didn't work out and they left early 2022. Why? More info in a future post. I learned a lot though it killed the initial traction of the business. Then mid 2022 I got in touch with someone else and now we are building a great team. I'm very excited and will talk more about this in a future post.

3. Other
I'm an expert advisor for a fund which takes very little time. It teaches me what to look for, and what to look at, when investing in a business. Always good to learn. I'm also part of another business which takes very little time, but the outcome helps with speaking gigs and my educational business. Lastly, I'm a board member of a global organization. This doesn't take much time on a monthly basis, but I do have to travel to some events throughout the year. It is amazing for my network.

The first of many
If there are any questions, please write them below and I'll be happy to answer these. I didn't go into too much detail with everything above due to the length of this post. I have a lot to share, but I'll do so in future posts in this progress thread.

To wrap it up with my favorite quote : 'If you want something you have never had, you must be willing to do something you have never done'

 

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[NeoDialectic]

Very unique journey; thanks for sharing. It sounds like the biggest asset you currently have is your reputation and network. I'm interested in seeing what kind of future businesses you will leverage your past experience and network into!

 

[knz]

Very unique journey; thanks for sharing. It sounds like the biggest asset you currently have is your reputation and network. I'm interested in seeing what kind of future businesses you will leverage your past experience and network into!

I've read so many of your contributions on the forum and really appreciate you commenting on my first post of this thread! I look forward to sharing more and finding the answer to your last sentence. Exciting times ahead.

 

[Subsonic]

And so it started in June 2018. My journey as a fulltime entrepreneur officially began. But, the decision wasn't made just there and then. Let me shortly take you back to where it started and use this first post in this progress thread as an introduction. I have read many threads on this forum and it's time to start my own.

Hardstuck in the slowlane
My father used to say: ''School is important. But what you do outside of school is just as important.'' Oh, he was so right. I was never the entrepreneurial type, I thought of becoming a doctor and was doing a good job getting there. I was the good student: always making my homework, always studying hard for tests, always attending all classes making notes. I was unknowingly hardstuck in the slowlane and didn't even thought of getting out of it. It 'just so happened'. Or, well, that's what it felt like when the hockey stick effect kicked in.

A rolling ball
1. In 2007 I became a contracted professional gamer after my parents signed the contract. This gave me the opportunity to travel to events and, unknowingly at my young age, build a network.
2. Thanks to this I got my first interview on national TV in 2014.
3. This led to many more interviews (300+ nowadays) after which a popular TV channel picked me up in 2016 as they wanted me to host a show.
4. This resulted in a speaker agency putting me on their website in 2017.
5. The media attention and my work resulted in companies approaching me in 2018.
6. Simultaneously, I started giving educational workshops in 2016 as I noticed I could help people with my experience. This then led to launching an online educational business in 2020 and being the author of a book launched in 2020 with a great publisher and co-author.

I couldn't work with the businesses or dedicate enough time to my educational business due to being in medschool from 7am to 7pm every day. Choice : stay in medschool and know I'll study till 35 and stay inside the walls of a hospital, or try to follow my own path and see where it leads me? After a short holiday I came back on Sunday. Walked into my first day of the internship 'Surgery' on Monday, had some conversations, and never looked back.

I did have a safety net. I was allowed to go back to medschool and continue where I left off if I couldn't manage to make enough money in my first year to sustain myself. This was 4.5 years ago.

Sidenotes to put things in perspective
- I hosted the show for free from 2016 to the end of 2018. In 2019 I got paid 75 euros per broadcast (1 a week). I quit the show in 2020 to focus on other activities.
- My first speaking gig was in December 2017. The first year I earned enough money to sustain myself from solely speaking income was 2022. The years prior I also needed other income
- My book launched during the lockdown. This was not planned for of course. All bookstores were closed, which happens to be a big influence in my country. We did not have this form of marketing/sales and missed out massively. Still, it didn't do too bad and is still selling on a consistent basis.
- My educational business is still very much a startup. I'll explain below.
- I have never had to be proactive in business, business always found its way to me. This can also make you 'lazy'. What I mean with this, and how I now changed some of my ways, will be clarified in a future post.

So, what do I do today and how will I structure this thread?
I will make sure to always update the thread on 3 topics : my speaking, my educational business, and 'other'. I will share fails and mistakes, learnings, things that really helped me, tips and more. I have quite a lot to write about in this thread.

1. Speaking (Fastlane? Better than slowlane. But not CENTS)
I don't have much control as an event needs to invite me for an event or accepts me to speak there. It is also bound to my time, as I am my own product. I can only leverage my pay per gig. Hence in 2022 I had the goal of being contracted to global agencies. This happened, and I now had 2 global speaking gigs so far. These pay 10x the amount of local gigs for the exact same.

2. Educational business (Fastlane potential & CENTS)
This business is an educational platform and launched in 2020 with two cofounders. It didn't work out and they left early 2022. Why? More info in a future post. I learned a lot though it killed the initial traction of the business. Then mid 2022 I got in touch with someone else and now we are building a great team. I'm very excited and will talk more about this in a future post.

3. Other
I'm an expert advisor for a fund which takes very little time. It teaches me what to look for, and what to look at, when investing in a business. Always good to learn. I'm also part of another business which takes very little time, but the outcome helps with speaking gigs and my educational business. Lastly, I'm a board member of a global organization. This doesn't take much time on a monthly basis, but I do have to travel to some events throughout the year. It is amazing for my network.

The first of many
If there are any questions, please write them below and I'll be happy to answer these. I didn't go into too much detail with everything above due to the length of this post. I have a lot to share, but I'll do so in future posts in this progress thread.

To wrap it up with my favorite quote : 'If you want something you have never had, you must be willing to do something you have never done'

I'll be watching your threads as I am sure you are going to create something great.
Unlike many others you have valuable and leveragable assets and skills right from the "start"(quotations since you have been in business for quiet some time already)of your unscripted journey.

 

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[knz]

I'll be watching your threads as I am sure you are going to create something great.
Unlike many others you have valuable and leveragable assets and skills right from the "start"(quotations since you have been in business for quiet some time already)of your unscripted journey.

Thanks Subsonic! I'll make sure to also explain how I have developed certain skills and leveragable assets. In the end, it mostly comes down to trying and doing something long enough to develop knowledge/skills and then look for ways to use it.

 

[kendamakid]

To wrap it up with my favorite quote : 'If you want something you have never had, you must be willing to do something you have never done'

Great post and interesting background. It's interesting how your parent(s) always have great life tidbits in passing but as a child you sometimes never pay attention to them

Will be a great thread to follow. It's different than what's usually posted to the forums

 

[knz]

Besides posting updates about the progress I'll also post things that are related to achieving that progress. In this post I like to highlight several mistakes I've made in the past and some tips on how to approach it differently.

Mistake #1 - Making decisions in a hyped/emotional state
You probably recognize the following: there's an opportunity and the only things you think of are the positive and what it can do for you. You can see the future unfolding in your eyes, all the opportunities it will create, the successes and what not. You are in a hyped state and make a decision during that state. What's the problem?

Well, I have been in this scenario a few times which I will elaborate on later:
- Buying something at an event where the guy sold from stage.
- Getting a chunk of money and immediately dedicating it to a coach
- Seeing Bitcoin go up years ago and putting all my savings on the line afraid of missing out (was my biggest winner ever, before losing all profits soon after of course. Funny story this one, for another time)
- People that are interested in your business and want to become partners

The problem with making decisions in a hyped state lies in not objectively seeing the positives and negatives of the opportunity infront of you. Very often, this state is achieved when there is a chance of missing out and fomo. It's now or never. You don't have time to think about the negatives. You just heard how good and amazing it is. Make a decision. No time to think. It's like a salesperson that keeps talking to you about the best XYZ ever and you get pumped and don't get time to think because you can only get it NOW. In this case, negative outcomes oftentimes become visible quite quickly after saying 'yes' (hours, few days, a week)

Other times, you do have enough time to think about. But now, you've planted the idea of everything playing out succesfully so much in your head that you are overseeing potential downsides. In this case, negative outcomes might become visible in the longer term (weeks, months, years).

Whenever an opportunity presents itself, whatever it is, do not buy into it immediately. Step back, realize your state of mind, grab a piece of paper and write down the positives and negatives. What also helped me a lot is to speak about the opportunity to people around me that are completely objective. Their questions will most likely be addressing both sides of the story. And the classic: sleep on it. The opportunity will most likely be there tomorrow as well, or next week, or next month.

Mistake #2 - Perfecting before testing
When I needed a platform for my educational business, I thought it was a good idea to let a company build a brand new platform for me on which I can put my courses and stuff. I already gave workshops for a few years and knew the market and interest was there. So, why not?

After reading the book 'The Lean Startup' I felt so foolish. I literally made every mistake in the book regarding this platform. So, few downsides of this process:
- It costs a lot of money
- It takes a lot of time
- You don't get feedback from customers till it's finished, if ever

In my case, the platform was 7.5k and ... rubbish. I didn't like the layout, I didn't like how it worked and all that stuff. Even with countless feedback sessions it just wasn't what I had in mind. I basically wasted 7.5k, had no platform, only got a bit of money left, and had no customers testing the platform idea I had.

What should I have done instead? Grab a online elearning platform and pay a few bucks a month to run my courses and other material on there and test the market. I can set it up in a day, I can cancel every month, it's cheap, it's convenient, I can test the market the next day, I can already generate income and with that income work on a brand new platform in the future (maybe..). In hindsight, this would've saved me a few thousand euros.

Mistake #3 - Not truly understanding the added value & moving too quickly
What does it bring you? What does following that course bring you? What does adding these potential business partners add to your business? What does this coach bring you? Is the value proposition clear?

I have two examples of this going wrong in my case.
- The first was investing in a speakercoach. I was already a paid keynote speaker but decided to take on a training (the guy selling from stage). This actually helped me out as I learned how to effectively structure my speeches and build models to teach. But at the time, I had all this information of days of training and didn't yet go through everything by myself by the time I was able to possibly get a coach. I didn't yet take the time to review, rethink and work everything out.

The problem was the upsell, smart asses. I had the option to get coached for a few weeks with like 1 or 2 meetings a week, can't even remember. It was expensive, let me tell you. But because I didn't yet properly implemented the material of the training, the coaching came too early. I also didn't truly grasp the value of the coaching provided. I knew the structure and what we would discuss during each meeting. But I didn't really understand how to implement this coaching in my future business (honestly, I didn't even think about it I believe as my head was also rolling on mistake #1). I didn't really understand the added value yet. Here lies the problem: I made the decision before I knew what it could bring to me.

In the end, the coaching was quite useless for me. It didn't provide me with more info than I already had and I don't need someone holding my hand to implement content as I have more than enough discipline to do that myself. A costly mistake. Instead, I should have done the following:
- first implemented all the material myself and then decide my next step. In other words: not moving too quickly.
- truly understand the added value. Ask as many questions you need to in order to get a clear picture

- The second had to do with my (previous) business partners. I like to say that they are great people, but they simply didn't match what the business, and I, needed. They approached me few years ago and were interested in what I did. They saw the potential. Me being a business noob at the time didn't really think of how their skills and background would work next to mine. I only thought: ''oh great, a team''. Even though we 'took it easy' and got to know each other over multiple meetings in several months, I didn't see negatives and had my head running on mistake #1. One year down the road and I started to realize the problems. First: one partner was similar to myself, which meant we were in eachother's way regularly. Second: the other guy had a business which took a lot of time, so he was quite invisible. I knew he had this business, but thought he could fit it in his schedule.

This demotivated me and caused the business to become inactive. After months of inactivity, they left the business on good terms. Lesson being: find people that either bring money you don't have, skills you don't have, or a network you don't have (and preferably all 3). If someone is the same as you, it might feel great at the start but it will hurt you down the road. Also, if someone already has another business and has to dedicate loads of time to that business, better avoid it.

I'm currently creating a new team which I will talk about in another post. But all lessons learned are now being implemented.

 

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[knz]

Progress Thread Update
​

I will provide an update of my activities as a speaker in the past few weeks. I will also provide some more insights, tips and background information that is relevant to understanding where I am today. An update regarding my educational business and other stuff will follow soon.

1. Speaking
Background story with insights, tips and information
I rolled into being a speaker, almost by accident, as explained in my first post. I had a speaking agent that got me my first speaking gig in 2017. Though, in the years that followed, by far most of the speaking engagements I get contact me directly. I do, however, always forward them to my agent and have them close the deal. I received mixed opinions about this in the past, but I'll explain why I do this:

First and foremost: building relationships and trust. They will see I bypass them on my socials, as I post my speaking engagements, and might become less motivated to sell me to their clients whenever there's the opportunity. This means I will have less speaking opportunities: I will have the ones reaching out directly, but none/less coming from a demotivated agent. Especially when you're in your first years as a speaker, getting experience, building relationships in the industry and building your numbers are important. But even to date, with over 200 speaking engagements under my belt, I still forward every opportunity that I personally receive to my agent.

Second: professionalism, money, reputation and comfort. The word 'comfort' can be a pain for the aspiring entrepreneur as the comfortzone is the zone without growth. But in this specific case, it helps me by explaining the other three words I wrote down. Being represented by a speakerbureau is something you have to earn, especially the higher rated ones. Having an agent shows a form of professionalism. Instead of me selling myself and putting a price on my own head, I let someone else do the talking. I do have set prices that I arranged with my agent, but he is the one talking budgets. This takes pressure off my shoulders and also helps me to not hurt my own reputation by offering a price too low or too high. Besides, as the agents are very experienced and know the industry, know most clients, know the budgets and are experts in negotiating, the deal they make is very likely to be higher than I would've made myself. I value great communication and proactivity from my agent. I bring them deals, they should bring me deals. Also, before a deal is made, they always tell me the available budget or the offer they want to make and if I agree. So for me, an agent is likely to get me more money, shows professionalism to the client, helps my reputation and gives me the comfort of focussing on my job while they focus on theirs. Besides, I create a strong relationship based on trust and good communication, something that goes very far in the speaking industry.

I now work with an amazing local speaking agency and also work with a very well known and respected global agency for the big deals.

As a speaker it can be difficult to know what you can do to get more deals. It feels like you can't really influence people to select you to speak. For years (2016 to december 2021) I was not proactive as a speaker trying to 'sell myself', meaning I didn't call or email parties to consider me as a speaker for their events. Gigs just came my way based on reputation. What I did do though, is whenever I was invited to speak I would stay the whole event. This is something clients enjoy, and I can use the event to build my network. Win-win. Whenever I'm invited to events where I don't speak, I go and try building my network. So in some way, I did sell myself, but very indirectly. Got some great tips on networking for a future post.

For 2022 I decided to put more focus on speaking at global events for which it's best to have a global agent. What I did to get multiple global agents interested, with one willing to get me exclusively, will be something for a future post. Goal achieved, including 2 global speeches.

Recent speaking progress
In december 2022, I decided to focus on doubling my speaking engagements compared to 2022 including 2 global speaking engagements. This is part of my 10/5/1 year plan, a great idea of @MJ DeMarco which I executed in detail. More in a future post.

In order to achieve my goal, I need to push myself into proactivity, which is good. So far, I have done 3 things to achieve the goal this year:
1. I decided to look at all my past (paid) speaking engagements and get data from it. How many times do I speak for X audience? How many times do I speak about X topic? etc. This will provide me insights in potential trends and target audiences.
2. Based on data, I made the decision to niche down into a growing sector, as well as my most popular speaking sector. I decided to make several lists of parties that could be interested in my services as a speaker.
3. Contacting them.

Point 1 and 2 are the habit of 'sharpening the saw'. Point 3 is cutting the tree in an hour after sharpening the saw for 5 hours.

I made 3 lists in January: one includes all overarching school organizations in the country (150 prospects). One includes all overarching library organizations in the country (131 prospects), and one includes global events that would fit my area of expertise (79 prospects).

For February, my goal is to reach out to all of them by email. I so far have reached out to all overarching school organizations and all overarching library organizations. I created an email template in which I personalize 3 things for each mail: name, name of the company, amount of schools/libraries that the organization has. How I build my email template will be covered in a future post.

In short regarding the overarching schools organizations
From the 6th till the 12th of February I send 150 emails to overarching school organizations. Quite a number of times I was able to directly target the director instead of going through an infomail.
- So far, I received 28 responses (18.6%)
- 2 (7%) have no interest (for one it didnt fit their themes, for the other they said they get many requests and have no interest)
- 1 (3.5%) is going to update their website and include my area of expertise on their website. They weren't interested in working with me.
- 12 (43%) said I can better reach out to the individual school boards directly as organizing events is not something they do (I knew this was very likely to happen, but I prefer to reach out to the highest organizations first and then branch down to school boards directly and then maybe even individual schools. But the lower you go, the bigger the pool of prospects becomes and the longer it takes to contact them all. If an overarching organization could refer me to boards or schools, it saves me work)
- 9 (32%) forwarded my email to the relevant person in their organization, or forwarded my email to school boards.
- 3 (11%) showed immediate interest. I already had a meeting with 1, and for the 2 others a date will be set.
- 1 (3.5%) prospect I had a meeting with which was great. They were very excited, planned to have me speak on the 1st of November. I forwarded them to my agent and this is close to being a closed deal.

In short regarding the overarching library organizations
From the 13th to the 19th of February I send 131 emails to overarching library organizations (+-23 per day of the week). By far most of these emails are send to the general infomail. It often takes a few days for them to read or forward it.
- So far, I received 7 responses (5%)
- 0 (0%) have no interest
- 6 (86%) forwarded my email to the relevant person in their organization
- 1 (14%) prospect immediately thought of a week in March in which they can use my services as a speaker and is excited to plan a meeting.

Upcoming week:
The goal of upcoming week is to email all events on my global event list. These emails, in comparison to the previous weeks, will directly be targeted to events. Therefore I also have to change my email template. The events that already occured in January and February this year are ones I won't contact. I will likely start emailing events which are organized from April or May onwards. Usually, with global events, the agenda will be set at least 2 to 3 months in advance. Best is to email these events between 3 months to 6 months prior to the event.

Deals coming my way
I have a few speaking engagements already set for the year and last week another one has been confirmed. It's a local gig in the country.

I have also been approached by a global company with 41.000 employees. They got to me through one of my connections. I forwarded him to my global agent. I will let you know how this goes.

Keep you posted.

 

[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

2. Educational Business

- The second had to do with my (previous) business partners. I like to say that they are great people, but they simply didn't match what the business, and I, needed. They approached me few years ago and were interested in what I did. They saw the potential. Me being a business noob at the time didn't really think of how their skills and background would work next to mine. I only thought: ''oh great, a team''. Even though we 'took it easy' and got to know each other over multiple meetings in several months, I didn't see negatives and had my head running on mistake #1. One year down the road and I started to realize the problems. First: one partner was similar to myself, which meant we were in eachother's way regularly. Second: the other guy had a business which took a lot of time, so he was quite invisible. I knew he had this business, but thought he could fit it in his schedule.

After the story quoted above, the business was on a pause as well. At least, my efforts. As the educational business as a startup is not my main source of income, I focussed more on speaking. The platform was still online with quite some people downloading the free stuff and some paying clients. As I do enjoy working with a team I kept my eyes open and eventually got in touch with a banker that I met at an event. He has an incredible amount of experience with finances, planning, building teams and more.

We then tried finding a content guy. I happened to be interviewed for a podcast where I know the host was very interested in what I did and has a content background. Called him, planned a meeting together, and since a few months he's now also involved.

We also have a 4th person in mind, a succesful entrepreneur that has worked with the banker. He could be the one hyperfocussing on the growth of the business. We'll see, haven't spoken to him yet.

I'm still the 100% owner of the business, though the ''point of no return'' is coming quite soon. The banker has a document with questions that we'll have to answer which will help us to talk about the 'difficult stuff' before actually partnering officially. Meaning things like money, shares, responsibilities, time, investments and more.

Where we are now
The banker made a list of questions for us all to answer. The questions were all directly related to the business and provides a complete overview of what we're about to do. It's basically going to be a complete 2.0 version of the current business. I've written down all the questions we've answered as I'm sure some of these might help you in your journey:

- What are all the products/services the business will offer?
- What is the Vision, Mission and Golden Circle of the business?
- Where will the business be in 3 years?
- What is the customer journey on the business' website?
- What is the lead time to create content?
- What is the ideal lead time of the customer journey?
- What are examples of other websites that offer courses?
- What will we outsource?
- Which products or services will we not yet offer when 2.0 goes live?
- What is the best imaginable 2.0 business?
- What is the earnings model of Pthe business?
- Which marketing & sales activities will we carry out ourselves?
- What has the most marketing and sales potential?
- How can customers find the business?
- What sets the business apart from others?
- What is the main incentive to buy from us?
- What is the money back guarantee of similar businesses?
- What are the most important trends, both in the Netherlands and global?
- What are the opportunities within this market segment?
- What are the threats within this market segment?
- Who are the main competitors? What can we learn from them?
- What are the potential markets we want to serve at launch?
- What are the restrictions for not serving more markets at launch?
- What does the roadmap look like?
- What can a potential client help us with?
- Do we expect a seasonal pattern?

We have also made lists of what functionalities our best possible platform should have, what our ideal marketing activities are, and what our ideal branding looks like. We are currently sending these lists to different companies so we can receive their offers and get an estimate of how much the costs are for a new platform, the marketing strategy and the branding. These will then basically reflect the maximum costs, as this is the best-case-scenario. From there, we can decide how and what. The banker wants to get as much insight as possible in the finances before launch so he can do all his magic calculations. This will also help with pricing our material from the very beginning.

I've personally been writing course scripts the past two weeks. It takes about 1 week to finish the script of a course. Currently finished two and the goal of this week is to finish another one.

I have a meeting today with the content guy to make a plan for creating the content. We also have a practice recording day in a professional studio later in March. Today we also have a meeting with a company that can build the website and do our marketing. Having the website and the marketing done by one company can be beneficial. We hope to get some good insights in pricing.

 

[knz]

Progress Thread Update
​

1. Speaking
As my target is doubling my speaking engagements this year, February was all about reaching out to potential clients.

January: make lists of potential clients (which are overarching school and library organizations, and some global events)
February: email all of them (150 overarching school orgs, 133 overarching library orgs, 66 global events)

I also had 2 local speaking gigs last week and have some more planned for this year already.

Results of February:
Overarching school organizations emailed 3 weeks ago:
- 28 (18.6%) responses
- 5 (18%) have no interest
- 1 (3.5%) said I should get in touch with organizations that usually organize the speaking events at the school
- 11 (39%) said I can better reach out to school boards directly
- 8 (28.5%) forwarded my email to the relevant person internally. 1 (12.5%) of these is almost 100% confirmed, speaking on the 1st of November
- 3 (11%) showed immediate interest. 1 (33%) I planned a meeting with. 1 (33%) will get in touch in Q3. 1 (33%) first want to see me speak at another event
- 1 (3.5%) almost 100% confirmed deal

Overarching library organizations emailed 2 weeks ago:
- 27 (20%) responses
- 1 (3.7%) said events are organized by another party
- 9 (33%) forwarded my email to the relevant person internally
- 1 (3.7%) will consider my offer in a meeting in april to then speak later this year
- 4 (15%) will remember my name for possibly a future event
- 3 (11%) wanted to know my price. Forwarded them to my agent
- 1 (3.7%) wanted to hear the experience of another library. Forwarded them to a gig I've done in the past
- 7 (26%) showed interest. 4 (57%) meetings are planned. 2 (28%) are trying to plan. 1 (14%) still waiting for follow up.
- 1 (3.7%) gig is planned but not yet confirmed.

Global events emailed last week:
- 9 (13.6%) responses
- 1 (11%) speaking slots are full
- 3 (33%) want me to pay to speak. So that's a nogo
- 3 (33%) saved my info for the next / future event
- 1 (11%) event is cancelled due to no sponsors
- 1 (11%) is interested. Meeting is set on the 24th of March.

The focus of March is to make a new list of the individual school boards and email them. I also like to send some reminders to people that didn't reply.

2. Educational Business
Last week I finished another script for another course. Currently 3 courses are finished at a pace of 1 script per week. We are planning to do a test-recording at the end of March and likely start recording in April.

We aim to record the course material in very high quality. Green screen, high quality cameras, lightning, good editting etc. The videos I have now in the 1.0 version of the business were taken with my laptop webcam, no light, the microphone of my earphones and a powerpoint presentation in each video :')

The focus of March is to write 4 more scripts and also continue working on a book I'm interested in writing. Kinda like a follow up of my previous book, but then in English and not as niche. As I had a co-author with my first book, I now do some research on how to write a good book myself.

3. Other
Started a youtube channel about one of my interests/sidegigs in the financial space like 5 months back. Got to 59 subs and then got inactive. Picked it back up with a good idea of how I wanted to approach it and just started convincingly and consistently, getting shit done. In 7 days time, I went from 59 subscribers to 132 subscribers.

As I follow the 1/5/10 strategy rigorously, I made my new monthly goals for March as well as my new weekly goals for this week. The amount of productivity increase I got from this, planning out my days that support my weekly goals, then monthly goals, yearly etc, is incredible. Love it.

Keep hustling.

 

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[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

1. Speaking
Over the past few weeks I've been sending emails to organisations that can potentially be interested in the topic I speak about. A short summary of what happened since my last post:

Overarching school groups
150 mails send, 28 replies, 2 meetings set, 1 meeting done which resulted in 1 deal closed for a good gig later this year. Most of the other responses mentioned I have to reach out to another target audience basically. So I did yesterday.

School boards
There's more school boards than there are overarching school groups, so it took a a while to get all the emails. I then made a proper email that I was able to send through bcc, which is a first-timer for me. Usually I don't send emails to a big list through bcc, so I'm curious about the response in the upcoming days after sending the emails at the end of yesterday. So far I have 5 responses. 2 of these forwarded my email to the individual schools, 1 forwarded my email to the director of the organization, and 2 said I have to email individual schools myself.

Libraries
The libraries have been good though. 133 emails send, 32 replies. The meetings I had were really good with the libraries being very excited. Therefore, I managed to forward 99% of them to my speaking agent to talk about pricing. 10 libraries are currently talking to my speaking agent.

It's the first time I'm this pro-active as a speaker as over the past 6 years, I never had to do any outreach as gigs just came my way. They still do, but now I'm trying to double the amount of gigs within 1 year as a result of my my 1/5/10 plan.

2. Educational business
I've been writing scripts for the courses and currently I have finished 4 scripts. It helps I'm also the author of a book as I can use parts from the chapters in the script, making life a bit easier at times. We are also getting more into the finances now in preparation of launching the business. We've been reaching out to marketing & website organizations to get a better idea of the costs involved to build a new website and the options for a elearning platform. We have 2 meetings set this friday, exciting.

3. Youtube
The youtube channel currently sits on 379 subscribers, quite nice compared to the 132 subs I had when writing my previous post. I don't know what the normal growth rate is, but it looks quite nice. See the picture below for the growth of subscribers per day. For the content I make, which is very time-sensitive as it's about the financial markets and analysis, a hobby, I don't need to edit videos and I got easy thumbnails. 3 videos a day sounds a lot, but it only takes me 1.5 hours a day, with the first video at 7am, then 1pm and then 7pm. Leaving more than enough time for my other workrelated activities.

I started the channel in 2022 in October and made a bit of content about the same topic, but it didn't really work for me with my schedule. On the 20th of February, I decided to pick it up again and fully go for it, making slightly different content that works with my schedule. It's very enjoyable so far.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Any updates? A lot can happen in 6 months!

 

[knz]

Any updates? A lot can happen in 6 months!

Progress Thread Update​

Sheesh! It's been a while but back again with an update. Thanks for your reply MJ, a lot has happened indeed.

I've actively started to plan my life using the 1 / 5 / 10 planesy since December 2022. Made my 10 year, 5 year and 1 year goals. Made myself a planner to also subdivide my yearly goals into monthly and weekly goals, which then translates into my daily activities (attached below). 2023 has been my most productive year. Clear vision of where I want to go, which also helped saying no to opportunities that came my way.

1. Speaking
2023 resulted in the most paid speaking gigs I had in a year. I started speaking in 2017 and did a lot of free stuff besides some paid gigs. In 2020 I had 16 paid, 2021 24 paid, 2022 27 paid (interesting that I spoke more during covid. However, the budgets were lower due to webinars instead of offline speaking), and in 2023 I had 38 speaking opportunities of which 2 were global events.

I thank this to my pro-active approach in January & February which I posted above. The goal was to have 50 speaking opportunities (not passed) and 2 global opportunities (passed). Eventhough I didn't reach 50, I got much further than I would've been without a clear and challenging goal.

2. Educational Business
This one has been quite a rollercoaster. Three marketing companies pitched in March to have us as a client. One was our clear favorite to do marketing, while another one was chosen to develop a new website/logo/look&feel. We weren't yet ready to start, but at least we madesome choices.

However, in July, August and September nothing happened. I knew some money was needed to launch the business, but I didn't expect how much was needed after the banker did all the calculations. I didn't have it just laying around and I received quite some pressure to get it done by the end of August. Felt a bit like my back against the wall or pushed in a corner. 1.5 months flew by and I didn't do anything while focussing on YouTube (see story below). Last week of August I checked some stuff but didn't manage to get anything done of course. In these two months, I didn't say a word to the others.

End of September we had a meeting where I opened up against the others explaining the situation. Obviously not happy with the silence, but understanding. It wasn't about the money itself, but the lesson to look for it. I felt different in July though. After this we continued again. Recording an online course, have people test it and give feedback, record some more etc.

I did notice my motivation went down as we continued but I wasn't able to pinpoint the reason. Was it the others? Was it it because of YouTube's success? Was it because of the subject of the educational business? Can it be that I add partners just to fill in a gap of motivation?

For this reason, I wanted to have a conversation with someone experienced in business. I had doubts and had difficulty figuring out what I wanted to do. So, I checked for a business coach - maybe it helps. Found a well-known guy in the Netherlands and sat down. Spoke about what I do and some of my struggles. Mentioned that I have all the IP and know-how, and the others can also be hired for content & finanical planning. So why not build it alone and hire / add others along the way?

Before Christmas I told my partners about the dip in motivation. Due to the holiday season I got some time to figure things out. Spoke to my lifelong friends and my dad, and that is when things got clear. I figured one of the issues I might have is splitting the company in 3. Did that once in the past, didn't go well. Is there an element of fear? I have been by myself for most of my entrepreneurial years. Is it difficult to let that go? Would be interested to hear if anyone here recognizes this.

Another 'issue' is that YouTube does well and I prefer spending time there throughout the year. So can 'time' be another challenge and if so, can I find a solution here?

These two guys invest a lot of time in the business and have a very strong belief in the content/product/vision and me. They are very motivated which is what I enjoy seeing. They have skills that move the business forward, saving costs of hiring people like this early on. And, we can talk with one another when we encounter difficulties, instead of figuring it all out myself.

Question is also if I'd be able to build this business by myself, alone, besides YouTube. Having 100% of nothing is less than x % of something. Not necessarily the right argument to have partners, of course. But I notice that having a team helps me.

As I got clarity about my feelings and doubts that impacted my motivation, I was able to reflect on it and make a decision: continue with the 3 of us and work on this business throughout the year. Starting by coming together every Thursday morning/early afternoon to work on content. This causes me to only miss one YT upload that day. During the rest of the week I can do some other smaller stuff like writing scripts.

The businessmodel will change, however. Based on calculations done by the banker just before Christmas, a marketing-approach is too expensive. The Cost per Customer is too high and we don't have a recurring revenue model. Pushing marketing also doesn't fit a Productocracy. Therefore, we will switch to a B2B model where we partner with organizations that reach our target audience. This can also become a recurring revenue model which is attractive. Our audience still has the option to follow courses through our B2C platform but it won't be the focus.

3. YouTube
Last time I wrote here, my YouTube channel had 379 subscribers. It feels unreal that the channel is now sitting at 6207 and generates an extra revenue stream. I'll explain:

YouTube wasn't in my 2023 plan... Life happens, I suppose. I'm also a trader and was part of some Discord communities that asked me to make some videos. Made a bit of a businessplan (picture) and wanted the channel to be very lean. I'm not an edittor or photoshop guy, so I simpy wanted to press record - finish the video - and ship it to YouTube. Everything is very lean. Same title for every video and made 30 thumbnails that I re-use constantly. I upload a financial market update at 7am, 1pm and 7pm if I can, which is true on most days. This was the progress:

February 20th - Start of the channel
March 15th - 379 subscribers (previous post)
April 23rd - 1000 subscribers
May 4th - First YT money earned : €5,49
May 11th - 100k total views reached
May 12th - First video to get past 1k views
May 25th - 2000 subscribers
July 15th - 250k views reached
July 22nd - 3000 subscribers
September 24th - 4000 subscribers
November 17th - 5000 subscribers
November 18th - 500k views
December 14th - First video hitting 10k views
December 21st - Yearly goal of 5600 subscribers reached (I made this goal when working on the businessplan for the channel)
January 7th 2024 - 6207 subscribers

In that time, I have received tons of messages of appreciation (pictures). I opened a Discord community on the 20th of March 2023, it now has 1401 members. I have 86 paying YT members as well divided over 4 membership levels. I replied to every comment and every message so far. I also regularly go live on YT to interact with the audience.

I sometimes do spend quite a lot of time making a video. Whenever I make a speaking mistake I tend to restart the recording. I know the audience doesn't mind but yea - perfectionism thing. When reading Unscripted for the second time recently I opened the book randomly.. Chapter 39: ''Kinetic Execution: everything significant started insignificantly - Perrfection is not obtainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence''. I now try to continue after short break and then edit the mistakes out. This takes less time than redoing a video when making a mistake.

I take YouTube as it goes. Nothing was planned, it's all on the spot. Listening to the feedback of the community and improving bit by bit. So far so good.

Summary
1) Speaking - Best year so far. Looking forward to 2024
2) Educational business - Continue with a team in 2024 and combine it with YT
3) YouTube - Unexpected success.

Happy to answer any questions and to receive any feedback from the community here. One of my goals for 2024 is spending a bit of time here every Sunday. More to come.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

I have 86 paying YT members as well divided over 4 membership levels.

2023 resulted in the most paid speaking gigs I had in a year.

Last time I wrote here, my YouTube channel had 379 subscribers. It feels unreal that the channel is now sitting at 6207

Wow, sounds like some nice traction. Are all of these activities synergistic, or entirely different fields? What topic are you speaking about?

I've actively started to plan my life using the 1 / 5 / 10 planesy since December 2022. Made my 10 year, 5 year and 1 year goals. Made myself a planner to also subdivide my yearly goals into monthly and weekly goals, which then translates into my daily activities (attached below). 2023 has been my most productive year. Clear vision of where I want to go, which also helped saying no to opportunities that came my way.

Nice, check out GoalSumo.com, it is the online version of the 1/5/10 system which I recently ditched in favor of the online version which is far more effective. An online tutorial is here if you'd like to experience it without visiting.

 

[knz]

Wow, sounds like some nice traction. Are all of these activities synergistic, or entirely different fields? What topic are you speaking about?

Morning MJ.

The fact YouTube got nice traction is another reason why I had so much difficulty making a choice with the educational business. Throughout the past months I have spend a lot more time on YT.

Speaking is in the field of gaming/esports. I speak about how to cope with gaming / screen-using children. At global events, or commercial events, I mostly speak how businesses can survive changing environments by implementing lessons from the gaming industry, and about opportunities and trends in the industry.

The educational business is in the field of gaming/esports as well. Also focused on how to cope with gaming / screen-using children. There's potential for a productocracy with the educational business. Courses have been sold in the past.

The YouTube channel is focussed on Elliott Wave analysis on Bitcoin. So it's a different industry and has no relationship with the educational business or the current speaking topics. YouTube fits the ''Balance is Bullshit'' part on page 333/334 in Unscripted in combination with 'Market Echoes', page 312.

Reading Unscripted for the second time got me thinking about a lot of things. One of these is focus. Can't get the part out of my head on page 333 of Unscripted : ''Be faithfully monogamous''. Makes me think of the book 'Essentialism' as well.

Page 370 and 371 in Unscripted were recognizable depending on the business.

Thanks for sharing the information about GoalSumo.com, I'll check it out!

 

[Vntonio]

The YouTube channel is focussed on Elliott Wave analysis on Bitcoin. So it's a different industry and has no relationship with the educational business or the current speaking topics. YouTube fits the ''Balance is Bullshit'' part on page 333/334 in Unscripted in combination with 'Market Echoes', page 312.

Oh, you are Koenz Trading on YouTube. Nice channel!

My opinion is to rush on it. It's crypto, lots of ways to monetize. More than that, you are gaining traction with it. The niche (finance/money making) it's not only future-proof, but the RPM is great on YT.

 

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[knz]

Oh, you are Koenz Trading on YouTube. Nice channel!

My opinion is to rush on it. It's crypto, lots of ways to monetize. More than that, you are gaining traction with it. The niche (finance/money making) it's not only future-proof, but the RPM is great on YT.

Correct indeed! Didn't expect someone here to know it so quickly with only a couple of thousand subscribers. Thanks Antoniol.

Appreciate you sharing your thoughts as well. There's indeed options here and I have some other ideas on how to scale the YouTube channel to increase control, which is my main commandment violation. Lots of potential. Some brainstorming and still some decisionmaking to do

 

[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

Speaking
Got three gigs this month, that's nice for January. Usually a very quiet month.

Educational business
Had a meeting last week about a name for the holding company, content packages, market/sales etc. A meeting with a designer is made early February to develop a new identity for the launch of the 2.0 version of the business. However, read struggles & questions below.

YouTube
Last week: 6207 subscribers
Today: 6654

This is the most subscribers I've gained in a week. Mainly thanks to doing livestreams on YouTube. One can also time it nicely if the market is moving quickly. Emotions are higher which results in people looking for information online. I did some livestreams at times in 2023, and noticed these did well. Based on this I put some more focus on the livestreams which really increased viewership numbers, engagement, subscribers and members. All numbers are up.

Improving the Commandment of Control
Last time I mentioned the commandment of control being an issue with YouTube. This got me thinking of opportunities to improve this control. Based on the livestreams and direct market feedback, I have two ideas that are interesting. However, I do realize that in order to really focus on this, I need to make a choice between the educational business and everything surrounding YouTube. Enough opportunities, not enough time.. Focus is necessary.

Short-form content
Someone making YT Shorts and followed my channel got in touch, asking if he could make shorts for me out of my longform content. I made some shorts in the past, but it wasn't great quality and didn't add much. However, I was looking into getting back into shorts. So it was a well timed email. He shared his portfolio and I'll ask if he can make a short from one video I make to basically test him with what he would do. If the quality is what I look for, he'll be the first editor of the channel focusing on short-form content that I can distribute across different channels.

Ideastorming - Getting a little taste
In a video I saw last year they explained a strategy where you write down a goal, and then write down 20 answers to achieve that goal, I believe it's called 'ideastorming'. Once you write down some answers, it becomes increasingly difficult to come up with a new answer which makes you really think about it. I executed this strategy and found that adding a new high-value high-priced YouTube membership level was the best option to achieve my goal. The moment I launched it with 4181 subscribers at the time, 10 people joined. The effort going in was immediately worth it. This short moment made quite an impact as I got a little taste of what I'm aiming for in the future: a productocracy business.

Other
Got approached by a car brand to help them with a campaign in the gaming/esports industry. It doesn't fit my goals for this year though. So I will have a second meeting but loop two other people in that can help them down the line so it doesn't require my time at a later stage.

Struggles & Questions
In my update last week I mentioned I made the choice to continue with the educational business after some doubts and motivational struggles. After talking to others about this, I felt like I found the 'why' behind it.

However, during a meeting last week I once again noticed my passivity and small doubts after. I don't really know why this is, but I really struggle.

I enjoy speaking about this topic, most of my gigs are about this. So I can't imagine it's the topic itself. I survived the desert of desertion already in the past. I have lots of echoes, But, something is still missing and I can't put my finger on it.

My feelings guided me in 2018 resulting in the best decision I've made so far. I feel like I'm at an important crossroad once again in my productocracy journey.

I wonder if there's other people here that had a similar situation in their life and how you went about it. What was the process that helps you make difficult decisions?

 

[knz]

Decision is made to fully stop the educational startup business. Everyone is informed, including the website host and the accountant. I continue speaking and will focus on the growth of YouTube. Shorts coming soon to diversify my content over different platforms. Aiming to launch my other business idea related to my YT channel (and gain control instead of being stuck with the 'Job Proxy Principle') by the end of the year. Feels like the right move.

 

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[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

Speaking
Received two global speaking invites last week. I know that one of these still consider another speaker as well. I don't know what the progression is with the other invitation. The agents are in touch with them.

I've been very inactive on LinkedIn the past year (and enjoyed that actually). But, I will write a little summary of 2023. Always helps to receive more invites throughout the year.

Educational business

Decision is made to fully stop the educational startup business. Everyone is informed, including the website host and the accountant. I continue speaking and will focus on the growth of YouTube. Shorts coming soon to diversify my content over different platforms. Aiming to launch my other business idea related to my YT channel (and gain control instead of being stuck with the 'Job Proxy Principle') by the end of the year. Feels like the right move.

The final update that includes the educational business. I continue to inform/help parents with gaming children through my book and speaking, but not through an online platform. There were a many reasons that led to this decision. It included the businessplan, geography and my personal feelings and focus.

Businessplan - Once we calculated that the cost per customer was too high for a full online marketing plan, we had to divert to B2B2C. Most of the B2B organizations that are interesting to us in this space are government funded and have limited budgets.

Geography - As most organizations are government funded, and each country will have different rulings and systems, scaling outside the country is very difficult. Some organizations require you to provide scientific proof of the models and systems that we use to help parents. However, all of our material is 'real life tested' for over 5 years and we know what works and doesn't. This isn't always enough. Have a university do research will take a couple of years, slowing down the progress. Increasing the commandment of Entry.

Personal feelings and focus - Two things kept me with the idea eventhough it never really took off. Sunk Cost Fallacy and Loss Aversion. The theme of the business is related to my past and I've been involved with this subject for 8 years now, and the educational business for 4 years. Not easy to let that go, especially the emotional side that holds on to it. I also constantly looked at what I lose if I make the decision, instead of what I gain. ''The pain of a loss is approximately twice as potent as the pleasure generated by a gain''. Instead of focusing on what I lose, I focused on what I gain. My feelings knew for months what choice I was going to make, my head didn't.

When looking at this model with regards to CENTS:
Control - Full control over the content, not full control when it comes to getting it to the audience
Entry - Difficult
Need - Medium. People experience problems, but the question is if these are big enough. An early sign may have been my book - published with one of the best publishers in the country and an experience co-author. We were on national TV and other media. The wife of the brother of the king endorsed it on live television when she brought the book with her to a talkshow. The sales were okay-ish but nothing special. The hurdle of paying for something seems high with lots of free info online, eventhough our models are unique and work nicely. Having people pay can be avoided by working B2B2C: the organization pays us, and parents follow the course for free. Is that need big enough? Questions.
Time - Medium, but can scale to good with employees. As the courses are online, one can make these once and have them be for a couple of years. The time sits in all meetings with potential partners. When the business grows, people can be hired to update the content or make new content, and do sales.
Scale - A bit of a thing as explained.

Happy with the decision. I have more focus, less stress, more clarity and more time for YouTube. I remain a speaker about this topic. Maybe in the future I come back to this as a passion project, but not anytime soon.

YouTube
Last week: 6654 subscribers
Today: 6907

For the first time, I reached over a 100k views and 1k subscribers in the last 28 days (standard YT Studio measurement). Youtube data tells me that the usual number should be between 53k - 65k views. Viewers watched content 118% more often from recommendations on YouTube (without changing thumbnails or titles), and watched 109% more content from YouTube search results. My top 10 most viewed videos in the last 28 days include 9 livestreams and one evergreen video that's always in my endscreen.

The livestreams have been really beneficial to the channel, while also very helpful to the audience. The live interaction is something I enjoy, and it seems other do to. I still upload my +-10 minute updates 3 times a day and will not upload a seperate 10min video if I am live around the usual upload time.

One viewer surprisingly made me a banner and logo as a gift. I won't use it as it's not the style of the channel, but it's very kind. Another viewer randomly made some thumbnails and showed me his ideas. We remained in touch and worked some stuff out as my thumbnails can definitely be improved a lot (skew). We got a few very easy designs and I will let the community vote for what they think is the best one. I will use their feedback together with my thoughts to get to a final design. This can also be a win-win situation, as the designer is in my Discord group and I can gift him the top membership as a thanks.

I didn't yet receive any shorts from the guy I spoke to, but we remained in touch and I know he's working very hard on doing his absolute best to make like 10 he said. Curious to see what comes my way hopefully soon as I want to get things going on that front.

11 months ago, there was no YouTube channel. But, unexpectedly, it grows much quicker than I ever imagined which caused me to make important choices. I feel focused, calm and have clarity. I look forward to my final progress update of the 2024 to see how far the channel has come.

 

[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

Speaking
Had two speaking gigs last week. 8 others are already planned. And agents continue to have conversations with several other opportunities, including the two global ones. Good start of the year so far.

YouTube
Last week: 6907subscribers
Today: 7235

Great progress with YouTube. Especially since I could only upload 1 out of 3 updates on Wednesday and Saturday, and nothing on Thursday. Livestreams continue to do very well with a lot of engagement. I enjoy doing livestreams though I do have to keep an eye on time. I have several goals per week and long streams can make it difficult to reach all goals.

Shorts
The editor from my community that approached me to make shorts finished his first video. He made a short from one of my 10min update videos. He really put a lot of effort into it and is incredibly motivated and dedicated. He reconstruated my whole analysis in vector graphic software, which includes making every candle and the tools I use. Took him 8 hours to make one short. Uff.

I forwarded this short to some people in my community and got some good feedback. I also decided to make a short myself (no editting) where I run through the analysis in the 10min update videos, but in 30 to 60 seconds. Also tested this with the community, and a combination of both seems to be best. If I record a short video, instead of him picking a part of my 10min update, he only has to put the 'make-up' on like subtitles, some transitions etc, and he's finished. This is probably the best way. I record something, he edits it in no-time, and then we put it online. Look forward to trying this next week.

Thumbnails
I also had the community vote for new thumbnail designs on livestream today. It's all about the design of the thumbnail and not the background. Things like the words / logo / my face. There's four designs we wanted people to vote for. I did five seperate votings during the stream and each time the background was different. Just so people see each design with different backgrounds, giving us the best idea of what people like. There's quite a clear winner so that's nice.

Planning to also do a voting in the Discord community to get more data. And then the designer and my opinion together with the community votes will decide the design I'll use for probably a long time.

Educational business - question
Said last time was the last post about the educational business but nope. A designer who was approached to potentially design a new logo/website send an invoice of 1.6k saying he already ''put work in preparation of the collaboration'' eventhough nothing was signed. It also happens to be a friend of the banker (potential partner) who surely wasn't happy with my decision. The designer had send an offer including logo/website/marketing work. At the time, we said we wanted to work together but only for the logo & website (replied by email). His offer wasn't signed as we had to receive a new one of course. I never received a new one in all weeks/months after. Nothing was signed.

I haven't seen the results of his 'preparation', which would be my first question to him (prove me). And I also want an hourly overview of the time invested, and what was done per hour, totalling this amount.

I'm not sure what the legal situation is here. Anyone has experience? The 1.6k is no problem, it's mainly a principle thing. I can pay it and get this over with. But, as nothing is signed and no confirmation was made based on a new offer, I do wonder what my rights are here. Will ask some people I know. See what happens.

 

[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

Speaking
Another webinar this week for 1100 children concludes speaking for the month. January is usually very quiet and there's been years there's nothing going on. So having three good opportunities is a nice start of the year.

Three more speaking opportunities are confirmed last week for later this year. Few in April and in November.

The agents are still discussing with the two bigger global opportunities. Not yet sure about the outcome. There's always a couple of speakers on the list. All I know is that I'm one of the last two options.

YouTube
Yearly update - 2023:
- Subscribers from 0 to 5831
- 593,351 views
- 50.4k watch hours
- 5 million impressions
- 6.2% CTR
- 57,9% found videos through the YT Browse features
- 11,8% found videos through YT search
- 97% is male
- Top 3 age-range is : 35-44 / 25-34 / 45-54
- Top 5 geographies: United States / United Kingdom / Netherlands / Germany / India
- Biggest revenue source: memberships

Monthly update - January
- Subscribers from 5831 to 7449
- 129.2k views
- 19.6k watch hours
- 585k impressions
- 7.2% CTR
- 56% found videos through the YT Browse features
- 13,8% found videos through YT search
- Videos growing my audience the most: livestreams
- Watch time from subscribers: 65,1%
- Watch time from non-subscribers: 34,9%
- Biggest revenue source: commissions

January has been the craziest month so far. Growth has been consistent, but untill january I didn't yet had a 1000+ subscriber month. 1.6k subscribers is great. The 3A strategy in a nutshell:

Act
Trying out some livestreams and observing the feedback (views, interaction, subscribers, other data).

Assess
I identified an increase in all numbers. Streams were also at the top of the ''Your top content'' in the last 28 days. Therefore, I adjusted the content from 3 shorter +-10 minute update videos a day, to doing close to daily livestreams in the afternoon (cet). America wakes up, its evening in Asia, and Europe is up and running.

Livestream attendance increased from about 60 to 80 people, to 150+ people on average. I also attracted a lot more new people to the channel - viewers checking out the content for the first time.

I'm now going to create more of a structured planning around my content so people have the right expectations. A normal video in the morning, a livestream in the afternoon, and a video in the evening (unless the market is volatile).

Weekly update
- Subscribers from 7235 to 7519
- 28.3k views
- 4k watch hours
- 139.5k impressions
- 8.1%% CTR
- Watch time from subscribers: 71,7%
- Watch time from non-subscribers: 28,3%

Another good week with stable growth. By this rate it should be possible to end February with 8.5k subscribers.

Thumbnails
New thumbnails are being used since a few days. Needs some more time to see if it has any effect. I eventually have to compare the CTR from videos with old thumbnails with the videos with new thumbnails.

Shorts
Not a lot of action here. Still talking with the 18 year old editor guy, a young entrepreneur which I like from Latvia. Recommended the MJ books and he's got them noted. He has great skills and can do a lot with vectors and overlays and I don't know what. As long as the short stays close to my style it's okay. We're still checking and testing. Will start uploading the first shorts next week (said the same last week... time to put in the work and start with the 3A's again).

The great rat race escape
I finished the book in about 3 weeks and loved it. Lots of material I recognize from Unscripted but packed and brought in a bit of a different way. Enjoyed the story of the Trottman's. An inspirational journey. I will write down some of the exercises and to-do's from the chapters here on the forum with future updates.

 

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[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

Speaking
Another gig confirmed for April. So far, there's 12 confirmed speaking opportunities this year and still a few in the pipeline. Good start of 2024.

YouTube
Weekly update
- Subscribers from 7519 to 7791
- 26.9k views
- 3.1k watch hours
- 258.4k impressions across video, livestream, shorts
- 8.4% CTR videos
- Watch time from subscribers: 73%
- Watch time from non-subscribers: 27.1%
- 50% watch videos & livestreams, 26% only livestreams, 24% only videos

Shorts
I uploaded 4 shorts last week, both on YouTube and TikTok

Youtube:
- 3k views
- 8.1k shown in feed
- 133 likes
- +5 subscribers

TikTok:
- 1.5k views
- 13 likes
- 5 people saved a short
- 5 followers

I don't have more data from TikTok as I didn't know I had to turn ''collect data''. Just noticed it. So I probably have more to share next week.

General
Solid progress with YouTube. Stable growth. I just started uploading shorts with the editor. They look good but we need more data and shorts to really see how shorts help the channel move forward. The Discord community continues to grow and sits at 1774 members at the moment. I also started to build an email list which might be useful in the future, as also shown in the great rat race escape . I currently have 201 emails.

I also started to create a mindmap and want to zoom out a bit more to make a bit of a plan of where I want to go long-term. The goal for this year is to simply grind YouTube and create a solid foundation.

Other
Was invited to consult on a campaign for a car company. Had two meetings and brought in someone I know very well. I will leave it to her and focus on YouTube myself.

 

[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

YouTube
Weekly update
- Subscribers from 7791 to 8436
- 42.5k views
- 6.5k watch hours
- 438k impressions across video, livestream, shorts
- 7.5% CTR videos
- Watch time from subscribers: 61.3%
- Watch time from non-subscribers: 38.7%
- Most subscribers gained during livestreams
- Most new viewers through livestreams
- Most returning viewers through livestreams

Shorts
I uploaded 2 shorts last week, both on YouTube and TikTok

Youtube:
- 2.1k views
- 3.6k shown in feed
- 155likes
- +0 subscribers

TikTok:
- 570 views
- 444 unique viewers
- 8 likes
- 11 profile views
- 1 saved a short
- 0 followers

General
Great week on YouTube, especially with the livestreams. I stream once a day in the afternoon (cet), with the morning and evening being regular update videos. The livestreams average about 200 people live now. The chat starts to move too quickly so I appointed a moderator. Someone very experienced as he's also a mod at some other channels. Well known in the communities of these channels. Therefore, he's also a 'superconnector' one could say, connecting me to other channels in the same niche and setting up collaborations like duo-livestreams. This can help the channel grow and is great to get to know people in the industry.

Shorts just started so we just continue making them. Views are good at least.

 

[knz]

Progress Thread Update​

YouTube
Weekly update
- Subscribers from 8436 to 8646
- 36.7k views
- 4.8k watch hours
- 166k impressions across video, livestream, shorts
- 7% CTR videos
- 6.7k Returning viewers
- 11.9k unique viewers

Shorts
I uploaded 1 short last week, both on YouTube and TikTok

Youtube:
- 1.8k views
- 3.6k shown in feed
- 134 likes
- +6 subscribers

TikTok:
- 255 views
- 213 unique viewers
- 4 likes
- 6 profile views
- 0 followers

General
A slower week as I uploaded less content due to having an international guest over and some personal celebrations. However, it remains solid progress with over 200 new subscribers. I will also be abroad in March so it will be a slower month. I will continue uploading content whenever I can though. At least the community knows as I always keep them informed so their expectations are correct.

Currently I'm still testing and checking the editor but he's done great work and I'm planning to add him as the first paid member of my team after March. He's incredibly creative and can do a lot more than just making shorts.

After March I will write more about the lessons I learned during this YouTube journey.

 

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