Operation 11th Hour: Month 2 Update!
I have one quarter (January - March) to establish a viable business producing educational content. I’ve dubbed this mission… Operation 11th Hour!
Month 2 is complete! How’d it go?
The short answer is: I survived!
Operation 11th Hour basically entered a holding pattern. In January I could see that course sales would be much slower in February. I didn’t yet have a good plan to boost sales and get in front of new eyeballs.
So I elected to buy some time. I rallied some freelance work, coaching, and consulting to fill the hole… and it worked. (However, because I diverted time to this other work, course revenue probably dropped even further.)
The end result: February generated almost as much revenue as January. I remain in the same position as at the end of Month 1, which I described as “slightly good.” I’m in a decent place for the short term, but staying at the “slightly good” level will not cut it. The trend line’s gotta up.
What’s in store for Month 3? It might look a lot like this month because I’ll still be working on those freelance projects, which will take most of my time.
I definitely need to change things up and get fresh revenue flowing. Month 3 would be successful if I could generate some new momentum from the educational work while working on freelance projects.
Operator 11th Hour: Month 1 Update!
I have one quarter (January - March) to establish a viable business producing educational content. I’ve dubbed this mission… Operation 11th Hour!
Month 1 is complete! Where did I land?
The short answer is: 65%. I got 65% of a bulls-eye for the course launch.
Sales were… fine. They were slightly good. And I had good success in a few additional areas:
The Everything is a Remix newsletter had good growth.
I’ve been consistent with producing two articles per week.
The Remix site has gotten the most traffic since its heyday.
I tried Google Ads as a small experiment… and got an actual sale!
I started doing coaching and consulting and I’ve already arranged bookings for Month 2. I can help with ChatGPT training, video and creative consultation, and more. If you’re interested in working with me directly to help with education or your projects, reply to this email.
Overall, Month 1 sales results are mixed.
On the one hand, it’s a decent start and I’m still learning.
On the other hand, this was a launch, which is when you get to ride downhill for a bit. Month 2 will be all uphill, at least for the video course.
All in all, I need to regroup and find some high-leverage plays. Here are a couple upcoming attempts.
Videos are returning to the YouTube channel! The first one is already up!
I’m launching affiliate sales. If you register as an affiliate and sell a copy of my course via your link, you’ll make approximately fifty bucks. (Details TBD)
However, I’m not sure I’ve got anything on deck that can turn the ship quickly. So I called in the cavalry. I’m doing some commission work to relieve some short-term pressure. This will slow the progress on my business, but it’ll give me some financial runway and some space to reflect and re-orient.
Operation 11th Hour
Image created with DALL-E
As mentioned last week, I have one quarter (January - March) to establish a viable business producing educational content. I’ve now dubbed this mission… Operation 11th Hour!
Sounds campy but also serious. Yeah, it is!
This is my final attempt at making an independent business work. If the numbers don’t add up come April, that’s it, and I move on to pursuing in-house opportunities.
The primary revenue vehicle for this is my new video course, Create Content with ChatGPT and AI 2024. (If you’ve not bought it yet, you should and you can still save $50.)
I’m now two weeks into Operation 11th Hour. How’s it going?
So far… it’s working! However, please brace yourself for a rather enormous “but.”
BUT!
This is the part that often works: the launch.
The challenge when selling digital products is to keep the faucet of sales flowing over the coming weeks and months. It’s very common to see sales stop entirely not long after launch. My daily battle is to keep the sales going.
I got a small win this week because week 2’s sales actually surpassed week 1’s. That’s no mean feat.
A huge win would be if month 2's sales exceeded month 1’s. How can I do that?
Firstly, through ongoing sales efforts, day in and day out.
And secondly, I’m gonna try something crazy…
Video.
I’m sure many of you are old enough to remember when I retired from video content creation. Yes, something like that did happen!
But actually, it was more specific than that. I quit doing the kind of video production I’d been doing for years: making cool videos and praying. That kind of video-making is indeed over.
When you don’t have a business model, video content doesn’t make sense. I now have one, so video makes sense.
For Operation 11th Hour, I’m trying some new things and some uncomfortable things, like ongoing sales. But I also want to play to my strengths. I need to break out the big guns for this battle… and that’s video.
So videos are coming to the YouTube channel! (I also might make a video for a large newspaper I’m sure you’re familiar with.)
Are you somehow not subscribed to my YouTube channel? I command you to go do that too.
Wading into a cold sea of indifference
Image created with Midjourney
Prompt: middle-aged man poised to dive into a cold sea of indifference --ar 16:9 --s 50 --v 6.0
Folks, I am bracing for a tough winter. I live in Southern California so it’s not the weather that’s gonna be tough. It’s my professional life. Here’s where I’m at.
If you don’t believe, why bother?
In the spring of last year, I officially pulled the plug on my old career. The business model for that era was this: make the best videos I could, give them away, money happens. That method worked extremely well for me once, about a decade ago, but it was in terminal decline for a while before I finally let it go.
For the rest of 2023, most of my income was generated by awesome freelance projects for people like Sysdig and Sandwich Video, Generation Genius, Nick Milo and Linking Your Thinking, and Bloomberg Law.
But alongside this work, I was creating impressive growth selling educational products through the Everything is a Remix site. My first little hit was a downloadable guide to writing in ChatGPT. I followed that up by selling pre-orders for an on-demand video course about creating content with ChatGPT. That course is by far the most successful product I’ve ever created.
Even though my educational ventures did well last year, it was still a minority of my income and nowhere near being a livelihood.
My objective this year is this: turn my educational work into a real business. That means it entirely provides for me and my family.
And I don’t have a full year to prove this is viable: I have one quarter. If the metrics aren’t good enough come April, it ends there and I look for in-house opportunities.
One of three futures will arrive come spring.
This attempt fails utterly.
I land somewhere in between and have to make a judgment call.
This works well enough to continue the pursuit.
You won’t hear me say this again, but number 1 is the most likely outcome. That’s the reality for all businesses – they mostly fail.
But I’m putting on the blinders… now. I am going to run at number 3 with all my might, with moronic optimism. If you don’t believe, then why bother? I believe.
Weathering my winter of suck
The product that will decide my fate is Creating Content With ChatGPT and AI 2024. If it can generate the right revenue this quarter, then the journey continues onward into the spring. If not, the path ends there and I move on to something else that is not running my own business.
I am by no means a master of online sales, but I’ve done enough to know this: launches are the easy part.
I have loyal fans and this product had a good launch. But I am now leaving the warm confines of my fandom, you guys, the people who know me and like me and trust me. This winter I am wading into a cold sea of indifference.
I will be doing sales and marketing all day, every day, for three months straight, weekends included. And I’ll be doing it to people who don’t know how I am and don’t care. Rejection and above all, indifference will be constant. Every day I’ll need to generate momentum and sales.
This winter is gonna be challenging. Here’s what will help me weather it.
I am extremely fortunate to otherwise have an awesome life. I will be grateful for it throughout.
I’m gonna celebrate every little win, every click, every newsletter subscriber, every sale.
Above all, I’m grateful that I get to give my all and try. I’m prepared, I’m ready, I’m gonna give this everything I’ve got and the chips will fall where they may.
How can I help?
Some of you might be wondering how you can help. Here are a few ideas.
Buy the course (you can still save $50!)
Share the course on social media
Talk to your company or organization about taking the course or bringing me in for instruction, either on-location or virtual.
Every little thing you can do to help spread the word means a lot to me, folks.
Lastly, if you’re still not sure if you think the course is for you, check out this free chapter which I’m sharing with you guys first, My Journey With ChatGPT.
50 free book summaries on Blinkist
I have a playlist of 50 awesome book summaries on Blinkist, and they’re totally free. They’re mostly about personal improvement, productivity, creativity, and business. Complete list below.
The Female Brain - Louann Brizendine
Thinking, Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman
Expert Secrets - Russell Brunson
Traffic Secrets - Russell Brunson
The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding - Al Ries and Laura Ries
Design for How People Learn - Julie Dirksen
How We Learn - Benedict Carey
Testing Business Ideas - David J. Bland and Alexander Osterwalder
Daring Greatly - Brené Brown
Burn the Boats - Matt Higgins
From Strength to Strength - Arthur C. Brooks
Hyperfocus - Chris Bailey
ReWork - Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
$100M Offers - Alex Hormozi
Focus - Daniel Goleman
Life in Five Senses - Gretchen Rubin
How Minds Change- David McRaney
Discipline Is Destiny - Ryan Holiday
Think Again - Adam Grant
Chatter - Ethan Kross
Where Good Ideas Come From - Steven Johnson
Messy - Tim Harford
Thinking in Systems - Donella H. Meadows
Nonviolent Communication - Marshall B. Rosenberg
Mindfulness - Mark Williams and Danny Penman
Wherever You Go, There You Are - Jon Kabat-Zinn
Full Catastrophe Living - Jon Kabat-Zinn
Flow - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Building a Second Brain - Tiago Forte
The Willpower Instinct - Kelly McGonigal
Indistractable - Nir Eyal
How to Grow Your Small Business - Donald Miller
Atomic Habits - James Clear
The Male Brain - Louann Brizendine
How to Raise a Wild Child - Scott D. Sampson
The Myth of Normal - Gabor Maté with Daniel Maté
The Extended Mind - Annie Murphy Paul
Effortless - Greg McKeown
How to Begin - Michael Bungay Stanier
Building a StoryBrand - Donald Miller
Late Bloomers - Rich Karlgaard
Ultralearning - Scott H. Young
The 1-Page Marketing Plan - Allan Dib
Life Is in the Transitions - Bruce Feiler
This Is Marketing - Seth Godin
Hooked - Nir Eyal
Hacking Growth - Sean Ellis & Morgan Brown
Make Time - Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky
Build - Tony Fadell
Exactly What to Say - Phil M Jones