a single source, nothing corroborates it · contested
Stack the audience assets one on the next
A blog feeds a podcast, which feeds a first small paid product, which feeds a community and then a book, each one supplying the readers for the next over years. The doubt attached to it is that so many people now run this same sequence that the returns it used to produce may no longer be there.
Where this splits
The stacked blog, podcast and small product sequence is offered as the reliable route, and separately doubted by someone who lived off it for eight years.
5 claims against 1
Justin Jackson
Stack blog, podcast, product and community over years
- 01Stack the audience assets for years before you depend on them: a blog, then a podcast, then a first tiny paid product, then a paid community, then a book - each one feeding the next.
- 02Point every teaching product at one audience and one recurring problem so the audience compounds instead of fragmenting.
The platform and ebook playbook may no longer pay
The old ebook-and-course playbook of building a platform and following may no longer pay off, because so many people now run it simultaneously.
- 03Set the quality bar high on your first paid teaching product, because those early students become the long-term customers for the software you launch later.
- 04Use your own new product as the live case study for the audience you already teach, so building it doubles as content.
- 05Launch small projects continuously for years so that audience, connections, skills and instincts compound into the one that works.
What it returned
- 2008
Justin's sequence ran 2008 blog, 2012 podcast, 2013 first small product, 2014 paid club, 2015 book, arriving at the end of 2015 with 9,085 email subscribers and 7,852 Twitter followers before going solo.
- 17
Nathan Barry freelanced as a web designer at 17, was earning $2k a month from App Store apps by 21, made $26,679 in 24 hours from his first design book at 22, and founded ConvertKit at 23; it now does $40 million in annual revenue at a $200 million valuation.
Justin planned to feed everything he learned building Transistor back into his Tiny Wins tutorials.
Chris Guillebeau made a good living from online publishing for eight years and now doubts his own earlier instructions still work.
Sources
- Going independent (2016 year in review)Justin Jackson · justinjackson.ca · Starting small · undated · dissenting
- Compounding returnsJustin Jackson · justinjackson.ca · Compounding returns · undated · dissenting
- Why I'm building a new SaaS in 2018Justin Jackson · justinjackson.ca · What's next? · undated · dissenting
- Unconventional bootstrapping: round 1Justin Jackson · justinjackson.ca · 3. Build your audience now (instead of later) · undated · dissenting
- Is the market for self-published books saturated?Justin Jackson · justinjackson.ca · Is the market for self-published books saturated? · undated · dissenting
the second source
Three plays a week, for the phase you are in
No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.
More in community
- Make your members the content6 unconnected
- Assemble the audience before the product5 unconnected · contested
- Sell the gathered audience something other than ads5 unconnected
- Teach your own people before you sell them anything4 unconnected
- Choose the small room over the big booth4 unconnected · contested
- Ask the forum before you ask your friends4 unconnected