Ali Abdaal Profile picture
May 19, 2020 16 tweets 6 min read Read on X
“How to make money online” just went up - . here’s the takeaways if you cba to watch it - thread 1/
Money is a medium for exchanging value. Therefore, to make money, you have to provide value. 2/
There are 3 forms of value that people will pay for. These are the ‘3 Levels’ of making money online: (1) Services, (2) Products, (3) Attention. 3/
Level 1 - Services. Step 1 = Develop a skill / service that people would pay for. Step 2 = Find people to pay you for it. This is great for beginners (it’s how I started) but ultimately it’s dependent on your time. We want to scale up. 4/
Level 2 - Products. The ideal product has a fixed cost of production, and zero cost of maintenance, reproduction and distribution. Digital Products fit that bill best.

On level 2, we can sell other people’s products (Basic), or we can sell our own products (Expert). 5/
Level 2 Basic involves selling other people’s products via dropshipping and affiliate marketing etc. I’m not a huge fan of the dropshipping stuff (never tried it tbh and it looks quite scammy from the outside) but affiliate sales are great. 6/
Level 2 Expert involves selling our own products. We could try selling physical products but that’s quite hard (good job @PatFlynn and @CalebWojcik for the SwitchPod - there’s a good episode of Smart Passive Income where they talk about this). 7/
Alternatively, we could try selling software (eg: website, app, SaaS). This is also quite hard - *in general* you need to know how to code to a decent standard (or find a cofounder who does). Plenty of material about this in books, podcasts, YouTube, everywhere. 8/
My favourite way of making money by selling products is by selling info-products. Things like online courses, eBooks, digital downloads. @seanwes does a good job of this and has some great material on how to do it better. 9/
BUT we can make all the online courses we want, but unless we find people willing to buy them, we ain’t going to make any dollar. Level 3 is when we supercharge our money-making powers by leveraging Attention. 10/
‘Attention’ is what you get by building an audience. When you launch something (eg: a service or a product) you’ll have an audience of people who know, like and trust you, who are 100x more likely to hear about and pay for the value you’re offering. 11/
How do you build an audience? By giving out a tonne of value for free, on the internet, consistently, over a long period of time. You can tweet, blog, podcast, make videos - the medium doesn’t matter. What matters is showing up, providing value, and doing it repeatedly. 12/
I’ve been trying to follow the @garyvee playbook for past 3 years. The audience of people who know, like and trust me is now pretty big, and I couldn’t be more grateful. Firstly because it’s nice to be ‘famous’ in that way and help people out etc... 13/
And secondly because lots these people are buying the products that I’m selling lol eg: my online classes on @skillshare, my affiliate marketing bits (eg: @paperlike, @epidemicsound) and signing up to sponsors (eg: @brilliantorg, @CuriosityStream etc). 14/
To leverage attention to make money, you don’t even need a huge following. @kevin2kelly’s seminal essay “1000 True Fans” shows the power of having a small but loyal audience - kk.org/thetechnium/10… 15/
If you’re interested in this stuff, read these 3 books: - 4hWW by @tferriss , Show Your Work by @austinkleon , and then “Anything You Want” by @sivers. Thanks for your ‘attention’ hehe

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More from @AliAbdaal

Nov 14
Fear of failure can hold us all back, but I’ve found a simple mindset shift that helps me take the plunge without being paralysed by fear: I treat everything as an experiment. 🧵👇 Image
1/9

An experiment isn’t about succeeding or failing. It’s about testing a hypothesis, learning, and collecting data. So, whenever I feel jitters about a new project, I reframe it as an experiment to take the pressure off.

Here’s how it works:
2/9

1️⃣ Start with a goal

What’s something you want to achieve?

For example, let’s say you’re aiming to start a YouTube channel.
Read 11 tweets
Oct 28
1/7 🧵 5 Things I Got Wrong About Productivity

I used to think productivity was all about discipline, perfect time management, and cramming as much as possible into my calendar.

Here’s what I’ve realised over the years:
2/7 Productivity isn’t just discipline

It’s more about feeling good—being happier, less stressed, and more energised. When I feel good, my to-do list is way easier to tackle.
3/7 It’s not just time management, it’s energy management

Time is fixed, but energy isn’t. It’s about optimising tasks around my natural rhythms, not just filling the calendar with tasks.
Read 7 tweets
Apr 3
I used to make the mistake of thinking that I could fit everything into my life.

Work, hobbies, fitness, friends, family, a side-hustle, chores AND time to rest and recover.

But the truth is that we DON’T have time for everything. And that’s okay 👇 Image
There’s a pretty common metaphor used to describe how you should prioritise your life, and it goes like this.

Imagine your life is an empty glass. The things you consider to be the foundations of your life - your family, your job - are big stones that you put into the glass.
All the other aspects of your life—friends, fitness, a side hustle—are the small stones. They fit in between the gaps of the big rocks.

In theory, this means you put the most time and effort into those big foundation rocks, and anything left over can find room at the edges.
Read 13 tweets
Feb 25
We all want to get the best night's sleep possible.

Here's a mega thread of top tips to improve your sleep routine 🧵
1) It starts in the morning 🌞

Exposure to light in the morning sets our body clocks properly. Taking a walk first thing will give your body the light it needs to tell the time and start your day right.
2) Take 20 minute naps 😴

The occasional afternoon nap can be really beneficial. As long as you don’t sleep for more than 20 minutes, you'll wake up more alert and with more energy for the rest of your day. Try it next time you're procrastinating 😜
Read 21 tweets
Feb 24
How can we build a life that we love?

This is an evidence-based life design framework that I come back to every few years. I hope it helps you too 🧵
Step 1: Identify what matters to you

Step 2: Experiment with ideas

Step 3: Iterate on the good parts
Step 1: Identify

On a scale of 1 to 10, how much do you love the life that you’re living?

Try putting a number to your happiness levels. Now, write down the areas of your life that are contributing to that score, both positive and negative.
Read 16 tweets
Jan 12
I wasted seven years of my life.

And it was all because I was scared.

But you don’t have to learn the hard way.

Here's how to stop fear holding you back.
It took me seven years to make my first YouTube video and launch my business.

I’d block out time in my calendar and sit down to film, but for some reason I just couldn’t do it and I didn’t know why.

At first I thought I was being a perfectionist.
I didn’t want to make bad videos that didn’t live up to my standards.

But when I really thought about it, I realised that I was wrong.
Read 10 tweets

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