In 2018 I was running a small and very stressful ($500k~/yr) creative agency with and quickly realized the only path to scale was hiring more people (and become more inefficient).
Then I stumbled on this from @naval, required reading:
Then I stumbled on this from @naval, required reading:
A few concepts that snapped a few previously disconnected neurons together for me:
- Lean into "play"
- Publish recognizable work
- Build things with zero-cost of replication
"Earn with your mind, not your time."
@visualizevalue became a meta execution of the above.
- Lean into "play"
- Publish recognizable work
- Build things with zero-cost of replication
"Earn with your mind, not your time."
@visualizevalue became a meta execution of the above.
Combining my curiosity (commerce, first principles, philosophy) with my competence (design, brand, communication).
1,000+ visual iterations in a very restrained style (build recognizable work).
1,000+ visual iterations in a very restrained style (build recognizable work).
The equity & eyeballs created by 1,000 iterations created opportunity to experiment with products:
Prints (failed)
Wallpaper (made a few hundred bucks)
Worksheets (started to to get traction)
Community (2,000+ members to date)
Digital Product ($180k/rev in July)
Prints (failed)
Wallpaper (made a few hundred bucks)
Worksheets (started to to get traction)
Community (2,000+ members to date)
Digital Product ($180k/rev in July)
The fundamental change was moving from:
Responding to demand (agency business)
To creating demand (product business)
Responding to demand (agency business)
To creating demand (product business)
And, building an asset that increases in value vs. clocking in to sell time every day.
Producing something once, and leveraging software to deliver it as many times as you can find people to buy it.
The formula is simple, leverage free platforms that aggregate attention to drive traffic to product.
Also worth noting that very little happened on the product side for close to a year, but publishing did massively increase inbound interest in design/consulting work, so no real downside.
For context, I had 10~ jobs before this, lasted about 9 months in each on average.
The two products that have driven the most revenue:
How to Visualize Value
A "zero to one" guide to simple, impactful design.
howto.visualizevalue.com
How to Visualize Value
A "zero to one" guide to simple, impactful design.
howto.visualizevalue.com
and
Build Once, Sell Twice (The Productization Playbook)
A curriculum that breaks down the above journey from overarching principles to specific tactics.
shop.visualizevalue.com/products/build…
Build Once, Sell Twice (The Productization Playbook)
A curriculum that breaks down the above journey from overarching principles to specific tactics.
shop.visualizevalue.com/products/build…
