This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Hello there, it's Chris Guillebeau with you once again for Side Hustle School. Now, as you probably know, every day on the show, there's a different story of someone creating an income generating project without quitting their job. What you may not know is that as the show has rolled along throughout the year, somewhere around 15 to 20% of our stories are coming straight from listeners. And they followed the admonishment, let's call it a suggestion of how inspiration is good but action is better, and they have been creating their side hustles. As you can probably imagine, it's fun for me to read these stories.
I think you will like today's. And I would also encourage you to ask, what can you take away from each day's story? You're not gonna relate to each story. You may not wanna do what that person is talking about. You may have a different skillset, but still there's usually something you can learn.
I believe that everyone has something to contribute and we can all learn from everyone else. Okay, so today's story is about web design. In particular, a German agency, which recognized a few months ago that a lot of their clients and prospective clients didn't have a lot of money to spend on design. And a lot of designers are frustrated because their clients are expecting a great looking website but they don't have much money to spend. Now in the story, I'll tell you about the solution that this person came up with.
But I also think this model applies to a lot of industries. And if you're in an industry that is rapidly changing and there is essentially a devaluation of skills or a lot fewer people just don't want the product anymore, you can stand your ground and choose to resist and you may be successful for a while or you may find other clients or other customers, but you may also find over time that it's pretty hard to do that. And what might be better is to understand that the world has changed in some way, but also people still have needs and maybe there's a way that you can change too. As I said, today's story is a great model of that and I'll bring you that story in just a moment. [Music]
More and more people are deciding to start side hustles every day.
And many of those people need a website. Preferably not just any website, but one that looks good and the potential customers can navigate easily. While this may sound like good news for web designers, it can sometimes have the opposite effect. Clients with new businesses or an idea to start a side hustle usually have small budgets. That reduces the earnings for designers or clients might opt to build parts of the websites themselves which then greatly restricts the creativity on the designer's part.
So how can budding designers be more productive, profitable and creative in today's online world? Well, side hustler Anya Merritt in Berlin, Germany seems to have come up with a solution. Anya has been listening to Side Hustle School since we started and she noticed a trend in a lot of the stories we feature. More and more hustlers are trying to keep startup costs low by using bootstrapping techniques, including designing and building their own websites. A lot of them use templated sites like Squarespace, Wix and others, which is fine, but what does it mean for a designer used to building someone's whole website?
Anya also recognized this trend of decreasing budgets from her day job in customer relations for a web design firm. She wanted to find a way to help busy people get more done in less time and work with lower rates without damaging their bottom line. So working with a close-knit team from that web design firm, they came up with a solution. They would create all-in-one DIY user interface kits that are highly customizable, but require less time-intensive work up front. Now, what does that actually mean?
As Anya describes it, it's kind of like a Lego kit for websites. They essentially give you or a designer the box with all the pieces, like headers, footers, content blocks, et cetera, a guidebook, some step-by-step instructional videos, and from there, it's up to you to decide how to drop the pieces into place. You can follow the guide or you can find ways to create new designs from what you've been given. All of this gives designers lots of room to play and be creative while still saving time. And it also allows advanced designers and coders to add further customizations should they want or need it.
Anya and the team built this with the everyday side hustler in mind, no professional design or website building skills required. They decided that these kits should be downloadable from their website, and then they started thinking about what to charge for them. After the first kit was complete, the team sat down, looked at the components, and asked what price will make it irresistible, but still give us a good enough profit. And that's how they made their decision. Their first kit contained 83 different customizable modules and was called the unicorn bundle at a price point of 50 euros, or about $59.
Then they built a somewhat smaller kit with 57 modules called the mermaid kit. That one is 33 euros, or about $39. Anya said that they create their kits with magical names because they hope to give their customers a bit of magic to work with. In order to battle test their idea, they released their products in stages. They did a soft launch in April that brought in a handful of sales and continued to do so for the next few months.
But it was during their first big product launch in August that they ended up seeing much better results. In fact, they sold 332 kits for an impressive 10,142 euros, or just under $12,000. Now they had some real startup costs in building this, so that wasn't all profit. And they also decided to reinvest that profit so they could continue to develop more products. Anya calls this new side hustle Divi Den, and the most effective forms of marketing for it have been search engine advertising and offering what they call freebies.
These freebies are generally simple, one-page websites and basic coded templates that designers and site owners alike can download for free and begin using right away. If the designer wants to do any more work, they either have to build the additional pages manually or take the much easier option of upgrading to a premium product that allows you to build out as many pages as you'd like. Anya says this has been really effective because the freebies get people in the right places talking about your product. For example, one post from a freebie user on a design Facebook group mentioned how good their free products are, which led to lots of new signups and new customers. And that happened with little to no time investment from Anya.
If you're thinking of starting a similar side hustle, Anya recommends that you pay attention. In this experience, Anya found a real problem that designers were having and created a solution to it that fit with the common practice of web design and building WordPress websites. Maybe there's something out there that you can spot. Going forward, Anya and her team at Divi Den are looking to the future of WordPress, lots of new themes and updates that will allow them to create new solutions. They're making more products and they're currently in the process of developing a bundle called Pixi, which they're planning to launch very soon.
Pixi dust sold separately. A real world model and case study in the power of observation. Congratulations to Anya and her team. This comes straight from the world of paying attention. It also comes from the world of recognizing that industries change.
And like I said in the beginning, you can just resist that change or you can adapt. Generally speaking, I think it's better to adapt. I might have more to say about that in the weekly recap tomorrow 'cause I think it's important. And while we're on the subject of change and solutions, I have a book recommendation for you. This week I'm reading "Building a Story Brand" by Donald Miller, who I'm fortunate to call a friend now, but actually read his books years before I met him.
The subtitle of this book is "Use the Seven Elements of Great Storytelling "to Grow Your Business." I often talk about having an origin story, having a reason for why you develop any particular product or service or other idea, and being really clear about why that product or service is gonna help someone. Now in today's story, the need is very clear, the solution is very clear. And I think that's why they were able to do an $11,000 launch, the first time they really tried to market it. I also think they'll be able to go on and do much more. So if you're trying to figure out what your message is or how to clarify that message for people, this book is great.
It's already helped me and I haven't even finished it yet. Once again, that's "Building a Story Brand" by Donald Miller. I hope you enjoy today's episode. As always, inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is better. Today's show notes are at sidehustleschool.com/294.
The weekly recap is coming up tomorrow. I look forward to returning then. This is Chris Guillebeau for "Side Hustle School." [Music]
