This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
Welcome to Throwback Thursday/Where Are They Now, our weekly segment where we take an in-depth look at someone whose story has evolved considerably since we first featured them. So far in these segments, we have had a New York City musician with a blog. That blog is about teaching jazz if it comes in multiple six-figure business. We've had a guy doing citywide scavenger hunts, a woman leading food tours in Denver, and more. Now, today in our latest feature, we'll hear from the person behind one of my all-time favorite stories.
I told her a story early on in the podcast and then later live in person to audiences in about 25 cities during the side hustle tour in the fall of 2017. So you'll hear more directly from her, but in short, she has found a very creative way to help new immigrants who are preparing for the US citizenship exam. She does this without them paying anything forward at all. It's completely free, but she's able to earn a significant amount of money herself because of how she monetizes through YouTube. This is what's so cool about this project.
And in fact, in this update, she'll tell us about a huge jump she's experienced in subscribers and income since we first featured her. So let's hand it over to her and I'll be back at the end to wrap us up. Hi there, this is Danielle from Essa Group in Washington, DC. My side hustle is teaching citizenship classes and civics lessons on YouTube. It was featured on episode 94.
I am currently teaching citizenship classes and ESOL classes in the community. I volunteer with different organizations in the community doing that. And a lot of my students, because the classes run eight to 12 weeks at a time, they can't always make every class. So I started putting my lessons on YouTube for them so they could catch up and review. And what happened was I noticed that people from all over starting to watch the lessons and workshops and started gaining a following.
Then what we did was we turned on the monetization for the YouTube channel and the videos I was making just to kind of see what would happen. And it really took off. I was surprised. And now I feel like I'm connected through this YouTube channel with people all over the world asking questions and trying to figure out the process. And it's developed into not just going through the steps of what you have to know for the interview, but also I do a lot of interpreting the government websites because government websites can be so intimidating, especially.
It's like link after link after link. And English is obviously their second language. And it's just so confusing, the amount of red tape and forms they have to fill. So I work on just bringing it down to very simplistic terms and step number one, step number two, go here, fill out this form this way. And then I've also developed a network of people with different law organizations and different citizenship organizations around the country that I could work with.
And then if someone is having trouble, they write to me right on my channel. I try to actually answer every single question that comes in. And if they're having trouble connecting with what I'm trying to explain, I could connect them directly with somebody in their area. And so it's teaching citizenship, teaching ESOL, teaching how to do the interview, but then also being very specific in helping them through the process. I was going to go back to '94 to see how many subscribers I had, but I do remember I was making about $2,000 a month.
I'm not sure how many subscribers. But since then, I'm continuing to update my lessons and the videos to reflect all the changes in the current administration. But now I have over 93,000 subscribers and at 100,000 subscribers, YouTube award will award me like a silver creator award. Not sure what all that entails, but it's a recognition for getting to 100,000 subscribers. So I have that kind of goal in mind now before when I was like, "Oh, my goal was 25,000 and 50,000." And I'm like, "Oh no, I got to get to 100,000." So I'm at 93,000 subscribers and actually from $2,000 a month, I'm making basically about $10,500 a month on YouTube right now.
So it has been quite the increase in income, which has been great since I have one child in college and another one coming up. So it has been really, really helpful in that respect and it's more intensive, but I'm actually really happy doing it and it still brings so much joy to me every day and every day is different because people's stories are incredible and they're all so different. I think that my YouTube channel has been successful because I do really try to work hard on building a positive community. And like I said, I spend a couple hours every day answering questions and researching things for people. Sometimes it'll take me two seconds to answer a question.
Other times I'll spend an hour researching this one question for one person. But basically building this positive community where then they're able to talk and especially with the subject matter, the channel could go, I get some pretty hateful comments here and there, but they're just gone, just kind of like, I don't even pay attention anymore and they're just deleted and I don't allow them in the community. So kind of really growing that safe, positive community, I think keeps people coming back. Well, if you can't tell, I am such a big fan of Danielle's work. This is the exemplary model of service that is both socially rewarding and financially rewarding, two really good things.
And if you're thinking, wow, this is pretty cool, I wonder if I could do something like this. I actually think there is still room with many different topics for someone to come forward and use YouTube or also podcasting could be another medium, providing answers and tutorials as to what that topic could be. Well, I think anything that is new and confusing could be a good option. Could be blockchain or cryptocurrency, for example, something that a lot of people are interested in, but very few people understand. But it could also be something timeless, doesn't have to be the new hot thing, could just be something timeless that just doesn't get a lot of attention online.
And I keep seeing more and more people doing well with this format, especially those that stick with it, like Danielle. Now, it does take hard work, it takes consistency. You heard it from her, she's online answering these questions every single day. But if you find that suitable topic, it may be worth it. So I am grateful to Danielle for helping us out with this segment.
Definitely go and check out her channel, we'll link it up in the show notes page. And we'll be doing these new segments throughout 2020. Let me know what you think and who you'd like to see featured from our archives of more than 1000 stories. 2020 is our year of interaction. If you have a question, if you'd like to update us about your hustle, or if you'd like a free civics lesson, just come to sidehustleschool.com/questions.
Our show notes today are at sidehustleschool.com/1146. That is for episode 1146. Be sure to do one thing today to get closer to a goal you believe in. Be sure you're subscribed and come back tomorrow. My name is Chris Guillebeau, this is Side Hustle School.
From the Onward Project.
