Notes from Chris

Episode 1169

Beck Power seemed to be living the digital nomad dream, building a diverse business from exotic places around the world. She wrote an ebook for finding cheap flights. She dropshipped bean bags from China. Eventually, she ended up starting a content marketing agency called Power Creative.

It was nice to make money while traveling, but like many a nomad before her, she started to feel like she was missing something.

It’s hard to build meaningful relationships when you move every few months. On a beach in Mexico, Beck realized that she had to be intentional about creating her own community.

Before long, she had an idea … to create a conference! The idea lined up with her love for bringing passionate people together and her own needs—it seemed like the right way to move forward.

The only question was: who would this conference be for? Beck began to do some research, and discovered there was not a single event or community just for women entrepreneurs who identified as LGBTQ+.

This was the community she wanted and needed to thrive personally—surely there were others out there who felt the same way.

She’d call it Queer Hustle, and the first live event would happen in just three months.

Los Angeles seemed like a good location. The city was large and LGBTQ+ friendly. So Beck made a Facebook group and invited people she already knew who would be a good fit. Six people, to be precise.

To generate buzz, Beck started to think outside the box. She wrote some parody songs on the guitar and uploaded them—those got her group a bunch of new members. She also visited the Facebook pages for other LGBTQ+ events in LA and invited people who had RSVP’d to join her own group.

These guerilla tactics worked, and the group swelled in size to over 400 members. And people were actively posting.

The Queer Hustle event was held with 78 attendees. As a first event, it had some stumbles. Not all of the speakers came through with great advice—she says now that she could have vetted them better—and the sandwiches weren’t a big hit with everyone, but the attendees loved being there together.

At the end of the event she launched the Queer Hustle Collective, a paid online community where people who were really engaged with their businesses could keep the momentum going for $29 per month.

That was two years ago. Since then, she’s held another conference in New York City, launched a different paid mastermind group, and planned her 2020 event in Austin, Texas. Total annual revenue is still under six figures, with much of that going to fund the live events. It’s still a side hustle in her eyes, but she’s dreaming of the day it takes over her agency’s income.

The greatest reward for now is knowing that she has found what was missing on that beach in Mexico so long ago: a supportive community, and a new role as the organizer.

 

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  MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Sign up for the next Queer Hustle conference at the Queer Hustle website.
• Queer Hustle Collective: Learn more and join Beck's online community.

SEE ALSO:

• Call Center Employee Uses Patreon to Fund LGBTQ Podcasts: A call center team lead uses Patreon to support two LGBTQ activism podcasts, earning over $800/month in contributions.
• Queer Punk Artist Starts Personal Finance Workshop: A manager for a non-profit organization who describes herself as a queer punk artist creates a series of personal finance classes.
• Program Manager Builds Conference Into 6-Figure Business: A Silicon Valley employee fed up with his company’s lack of emphasis on improving workplace culture starts a conference. Two years later, it’s his full-time job.

Inspiration is good; inspiration combined with action is better. Now get back to work!

Yours in the revolution,

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