This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
When his old high school football coach reaches out to him, a sales professional creates a program to foster leadership skills in athletes. This program now brings in a six figure side income every year as a subscription service. Recurring revenue is key. What's up everyone, welcome to Seto School. This is your host, Chris Guillebeau.
I have the privilege of bringing you these stories. Now this one is the opposite of a generic coaching service. It's really interesting because it has a clear market. And even though it's a broad market, the amount of content and activities this guy has created is really impressive. I think it's why it's become such a sustainable program.
And he's also made a few key decisions along the way. So we'll look at that as we go along. At the end of the episode, I'll have some advice for anyone interested in either the world of coaching or in having recurring revenue. That story is coming right up. It's called Former High School Athlete Creates Coaching Subscription.
[Music]
Six years ago, Adam Bradley was asked by his old high school football coach if he would come speak to the next generation of players. While the team had plenty of talent, they lacked leadership skills. Many of them came from challenging home environments and didn't have many positive role models. The coach believed that if they could grow as leaders, there would be a positive change both on and off the field. Adam was working as a VP of sales and was given little instruction.
The coach simply told him that he thought Adam's energy and character could impact them. He had 60 minutes a week with the team. He could use it however he saw fit. It turned out that Adam loved it. Every week, he challenged himself to come up with a new concept or idea to teach the teenagers in a fun, dynamic way.
He wanted to make sure he was engaging the athletes. He hoped that he could get them to view character development and leadership to be as important as improving their football skills. That season turned out to be a huge success. The team made it to the playoffs for the first time in years and their energy and brotherhood was stronger than ever. Even after the season had ended, people kept asking Adam what he had done with the team.
So after having a lot of one-on-one discussions, eventually he decided that he needed to find a more streamlined way to get these exercises and concepts out to other coaches. Over the next year, Adam worked to launch Lead 'Em Up. It would be a subscription service where coaches could sign up and gain access to a library full of drills, exercises, and teaching concepts to share with their teams. To help move things along, Adam partnered with Game On Nation, a similar coaching company located in Florida. He offered to allow Game On Nation to incorporate some of his curriculum into theirs.
That way, while Adam grew Lead 'Em Up, he could start making money from a revenue share with Game On Nation. Startup costs were around $1,000. He spent that money on marketing, web hosting, a few WordPress plugins, and of course, T-shirts. He officially launched Lead 'Em Up about a year after he coached that first team. He set an initial price of $299 a year.
To spread the word, Adam started by reaching out to several friends and acquaintances who were in the position to utilize his services. He also encouraged his followers on social media to share and tag other people who might be interested in the coaching. This helped him grow a list of 25 to 50 potential clients. He then put his full energy into making sure that these first clients had the absolute best experience possible. Thanks to his hard work, they loved the program, and Adam was invited to speak at coaching clinics and be a guest on podcasts.
Working on the side over the next few years, he continued to refine and expand Lead 'Em Up. He focused primarily on marketing through Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. He was also able to promote the service on his other side hustle, a basketball podcast called Hardwood Hustle. Beyond marketing, he focused on making sure his content was always unique and engaging. And here's a good tip.
To that end, Adam invented an MPS filter for all of his lessons, which translates to memorable, portable, and sticky. He wanted to make sure that his audiences truly enjoyed learning these concepts, and a big part of that was connecting with the athletes. So Adam learned terms that young people were familiar with and implemented them into his training. For example, one of his exercises is called First Like. Many teenagers have competitions to be the first person to like a celebrity's social media post.
Adam remixed this concept and encouraged teammates to be the first person to like another teammate's leadership skills. By creating this unique curriculum and expanding his presence on social media, Adam has been able to keep the ball rolling and grow lead 'em up to make upwards of $100,000 annually in just five years. He also still has a full-time career. Adam enjoys his job, and up to this point, he's been able to do both things successfully. While some people encourage him to quit the jobs, we could build lead 'em up into something even bigger.
Adam has a family, and he likes the consistency that a day job brings him. Although he may transition into full-time subscription hustling at some point, right now he's enjoying the ability to impact young people, be around sports, and engage his creative side. Not only that, but the extra money from lead 'em up allowed Adam's wife to stay home the first few years after their daughters were born. In the future, he hopes to expand his program to collegiate athletes. [Music]
Awesome, this is a shining example of a successful subscription service in the sense that if you take a look at the website, which is really good, we'll link it up in the show notes, but I believe it is leademup.com, there's a $9 a month option, which just makes it really easy and compelling, which is the whole goal, by the way.
Your goal with a service like this, a subscription, is to make it as easy as possible to sign up with an enticing, compelling offer, some cool freebies, which Adam has on his website. You can kind of get an idea of some of the activities and exercises that he shares with coaches, and just a really smooth process. Like, it has to be super simple to sign up. You wanna maximize conversion. And then, the second half of it is to provide as much value as you can to keep people around, because with a subscription service, churn is always the concern.
So churn is when people subscribe and then quit, okay? And you have probably subscribed to lots of subscriptions and then opted out or left after a month or two. So this is the primary concern of a subscription service. The way to address it is through more content, through making members feel a sense of community, and just continually reinforcing what a good decision it was for people to join. So by all accounts, it looks like Adam is doing that.
And as long as he keeps doing that, then he's gonna have this pretty sustainable income. It can only grow from here. So it either maintains a base level, which is a pretty good base level to be at, or it grows. As he goes to expand to collegiate athletes, the word continues to get out, et cetera. So pretty cool service.
Way to go, Adam. Thanks for letting us share your story. And listeners, inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is so much better. I hope that you get inspired. I hope you do something about it.
Today's show notes are at sidehustleschool.com/1319. That is episode 1,319, 1,319. If you've got a comment or question for the show, just come to sidehustleschool.com/questions. All right, thank you so much for listening today. Be sure you're subscribed.
My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is "Side Hustle School." [Music]
From the "Onward Project."
