This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
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Today's listener wants to start a pandemic dating service. Question is, will it be short-lived or a viral sensation? I mean, that was just so easy. That was like the easiest setup ever for a pun or a joke. But just in case you didn't find it hilarious, here are some COVID-19 pickup lines.
Hopefully this'll be helpful for some of the guys out there. That mask brings out the beauty in your eyes. Here's another one. I wash my hands even when there's no pandemic. One more, you smell so good.
Is that hand sanitizer you're wearing? Oh, and let's not forget my favorite. I'm just a boy standing six feet away from a girl asking you to maybe move back another foot. Thank you. All right, you get the idea.
That's what we're talking about today. Pandemic dating, dating in the age of COVID-19. All right, listener question coming up. First message from our sponsor, don't go anywhere. Stay tuned.
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Hi, Chris. This is Keri from DC, and I've been loving the new format. And I'd love to hear your thoughts regarding my side hustle idea. I have an idea of starting a dating service for people who have already had COVID-19. It's not just a matter of antibodies and immunity.
It's also that I imagine people who've been through the experience have something in common that other people don't understand. What do you think? And what should I do next? My biggest problem, at least I think it's my biggest problem is how to convince enough people to sign up. Okay, thanks, Chris.
And I look forward to hearing from you. - Hey, Keri, what's up? Thank you so much for listening. And this idea is so interesting. I'm sure a lot of our listeners have all kinds of thoughts about it.
So here are mine, all right? With the caveat of always just throwing out ideas here. So when it comes to COVID-19, first of all, I would love to be able to say this is short-term. And you don't wanna build a business around something that's short-term. Well, hopefully in the span of the next decade, this is gonna be a short-term thing that we all look back on.
But sadly, it does appear to be relevant for at least the next year or so, even once there's a vaccine, 'cause there's lots of after effects and such. And I also like what Keri said about how it's not just about antibodies and immunity, it's also that people who've been through this experience have something in common that other people don't understand. So I do think there's some value there. But to go to the question of a pandemic dating service, the problem that she identifies is convincing enough people to sign up scale, essentially. If that's the problem that she identifies, that is gonna be difficult.
It's hard to start your own dating service of any kind without a lot of money, because the whole point is the service gets better the more users there are. So how do you go out and acquire thousands or tens of thousands of users? So that's why I tend to think, take this idea, the idea of serving people who have been through the pandemic and experienced COVID-19, take this idea and develop it in another way. So what else could you offer? Like what questions could you answer?
What information could you provide? I just did some quick keyword research on this phrase, dating COVID-19. Like I just put those two words together. And there are a lot of people searching for information. So I think it might be better to provide answers about dating in the COVID age or the post COVID age for those who've had the virus, maybe some kind of resource site.
In terms of revenue, you could earn affiliate commissions by referring users to existing dating services perhaps, or maybe just to other resources in general. So I think there are some possibility in terms of interest in the topic, but it's a little bit difficult to just kind of go out and build your own platform for something that requires like a lot of users for it to really take off. But you never know. So let me know what happens. Thank you again, Carrie.
Thank you listeners as well. If you have a question, come to sidehustleschool.com/questions. We're gonna continue to feature them for the rest of the year, along with some more updates from other listeners as they launch and grow their projects. All right, that's all for me today. My name is Chris Guillebeau.
This is "Side Hustle School." [Music]
From the "Onward Project."
