This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Listeners, what's up? Welcome to Side Hustle School. So glad you're here. This is Chris Guillebeau, your host. I have the privilege of bringing you these stories and also an ongoing dialogue with listeners, people like you all over the world.
Here's a question for you. We're gonna talk today about something called shogi. So I guess the question is, have you heard of it? Have you heard of shogi? It's also known as Japanese chess.
Now I have to confess I was not familiar with it until recently, and much of my enlightenment comes from one of our listeners. He's an avid fan and wants more people to know about it. So if you're into strategy, he says, strategy, tabletop games, you know, things like chess, I guess we could say, shogi is at least as interesting as classical chess. Now, naturally, because this is Side Hustle School, like I love to talk about hobbies, but we're also talking about making money, he's wondering about the side hustle opportunities for such a game. So how can our listener advance his gaming cause while advancing himself at the same time?
Now, if you've been listening for a while, or if you know anything about my work in general, that's what I'm all about. Like how can you help others while also helping yourself? Because it's not a false choice. It's not a dichotomy. How can you do both?
Let's talk about online tutorials or anything else that could be a possibility for this game called shogi. That's the question that's coming up after this brief message from our sponsor. [Music]
Hey, Chris, this is Kenny. Thanks for all the great side hustle stories. I've been thinking of my own side hustle idea and want to get your feedback.
So online chess is huge, and so are a few other games like Majang and Go. I don't see as much for shogi, however, the traditional strategy game that is sometimes called Japanese chess. It's a fascinating game and I'd like to bring it to many more people, but they tend to be intimidated by all the details and nuances. My plan is to fix that and offer free tutorials for beginners with a soft upsell after the first lesson. How can I find a market of people who might be interested?
I was thinking of starting with chess clubs or communities of tabletop gamers, but I'm sure there are other places I haven't considered. What do you think? Thanks for any help, Chris. [Music]
Kenny, thank you so much for the question. Here's what I think.
And I think this is gonna be applicable to a lot of people, including people who have no idea what shogi is. Whatever your idea is, think about it from the perspective of your ideal customer. Whatever kind of topic you're planning to go into, whatever kind of niche, if you have a product or a service idea already, think about it from the perspective of your ideal customer. In this case, if that person is somebody who has never heard of this game, like me until recently, perhaps, then you have a multi-step process there because the goal here to kind of spread awareness and then while also kind of building yourself up as an authority, it's one part evangelism and then it's one part money-making, right? You're trying to say to people, hey, here's this really cool game.
Maybe you've been playing chess or something else, but this is pretty cool as well. Do you know anything about it? Here's how it works. It's a little bit complicated, but it's worth the time or the effort that you put into it. I think my sense is that you'll probably do better with the money-making part by focusing on people who already have some familiarity with the game.
Maybe they're trying to learn it from those clubs that you mentioned, or maybe they're on the periphery of that, but they're feeling intimidated, perhaps. So once you've identified who you really hope to serve, I'm not sure you need to reinvent the wheel. So this is the good news, I guess. If the first part is bad news, it's hard to sell something to people who don't know what it is. The good news is this concept that Kenny mentioned of offering the free tutorial with a soft-up sell after the first lesson, well, that's great.
I mean, it's classic. It's classic because it works, right? Offering a free tutorial with a soft-up sell, classic model that can work well if you have the audience or demand. So that's the key point. I think I would focus more on that.
How can I find that audience or create that demand? How do skilled chess players earn money online? Like whatever they are doing that works, do that for this other game. And I might also get feedback from some of those clubs, the chess clubs, gaming clubs, et cetera, or at least scope out their interest level in the game itself. They might not be able to give you guidance on how to set up your business and charge for it.
That's the kind of thing that we talk about here, but at least you'll know if they're the right group of people or if this group is totally different. So that's what I think about that. And thank you for the introduction to Shogi as well. Listeners, if you have a question, come to sidehustleschool.com/questions. Let me know what's on your mind.
We'll be featuring them throughout the year, along with updates, some other listeners. I'll have to know what you're working on, what's working well, what isn't. All updates and questions are welcome. And I hope you'll subscribe and come back tomorrow. All right, signing off for the day.
My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is "Sawdustleschool." [Music]
- From the Onward Project.
