This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Hey there, what's up? Welcome to Side Hustle School. My name is Chris Guillebeau. We are starting an all new week here. I am excited about the stories I have for you, beginning with today's, which is really great.
And in my world, I'm going to Salt Lake City, Austin, and Dallas this week. If you are in or near any of those areas, I would love to see you. Got a bunch of stops coming up next week and the following week as well. As always, you can check the tour schedule at sidehustleschool.com/tour. Now, one thing I meant to mention yesterday, but I forgot, we would love to feature more stories on Side Hustle School.
We would love to feature more of your stories. The story on Friday was from one of our listeners who had started with us in the beginning of the year, ended up developing a pretty interesting side hustle. Later this week, we also have a listener story who modeled her side hustle specifically on an episode that she heard way back at the start of the show. But whether your side hustle has anything to do with the show or not, we would love to feature it. Or if you know somebody who has a side hustle that might qualify.
By qualify, I mean it makes at least $500 a month. The person doing it is not a full-time entrepreneur. They actually have a regular job or some other regular responsibility. They're doing something kind of interesting 'cause we wanna keep things fun on the show, of course. And last but not least, they're willing to tell us about the details of their project.
'Cause it doesn't do listeners any good to say, "Here's this project, but I'm not gonna tell you "what happened, I'm not gonna tell you "how much money they made "or how much it cost to get started." We are all about the details. So if you have a story like that or you know somebody, send them to sidehustleschool.com/about. At the very bottom of that page on the left-hand side, you'll see submit your side hustle story. We'd love for you or them to click that link and fill out the form. If you'd like some help with that or if you have some questions about whether your story could be good for the show, you can write to Whitney, my wonder assistant, who's also in charge of the show notes.
Her email is Whitney@sidehustleschool.com, W-H-I-T-N-E-Y. And now for today's story, it's about a musician who turns drum lessons into a six-figure podcast. Can you make money with a podcast? Can you make money as a musician? Well, this guy's found a way to do both.
I'll bring you his whole story in just a moment. [Music]
Philadelphia native Nick Ruffini developed a love for the drums when he was a teenager. At age 15, his parents hosted a party and invited his brother's garage band over to play for them. As fate would have it, the drummer of that band left his drums at Nick's place after the party and didn't come back to collect them for over a month. During this time, Nick played with the drum set every day.
By the end of the month, he realized he needed a kid of his own 'cause he had fallen in love with the instrument. This love of drumming continued through his teens. And when he wasn't helping out at the restaurant his family owned, he took his act on the road with a band he helped form when he was 18. As Nick said, one of the best ways to make money as a musician was to tour. And that's exactly what they did.
And this worked out really well for the most part and for a long time, even as he was earning a degree in business management and music performance, but all of that changed when he met a girl in New Jersey. This wasn't just any girl, it was the girl. And it got Nick to thinking that there had to be a better way to make money from his music without having to sacrifice his time and relationships to life on the road. Now, a lot had changed since he first started drumming at age 15. Nick was seasoned.
He had created a name for himself in his band. He loved touring, but at 30 years old with a promising relationship on the horizon, he figured it was time to find a new revenue source that would give him more control over his physical location. It was around that time that Nick decided to take up lessons to learn more about different drumming techniques. And one day, Nick asked his teacher if he could record his lessons for the day. Now, Nick was no stranger to side hustles at this point.
He had grown up in a family of entrepreneurs and he had two different hustles while in college. An eBay business selling high speed internet cards for anyone who remembers those and a booking agency that he started with his friend. As someone with that history of side hustles, Nick naturally thought that there had to be others who might want to listen to drum lessons by podcast or even conversations with other drummers. Meanwhile, podcasts were beginning to diversify and pick up steam in pop culture. Nick was listening to some business podcasts for inspiration.
He used GarageBand to process his audio files. And then he simply started releasing the conversations from these lessons in the form of a podcast. He called it Drummers Resource. Now, the first year of launching the Drummers Resource podcast was rough. He started by interviewing his small network of relatively well-known drummers.
That group soon dried up and Nick had to make phone calls and send out emails. By his own estimate, he made more than a thousand of them. But as Nick made progress and recorded more episodes, his podcast spread through word of mouth, allowing him to invite more and higher profile guests onto his podcast. Yet despite the success of this podcast, Nick only made his first dollar 11 months after starting. Like other people, Nick constantly feared that he was investing all of his time and energy for nothing.
Even as he constantly put up episode after episode starting in October, 2013, Nick couldn't shake off the self-doubt that Drummers Resource was not a viable business. That changed in September, 2014, when Nick debuted a social media marketing course he had created for musicians. His first course made $3,000, while the second made about $5,000. Nick fondly remembers the moment he sold his first product. He celebrated by taking his now wife, that same girl from Jersey, out for a splendid dinner.
Those were significant victories, but the game changer came two months later when Nick decided to take the plunge and sell advertising on his podcast. He approached sponsors the same way he did guests, by sending out emails and making calls. Since he had grown an audience, it was easier this time. He had social proof that it would be worth investing in his show. Moreover, he had met representatives from various brands at conferences, which gave him a foot in the door.
The move to sponsorship brought in $1,000 a month, right from the start, which later increased as Nick could command higher rates with a bigger audience. Additionally, he started releasing a second episode each week, doubling the available inventory he had for ads. Now he was on a roll. Just months after lending his first podcast sponsor, Nick decided to branch out into career consulting for musicians as well. He charged each client $250 a month and limited the number of clients he would take on to no more than 10 at once.
He taught them how to get more gigs, command higher rates and connect with other musicians they wanted to play with. It was a profitable income source, but Nick never took on more clients as he wasn't interested in trading more of his hours for dollars. He prefers a more passive approach for the rest of the income sources. Fast forward to today and Nick has successfully turned his recorded drumming lessons into a six figure podcast. That's six figures of annual net income.
He's also interviewed famous drummers from all different genres. The startup costs for this hustle were $500 to invest in his website and $40 for a microphone to record his podcast. These days he pays someone $500 a month to edit his podcast, but he only started doing that after charging for advertising. These days, Nick is able to turn his attention toward the things that really matter to him. He's begun to scale up the amount of content he produces for his podcast.
He now has three episodes a week, not quite daily, but he's getting there. And there's some intention and structure to how he does it. The Monday episode features interviews with Nick's guests. On Wednesdays, there's a show hosted by a friend of his. And on Fridays, Nick sits down alone to talk about a particular topic.
There's no fixed playbook on how you can grow and expand your side hustle. That's why every day you hear a different story, someone's unique journey, somebody's individual path. But just like Nick, as you build your hustle, you can march to the beat of your own drum. [Music]
Congratulations to Nick. I think this is a great example of someone actually following a passion and finding a way to make money from it.
If you've been listening for a while, you know that I don't use the phrase follow your passion very often. I think it's misguided. I think there's all kinds of things you can be excited about that nobody's gonna come along and pay you for. So there's some much better ways to think about what your side hustle should be. But it's also true that you should love what you do.
And if you love something and you're good at it, it very well could lend itself to building out a side hustle. Just like you see here with Nick, and I love his intentionality, how he took the skills he had, he focused on empowering other drummers through the podcast, through the course he made, through the coaching, whatever he's working on next. And it seems like he's also building real community through this process. So if you can serve people, build community and get paid, well, I think you have a pretty good life. And as someone who also has a great life, I would first say thank you for being part of it.
If you have a dream to start your side hustle or grow the project you're already working on, like I say each week, you're the reason I make this show. And like I say every day, inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is so much better. Today's show notes, including links to Drummer's Resource, are at sidehustleschool.com/296. I'm Chris Guillebeau, this is Side Hustle School, and I'll be back tomorrow.
