This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
Hello, greetings, welcome back. You are listening to Side Hustle School. I'm your host, Chris Guillebeau, and here we are with a new week beginning with episode 43, more stories of freedom and security created through the world of side hustles. If you're just joining in, every day there's a new story that features someone who starts an income generating project without quitting their day job. Now, that last point is critical.
It's what makes Side Hustle School different from other shows that focus on entrepreneurship. In fact, I almost never use the word entrepreneur on the show. That's because not everyone wants to be an entrepreneur. There are lots of people who like their jobs or otherwise just can't quit their job right now to pursue something that may or may not work. So my entire focus here is to support people who want another source of income in addition to their job.
Now, sometimes, like today, you'll hear about someone who ends up quitting their job because their hustle is going so well. Just remember, you don't have to do that. It's all about creating more options and possibilities so that you can then do what's best for you. And that story you'll hear today is about how a school district employee becomes a writing ninja and then earns more than $100,000 her first year. In December 2015, Shanta Grimes was in a miserable day job working for a school district and earning less than she could by working at McDonald's, which is, of course, a sad fact about the education system.
She knew she had to do something. Fortunately, she was very motivated to create change and it helped that she had a history with side hustles. In previous years, she had started an online vintage clothing store. She'd run a little side business where she prepared divorces and bankruptcies for people as a layperson. She'd operated an in-home daycare and she'd earned income as a freelance writer, which is especially relevant for our story today.
Shanta had been a single mother for a long time with a son who has autism and therefore wasn't able to go to daycare when he was small. As a result of all this history of struggle and hustling, she calls herself the queen of figuring out how to make a little money outside of a traditional nine to five. Still, she wasn't sure what to do. And yet another of her many previous roles, she had been a writer whose novel was published by Penguin. Her publishing experience hadn't been great, but that's what she knew how to do.
So at first she thought, well, I'll write another novel and maybe I'll get enough of an advance to make ends meet for a while. So she started working on that. And at the same time, she created a new resource almost on a whim. It turned out that this second project with a vision that was somewhat undefined in the beginning was actually the real lifesaver. This new project was an online journal about writing and publishing, focusing on what it takes to write a novel.
She ended the first month of that online journal with more than 800 subscribers. And she knew she was onto something. Now these were free subscribers, they just signed up for the resource. But for a long time, she'd had the idea to create a year long novel writing course. She created a product using Gumroad, and I'll link that up in the show notes.
And then sent out an email to those 800 subscribers. Then she went to a movie with her husband. By the time it was over, she felt embarrassed that she'd acted without really thinking things through and she planned to walk it back. But when she looked at her email upon leaving the theater, she noticed that two people had already bought the course. During that two hour movie, Shanta had earned $700, which was close to an entire month's pay at her day job in the school district.
After that, Shanta didn't walk back her novel writing course, she started running with it. As the months went on, her group of 800 subscribers grew to more than 11,000. She also started a Facebook group that grew to more than 7,000 members. And throughout the rest of the year, she made this her main project, pouring all of her time and energy into improving and relaunching that course, while also creating some additional sources of income by selling items such as a planner for writers. Before the end of the year, she had earned...
Well, maybe you remember from the top of the show, she had earned more than $100,000. Oh, and what about that novel she'd started writing? Well, she didn't stop. Throughout the rest of the year, as she built out the course, she finished that too. She liked the idea of showing her readers and now many of her new customers that she could in fact write her own novel as she was teaching other people to do it at the same time.
That novel is now coming out with a small press this spring. And once she stopped seeing it as her financial answer, she began enjoying the writing process much more. So what can we learn from Shanta's story? Well, personally, I was a little surprised at how well that course has done. And when I say that, I'm not selling her short in any way.
It's just that I expected the story to end with something like, "Oh, and I made $3,000," which would have been great. But it's more like 30 times that number. And that's why I thought, "Well, this is really great." And that's also really interesting, because it's not always easy to have this big of a success so quickly. And I often like to look for clues to someone's success in their story. And now that you're learning more about the power of observation, you can do this too.
The great thing about online projects is that there's usually a number of ways that you can go and read up or research someone's story, especially with websites, because you can see how they've changed over time, especially with blogs, because you can go back and read the early entries. And probably the easiest and quickest thing to do is to look at someone's about page. The about page may be the most important page on your website. It communicates your mission. It tells your story the way that you want it to be told.
And as you've heard, stories are critical, especially your origin story, your motivation of why you're doing what you're doing. So anyway, I went to look at Shanta's site, which of course we'll link up on the show notes. And here's what she leads with. Here's what she says. "All I've ever wanted to do is write stories.
You could say that I'm a story junkie. I take them however I can get them. In fact, the only thing I love, just about as much as I love telling stories, is helping other people learn to tell theirs. That's why I developed the plotting workshop and a novel idea. And that's why I'm writing this blog.
If 'write a book' is on your bucket list, or if, like me, it's the only thing you've ever really wanted to do, you've come to the right place." Now, it goes on from there. You can read the whole thing, but that gives you a taste of her style. Now, I assume Shanta is a good novelist, but I haven't read her novel. All I know for certain is that she's an excellent copywriter. Because the way she writes here, this speaks directly to the needs of a lot of people.
Not just the needs, but the desires, which can sometimes be even more powerful. This whole part about, "All I ever wanted to do is write a book." And here's this thing that you've always wanted to learn. This creates a connection between her identity, something she believes in very deeply, and something that, as she says, this is a lot of people who have always wanted to learn. And also, this part about if writing a book is on your bucket list. That's a great line because that's a lot of people.
And I know myself as a writer that a lot of people want to write a book, but the majority of them don't ever take action on it. And some people may just not prioritize that. Some people, they have other things they're more excited about. But a lot of people just kind of need some guidance. A lot of people need some, not just accountability, but also some logistics, some step-by-step, some instruction.
And so, the rest of her site, and all the resources on that site, continues with that story. There's a manifesto. She talks about a revolution. She's using insider language that is simultaneously welcoming and polarizing. She's essentially inviting people to join the shared identity of wanting to write a novel, but having been stuck before, just not knowing what steps to take.
And now we're on this path together. We're going to make this dream come true because it is a process that can be figured out. It's not that complicated. There are ways to decode it. We can plan this into our busy year.
So, it feels affirming, and it also feels challenging in a good way. It affirms those needs, those desires. It says, "That's normal. That's good that you want to do this." I always wanted to do this myself, too. And it also issues the challenge because it says, "Okay, if you're serious about this, I actually have these resources here.
I'm going to show you exactly how to do it." So, I love that. It's a really strong copy that leads to a strong offer. And, as you heard, she has a background in hustling. She was the queen of creating extra income. And I'm so happy that she's been able to not only create extra income, but to truly build something very substantial that brings her security and many more options and possibilities for the future.
So, congratulations, Shanta. And how about you? Do you want to write a book? Are you actively working on your hustle? Whatever it is you hope to achieve, if you listen to these stories and you begin applying their lessons to your own hustle, you will see results.
Remember, inspiration is good, but inspiration combined with action is so much better. If you want to find the show notes for today's episode, which include links to Gumroad, as well as Shanta's site, just go to www.sidehustleschool.com/43. I'm Chris Guillebeau. You're listening to Saddisville School, and I'll see you tomorrow.
