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The following is a reverse-chronological timeline of my entrepreneurial endeavours in 2019.
September 2019 – Present: Teaching Skillshare Courses
This is my favourite passive income stream. Since 2019, I’ve been a teacher on Skillshare. Every month, my courses generate around £30 in completely passive income. It’s not much right now, not compared to what it could be, but I have plans to bump those numbers up. Those are rookie numbers.
Over the next few months, Skillshare will become more of a focus. I’ll be creating more courses, with higher quality and more detailed information. I’ll be targeting specific niches and likely begin marketing organically through this site and elsewhere.
I’ve got a range of courses on my account. From YouTube thumbnails to daily routines and getting better sleep, if I’ve got a decent amount of knowledge on a topic it will be shared there.
You can view my current Skillshare courses here.
September – December 2019: Animated self-improvement videos
While doing freelance editing, I was working on making YouTube content using an animated whiteboard piece of software. The videos were good, but I had no idea how to grow or market a channel. After the argument with the YouTuber, I quit doing this. My focus was elsewhere.
May – November 2019: Freelance Video Editing (YouTube)
Nearing the end of my university degree, I started looking for more video editing opportunities. Promoting on Reddit as before, I started chatting with a guy called BeHumbleFriends (BHF) – who just happened to be one of the best players in the world for a specific champion in League of Legends.
BHF was streaming on Twitch and wanted to start a YouTube channel. I’d be his editor, for free, and we’d grow the channel to a point of monetisation. At the time, I had no knowledge of marketing or of growing a channel. No idea how to jump on trends or SEO-optimise a post or video. But it was an opportunity to develop my editing skills, develop my thumbnail design skills, and build a portfolio.
A few months into that and BHF found a video that a YouTuber with ~500k followers (at the time) was looking to hire a new editor. Having been editing for BHF for a few months, entirely for free and doing a great job of it, he recommended that I apply. This YouTuber was someone I watched when I was in my teens, so it was kinda surreal being able to work for them.
After being accepted for the role, I was still working with BHF for a time. At the end of a congratulatory conversation with BHF, he mentioned the big video I was supposed to be working on, and I basically said “fuck that, I’ve got a job now, I’m gonna go play some games”. I regret saying that. Even though I was always going to finish that video, it was disrespectful. I’m sure it made BHF feel as if he was just a stepping stone and that the only real purpose of our relationship was to catch a bigger fish. And while it partially was, it was not my intention. I think I was just on a high from getting the work and let arrogance take control. As I’ve grown, I now recognise there are better ways to say things like that, and better ways to treat people – as well as how to control myself. I know it’s not that deep but I feel it’s worthwhile to share flaws, as nobody is perfect.
Anyway, the new editing work started out great, we got along well. They liked my mindset. The relationship was different to that of BHF; it was clear they’d worked with editors in the past. As I’d never been in such a working relationship, I had no idea what to expect, no real baseline for work or for pay.
And the pay was the reason I’m not a freelance video editor today.
Upon reflection, I believe I let naivety and admiration cloud my focus and judgement. This was a creator I liked, and the idea of working for them was treated as a gift rather than an actual working relationship.
Long story short, I was unaware of the project rates for editing YouTube videos. Initially I was getting £40/50 per video, which was nice. But I was young and didn’t really know how money worked.
After a conversation about payment, triggered by a backlog of completed work left unpaid, I was offered about 10-20% of the ad revenue for each video, which really wasn’t that much money at all. It was actually less than minimum wage for the hours I was working, and less than the fixed payment from before. We had an argument over this and I ended up quitting.
Kinda gratifying to know that compared with their recent content, the stuff I made is some of the best performing. Oh, and they still use the intro I made for them today. But I’m not salty…
I held a lot of baggage there for some unknown reason for a while, and am only just releasing this now as I write. Perhaps because it was the end of what could have been an enjoyable career in video editing, which is remote and creative work, doing something I’m good at and enjoy, and would mean I can travel the world. Alas, I didn’t recognise this at the time yet I’m grateful for the path I’m now on and the path I’ve travelled as a result.
So, while it wasn’t the best experience or had the best ending, it taught me a lot and was the real starting point of my business journey.
April/May – August 2019: Writing my first book, The Informative Guide to the Constellations
Constellations have always been something that fascinates me. Ever since I was a kid, and first seeing Orion’s belt, I’ve easily been able to lose myself in the stories of the sky.
So, randomly towards the end of university, I was thinking about writing a book. I don’t remember why, but what I do remember is that I thought constellations would be a good niche. For the previous months/years I’d been using an app and trying to learn constellations, so I figured this could be a cool project.
Over the following months, I was writing this book in my spare time. Essentially it’s a breakdown of all of the modern constellations, what they look like, fun facts about each, and their mythological backstory/lore.
It was a fun and pretty cool project, and a fun fact to say that I’m a (self)published author.
If you wanted to learn more, you can buy the ebook here:
February – April 2019: First attempt at dropshipping
This business was the first time I actually made money online from a non-service. I’d taken a course on dropshipping with Shopify and Welcome to Camping was born – selling camping and survival goods to beginners. The premise was simple; create the website, populate it with products, promote the website via niche Facebook ads, and wait for the sales to roll in.
Well, the sales didn’t roll in. I didn’t realise it at the time, but I had no idea how to use Facebook ads properly, how to target, how to convert, etc. I was using the provided photos rather than having my own, I wasn’t targeting the right audience, my ad copy was weak, and I quickly started spending a lot of money for little results. Then the first sale came in and I felt elated. I was ignorant of the cost (ROI was very negative) but it was proof I could make money online.
January – March 2019: Dystopian Film Reviews
After starting to learn about online business and entrepreneurship, I thought I’d try and create my own niche blog. This was my first attempt at a blog, but without the keyword research, SEO, UX, UI, design, and other considerations that are necessary.
The idea was simple – I’d watch a film in the dystopian sci-fi genre, take notes, and then review it on the blog. Think films like The Hunger Games and Blade Runner. I liked films and it was a genre I was/am interested in, and in a seemingly small niche, so I gave it a shot.
I quickly learned that this was quite limiting – I only had a select pool of films I could watch, and I had to commit roughly 2 hours to the film before writing. All while in my final year of university. It quickly got dropped for other priorities.
December 2018 – Ramsden Wraps
A few weeks after winning a charity boxing match with only 8 weeks of training, I was curious about getting into the sport/boxing space. I don’t remember much, or how I discovered the idea, but I came across the idea of white label products.
I had the idea and ambition to set up a company selling boxing wraps (what you wrap your hands and wrists with for extra support when wearing boxing gloves and when fighting). Of course, I had no idea what I was doing or what it took to create a business. I got a logo made and was looking into suppliers in China. But that’s about as far as it got.
Expectantly, it amounted to nothing. It was a cool idea and taught me about white labelling, and finding suppliers, both of which were a nice foundation for later endeavours.
June – August 2018: FREElance Video Editing
Back when I was in uni, I wanted to build a portfolio of video editing work, gaining practical experience and examples that I could use to promote myself. All I was doing was offering free montage edits on Reddit for League of Legends, a game I played a lot when I was younger. This was a great first step into the world of freelancing. One client, who I did an extensive edit for, paid me a little as a thank you.