Can you create a series to help a subscriber earn their first $1,000?
You could pick someone with no social proof and create a series or one video showing how to do everything. I'd rather find an ambitious entrepreneurial woman and have her earn the first $1,000. It would be inspiring and give us belief in the process. The downside is that making such a video takes a lot of time—about 10 hours to coach someone, handle calls, and overcome limiting beliefs—whereas a simple talking-head video on a topic I know well might take only half an hour. I could still do those, but they'd take 1 to 20 times longer than my usual talking-head videos.
If you have $1,000, it's effectively the same as having $0 when viewed from a high enough level--there's no real difference. My advice is identical for anyone with zero or $1,000: start a daily consistent outreach habit, regardless of platform (social media, email, etc.). Choose a simple daily target--for example, talk to or get in front of 10 people each day for your business. Over a year that's 3,650 contacts; even a tiny conversion rate can generate significant capital because luck stems from preparation plus opportunity, and you boost luck by maximizing outreach. Most people struggle because they lack such daily habits; the real bottleneck in almost any venture is soft skills, sales ability, and marketing. You could build a product like Netflix tomorrow, but without marketing you'd have zero viewers. Practical ways to hit your daily goal: send 10 Upwork applications daily, send 10 cold emails per day on behalf of your business, or reach out to your favorite YouTubers (like me or Ali Abdal) with a custom pitch each day. Alternatively, list the top 10 creators, identify their problems, and offer to solve them--doing this for a month yields about 300 high-quality touches, each taking only 5-10 minutes, which can drive real results. Begin this habit now and maintain it for months; the compounding effect will create the bulk of your long-term capital.
The very first video I recommend is on how to get up and running with Outbound. If you want to bootstrap, I suggest using Upwork—I have a few valuable videos, including a step‑by‑step guide on how I made around $500K on Upwork. Also look up cold email; my cold email system generated $100K last year, so it’s worth checking. For enriched lead lists and personalization, I have content on deep personalization and have recently published a video called '80% of AI automation basics in 29 minutes'. I’m also preparing a video on making $100K a month as an AI solopreneur and another on making $10K a month in the simplest way. I produce a lot of content, so it can be hard to keep track, but those are the key resources.
I don't use video testimonials myself—I don't think they're nearly as valuable as many people claim. I have plenty of indisputable social proof from Upwork earnings and revenue, so you don't need video testimonials. Focus on the revenue you've already made; keep pushing what works, increase your prices to raise your internal hourly rate, and once you hit around $100k in earnings you can teach others how to make that amount—a higher‑leverage path. Don't start from scratch; build on the solid base you already have.
Well, the big thing is how much money you're making right now. If you're already making $5-10K a month and have something worth talking about, then it's worth making videos. If not, don't waste time documenting—focus on actually succeeding with the business. Social media is a massive distraction; it's easy to fall into a narcissistic loop of checking impressions and tweaking gear, which is wasted effort unless you've already achieved financial success. Nobody cares about your journey until you've made it, so documenting before that is mostly wasted time. If you do become a big success (e.g., making a million a month), then you can post your first video and build a brand. Aside from that, I’ve been checking stats: my main channel grew 43% in the last 24 hours to 19741 subscribers, Instagram audio glitch aside, Maker School is up to 2111 members, etc. I also realized my earbuds mic got water‑damaged, so I’ll replace them with cheap earbuds and use compression to clean the audio. Finally, I’m going to get breakfast, moisturize, and crush the day.