11 learnings from 15 top creators

It’s been a tough week this week

And I feel like I’ve been running on fumes when it comes to creativity.

The thought of writing my 15th newsletter all week was daunting.

So instead of coming up with a structure beforehand and writing down a list of my ideas

I thought this Sunday as I sit here drinking this beautiful Ethiopian Pour over with Teddy on my lap?

I’d simply write what comes to mind, and I’ll come up with the hook later.?

So let’s get into it.

Actually now that I am typing this into my notes

I know what I’m going to talk about ??

Over the past 2 weeks Steve and I

(Steve is the guy who works in the shadows with me)

Have interviewed 15 of LinkedIns top creators.

(These are all people that you would know btw)

We interviewed them for the new brand and program we are about to launch — Seven Figure Creators — which will do what it says on the tin.

Help creators get from 6 to 7 figures.?

We chatted with 15 different creators to make sure before potentially working together that we aligned on a few things

A) Align with our values we could work together with in the long term

B) Align on the vision they have for their business and how they want to build it

C) Would contribute and add value to others if they are put in a group setting?

D) Are someone that we feel we could help take from 6 to 7 figures?

Because once we do it with a few, the flywheel effect and marketing will pretty much take care of itself….

All the one hour chats were quite interesting tbh

And there were quite a few things I expected?

And quite a few that I didn’t expect at all.

I’m very happy that we conducted them though.?

If anything it helped cement that our landing page copy was on point ?? (which Steve was quite chuffed about)

And that we are going in the right direction of the business

Because working with talented and aspiring creators everyday

Now that right there is my forever business.

So thinking about this I thought it would be helpful for any creator looking to build their business

And it will also be helpful for myself to reflect on the chats and the learnings as we looking to progress closer to launch.

So let’s go through them now

(And remember from the start, I’m literally writing what coming to mind here so hope it makes sense)

1 - Creators are severely under monetizing?

Steve and I both already suspected this coming into it — but it was blatantly oblivious during the chats.

To set the frame — we are currently doing $100k every 4 weeks in the biz

Which if you stretch to a year is $1,300,000

And if you divide that by my follower count of approx 35,000

It means I make around $37 per follower per year.

Most creators we chatted to are not close to this level

And tbh → they are much better at the creator thing than me.

(Side note - Justin Welsh only makes $3 per follower per year which is why I no not think ANYONE should emulate his model at all unless you have 1,000,000 followers)

There are many reasons for this

— Many creators don’t know what to sell

— Many creators are selling time for money

— Many creators are not milking their leads dry

— All creators didn’t have a proper sales process

— All creators were not optimised digitally for conversions?

(And quite a few other reasons)

But overall it was oblivious that no one was making the money that they should be — especially with how strong their brands are

And being upfront about it — I should also be able to 3x my revenue with what we have currently.

I’m not even close to optimised...

2 - They have an insane amount of trust and attention?

(This is what gets me excited)

— The stories they told about how clients were soo excited to work with them

— How they had been following them for such a long time

— And how much they had impacted their lives.

These creators have all built crazy good social equity with their audiences.

Their content is positively affecting people’s lives in such an amazing way.?

And when you have this?

All you then need to do is roll out over time a proper funnel system, a sales process and a delivery model that can scale

→ And you’ll have a thriving business

→ Because the foundation of trust

→ Has already been built.?

3 - Creators value freedom over everything

(Even over money)

This one seems oblivious as most people became a creator to escape a wage cage

And for nearly everyone we spoke to — the thought of going back to one terrified them.

It’s why one of the questions we were asked over and over was “Will this lock me into a certain number of hours where I need to be there and in a routine and schedule”

Tbh I can totally resonate with this?

As I NEVER sell time for money?

And literally live with my phone on DND all day long...

Freedom was at the route of pretty much all their core values — and the ones that were stuck in agency and delivery hell we spoke to — were not at all having a good time tbh.

They wanted a way out.

4 - The magic income number is $50k a month

It was like Deja vu every single conversation.

No matter who we talked to whenever we asked about income they’d always come back with “If I could make $50k a month honestly I would be happy.”

Hearing this over and over actually make me feel pretty good about launching lol.

I’ve already helped Ryan Musselman go from $13k to $96k per month in 5 months?

And I didn’t even spend that much time with him compared to how much time I’d be spending with these creators.?

5 - All were confused what biz model they should build

How do you create something that you can sell that…

A) Delivers tons of value

B) Doesn’t trade time for money

C) Can pay you via an MRR model

(MRR = monthly recurring revenue)

The thing that you only need to spend 5 hours a week on delivery and can live a life of meaning and freedom.

Luckily this is one of the 3 main pillars that we will be helping these creators to help launch then build?

(Yes I said launch them build, that was not a mistake)

— Many were stuck in agency land

— Or they were playing with a few models

— Or they were selling something that’s price needed to go waaay up

But there was one thing abundantly clear

None of them had their forever business — which is the business you can build for the rest of your life and love it completely (the dream right?)

?

6 - They all have a strong personal brand, but not necessarily strong business brands

This is something Steve’s been hammering into me for months now

“If we want to do $10M in the business we need to make sure we look like a $10M business”

Took me months to catch on lol…

The big issue that all these creators have is that when you go off LinkedIn and look at the rest of their digital assets (website, funnel etc)

They either

A) Didn’t exist at all

B) Were not optimised?

And all of them didn’t make them look like $5-10M brands.

A great way to contrast this is to go to Justin Welsh’s website and take a look around

That dude looks like a $5M brand…

And the only way I was even able to identify this in the first place to place was working with Steve

Who was the CEO of a company that’s built 100s of websites — and has open ends up my eyes to this whole other side.

You could say essentially that everyone had unconscious incompetence which inevitably was effecting their brand and income potential.?

7 - Most didn’t have a sales process

(And if they did have one, it wasn’t optimised IMO)

Sales is one of those things like content

→ Everyone can get in there and start doing it

→ But until you go deep into studying it and truly put in the reps

→ You’ll have no idea how big the gap from good to great is.

(And being totally honest. I’m known as a sales guy and I still have soo far to go to be great IMO)

Honestly this is true though for 99% of small businesses I have chatted to and

It’s why one of the easiest ways to instantly uplift revenue is to implement a simple sales process?

(And what I will be doing immediately with the creators we work with)

But if anything?

It got me excited ??

Especially as the making of attention that these creators get is insane?

Because attention = more selling opportunities?

And that = money $$$

8 - All were not milking their leads

“I started creating content so that I didn’t have to sell. I wanted to create the best content so people would instead come to me”

I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve heard creators say this lol.

But you know what the great thing is?

When someone does have content that’s soo good it brings people to them

That means was they finally start reaching out to the other 95% of people that have only given them signals

It means there are A LOT of leads they still haven’t spoken to?

And this makes me very happy ??

Because nearly every creator I’ve worked with thus far — I’ve usually been able to 3x their meetings booked in less than a month

By simply starting more conversations with the right people in a way that didn’t come across as “salesy” but instead conversational.

Because you want to know the other crazy thing?

People will actually appreciate you reaching out as a creator — because to them sometimes your a mini celebrity in their eyes

And they want to work with you but are terrified to reach out…

9 - Funnels seemed like a foreign word?

One of the simplest ways to increase lead flow?

(especially if you have a lot of attention)

Is to optimise your LinkedIn profile into a communications piece that gets people to take the next step

Which leads them out of LinkedIn and down your funnel that is optimised for conversions.?

It could be (depending where you are at)

— Email opt in lead magnet > VSL > Book a call

— Long form VSL > Form > Book a call

— Newsletter > 5 step sequence > Sell By Chat

And the whole purpose of these funnels

Are to move leads through your funnel while sleep?

Taking them closer and closer to wanting to have a conversation with you about the thing you sell and how it might be able to help them solve their problems.?

That’s why brand and digital funnel?

Is another 1 of the 3 core solutions we will be helping creators with at Seven Figure Creators

10 - They all need help with the core 3

1 - Sales

2 - Systems

3 - Delivery model

These are the 3 major things we will be covering in the beginning at Seven Figure Creators.

Because for the creators we start working with and who I’ve hand picked and reached out to

We know from already doing this a few times — that one you roll out these simple implementations?

Their revenue is going to skyrocket?

And their delivery will go down to nearly nothing

Which overall is going to maximise for both

Income and Freedom

What every creator dreams of…

11 - Most have the LinkedIn bubble blinders on

“I help 7-8 figure CEOs build their personal brand on LinkedIn through creating content and optimising their profile”

This was the business model that nearly everyone was going after.

And I’m not saying it’s a bad idea?

But what I would say is that it’s going for a pretty limited total addressable market which would be quite difficult to build into a business with an ongoing recurring revenue component.

When for most of the creators we spoke to there was a much easier ICP that would love to work with them and would be much easier to monetize and turn into a recurring model

Selling to people who want to be you

The 12-36 month ago you to be exact.

You see…

There’s a reason why Justin Welsh’s stuff pops off so much?

Because he speaks or a pain that most people on LinkedIn have?

And has a lifestyle that most people want to live.

He’s selling himself — and tbh many of the creators we spoke to mentioned him and how what’s he’s done.

And these same creators have essentially their own fan base of people — that would love to live a life like them

One with?

→ Money

→ Meaning?

→ And Freedom.

You see…

These creators already have what most people want

And when you have what others want

You can sell them on how they can get it.

To a MUCH larger audience who will be people that will do the things required — because they are properly motivated…

I’m a CEO that does 7 figures a year in revenue?

If you sell me something that might be able to add $10-20k a month — I might pay attention (if I believe you can do it for me)

But if you showed how I could have earned $10k per month when I was hating my life as a $55k a year accountant?

And the exact step by step process of how I could get there if I simply followed a process

And you charge me $1-$5k at the start and then $10k per year after I was earning the $10k a month

I would have jumped at it.

And that's it → our 11 learnings from chatting to 15 top LinkedIn creators.

→ Some of it was surprising

→ Some of it was what we expected

→ But best of all it gave us clear direction

That niching down to work specifically with creators

To help them first build 6 figure businesses

Then take them from 6 figures to 7 figures

Is the correct route to take the business.

I hope you learned something and can take some gold nuggets away to help you build your business

And if you are a 6 figure creator right now

And want to take your business to 7 figures?

You can apply here - https://sevenfigurecreators.com/

Where we will work with you to build your forever business that will give you

Money

Meaning

And Freedom.

Our full launch will be coming in a couple of weeks so stay tuned.

Happy Sunday Everyone!

Cheers

Matt