My top 10 Reflections on product, distribution, and growth from running a side hustle

For those of you who know me, I maintain a blog as a side hustle (www.SeekingNorth.in) where I write on Behavior Science and how it intersects with Product Design and Development.

I started writing sincerely in June and now the newsletters reach out to 602 subscribers every week. By my own estimate, the subscriber growth has been very healthy and in this post, I will share a few things I have learned in this process.

But first, some stats that I shared with my subscribers as part of the August monthly update yesterday.

• In August I had 305 subscribers, with the aim to add 300 more by the end of the month. The Seeking North community grew by 291 subscribers during the month, thus just a bit short of the number I had in mind. I crossed 600 subscribers mark on 2nd Sep
• The website saw great traction in August with 1996 unique visitors (up 113% from July) and 3600 page views (up 66% from July). Bounce rate increased marginally from 74% (in July) to 80% (in August), which needs work

• Mail open rate for all emails put together is at 26.2%, which is marginally better than my target of 25%

Here are the 10 things that I have learned that I have divided into 4 sections:

• Do cliched things
• Don't do cliched things
• Obsess about distribution
• Don't obsess about distribution

Do cliched things

Sometimes all you have to do is follow cliched advice that you read on blogs and books. The reason these are cliched is that these actually work. So some cliched things I did:

1.0 ???♀? Do things that don't scale

As Behavior Science is a fairly technical space and doesn't have the critical mass of other domains such as fund-raising or branding, I decided to reach out to practitioners, academicians, and enthusiasts in the field of Behavior Science on LinkedIn. As many as possible.

On average I have sent out 30 daily connection requests and 30 DMs, in the last 1.5 months talking about mutual interest, sharing some of my write-ups, and generally catching up. This is like a 'hand-to-hand' combat mode of growing the reader base and this is not something that will scale well. But these connection requests and DMs have given me access to some of the most passionate readers who have also helped me in making the blog better.

Also, this comes at zero dollar cost.

2.0 ?? Perfection is your enemy

I have learned to press 'publish' when my content piece is 'good enough' without waiting to make it perfect. When you are side-hustling, you are always strapped for time. Thus, instead of spending time decorating your write-ups to become perfect, it is better to publish it so that you can utilize your time in taking it to as many people as possible.

At the same time, you should always be cognizant of the fact that your product/write-up is only 95% complete and be open to the feedback/critique you receive and use it to update your write-up.

3.0 ?? Own your audience (even if it comes at the cost of discovery)

When I started writing sincerely, I self-debated for a long time on the choice of the platform - Medium, Substack, or self-hosted (WordPress/Webflow/etc.). I started with Substack because owning your audience is much more important than discovery if you are serious about your blog/newsletter.

To put it simply, if you own your audience and you are not happy with the platform where you are writing, you can just download all email IDs, shut shop, and shift to a new platform. All it needs is an email to your subscribers that you are now at new coordinates. You cannot achieve this at Medium or similar platforms that aggregate your write-ups in a large amorphous bundle.

For instance, I moved from Substack to WordPress and it really did not make any major difference in the readers' experience as I was meeting them in their inboxes using emails in pretty much the same way. Now consider having 20 articles on Medium and then shifting to LinkedIn to write your articles. How many of your audience will actually follow you across the platforms when you can't reach them directly?

The reason I shifted from Substack to WordPress, if you are curious, is to create a unique visual identity for the blog. All Substack blogs/newsletters look exactly the same, which was something that I wasn't too happy with. WordPress allows way more flexibility.

Don't do cliched things

4.0 ??Don't worry if you are not sure what problem you are solving. Just find a large niche that you personally relate to

Most books/blogs that provide wisdom on 'successful' blogs and products, mention that you need to find an 'itch' or an 'unmet need' or a 'problem' that your readers/users are facing and then squarely position your blog/product as the best solution.

While this is a great way to build a product/blog, this is not the only way. On many occasions, you will not know exactly what itch you are solving but you will have this tremendous urge to write or build. So start writing or building and along the way focus on finding the itch that you can scratch. At the same time, ensure that what you are writing or building has a Total Addressable Market that is large enough and you personally relate to that area. Basically find a 'large niche'.

I was inducted into Behavior Science by way of my 3 unsuccessful attempts to finish Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. The real push came when I attended a session by Richard Shotton where he demystified the EAST framework and it came as a shock to me as neither I nor my friends in Marketing/Product Management had heard about it, even though it was of such great relevance for us. I kept digging for more knowledge and that's how I found my 'passion' for behavior science.

Even though I was passionate about it, there was always this question (and there still is) - if there are enough people who are interested. To validate this, I did a few things rudimentary things that you can also try:

• Online courses: A great way to check if a topic is large enough to check if there are online courses on the topic. I found out that Prof Dilip Soman runs a Behavior Science course on Edx that has over 100,000 enrollments. Similarly, there are other large-scale online courses being offered in this field
• Groups and communities: There are groups on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Reddit on Behavior Economics/Behavior Science, each of which has 20,000 to 30,000 members
• Events: If there are events happening on a topic, it certainly is large enough. For instance, Nudgestock, which is the largest annual gathering of the best brains in Behavior Science, went totally digital this year due to COVID. They streamed for 14 hours on YouTube and the videos had combined views of over 80,000. Seemed large enough to me
• Books: There are books like Choice Factory, Predictably Irrational, Alchemy, etc. that have all been extremely popular. I looked up the number of ratings on Goodreads and compared it to best-selling books. For instance, Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely (a popular Behavior Science book) has 99,000 ratings on Goodreads and Sapiens by Yuval Harari (One of the all-time best selling book) has 477,000 ratings. Thus a healthy 20% ratio for Behavior Science book

• Google Keywords Planner: I also used Google Keyword Planner for search terms but realized that the search volumes are low, indicating that this is not yet a mainstream topic

Thus, I validated that the field may not be as large as say fund-raising or self-productivity, but has enough critical mass. Thus it's a 'large niche'

5.0 ?? Don't treat your blog as a collection of content pieces but as a digital product

The typical way to think about a blog is to think about content strategy. 'Hero - Hub - Hygiene' is a popular framework that is used by content strategists to decide on the type and frequency of content pieces

If you are serious about building your blog, you need to think differently from this conventional way of thinking. I will suggest that you think of your blog in the same way as Quartz or New York Times think about their publications. They first think about 'product strategy' and then think about 'content strategy' for their publications. Thus, they are able to build differentiated offerings, on the same platform, for different segments of their audience offering a portfolio of products.

Right now Seeking North is a collection of the following 4 products:

• Long-form articles that go deep into specific areas of Behavior Science
• eBooks/PDFs that give real-life examples and practical advice
• behaviorXprodudct - a weekly newsletter that curates content on behavior science's intersection with product design/development
• Be Short - Weekly content piece that goes deep into one behavior science concept but only enough to fit on a smartphone screen

There is a definite overlap between the audience of these different products but each product has a dedicated audience also. For instance, ~40% of people who read Be Short, don't read behaviorXproduct. Hence, if I did not have Be Short as a different product, I would have lost out on this audience.

As you will see, the 4 products I mentioned above are not yet fully defined but this product-based thinking allows me the mental flexibility of expanding Seeking North into a published book, an online course, a community, and an event in the future.

6.0 ??Build publicly

You will be surprised about the number of people who are rooting for your success when you start posting publicly about how your blog/product is doing.

As human beings, we all have this psychological desire to support the underdog. If you are bootstrapping your way to a new product, writing a blog as a side hustle with a full-time job, or running a podcast during the graveyard shift, you are the proverbial underdog as you are fighting against the conventional wisdom of 'this-can't-be-done'.

I have been totally surprised by the number of people who have become an active champion of Seeking North. I did not know any of them before I started the blog and in just a few months, I am directly connected to many of them. This would not have been possible if I wasn't building publicly.

There are three things I do when building publicly:

• Celebrate milestones and failures - I write to my subscribers and post on social media when the blog hits milestones like a certain number of visitors or 500 subscribers. Also, I mention my failures like a terrible bounce rate or a failed attempt to run Twitter ads. I always add a screengrab from GA or Twitter in such posts
• Share knowledge: During my writing process, whenever I come across any interesting content piece/blog/website, I quickly share it on Social Media. This post, for instance, is also a part of sharing my knowledge
• Being vulnerable and open to feedback: When you are sharing publicly, you are putting yourself out there to be judged by people. So be prepared to be vulnerable and at the same time open to accepting feedback and constructive criticism. Some of the best advice I have received has come from complete strangers

BTW, are you tired now? Here's something to refresh you.

And now back to the article ??

Obsess about distribution

7.0 ?? Treat distribution as a series of ongoing experiments

Distribution can be a tricky thing as it is difficult to predict what will work and what will fall flat. I view distribution as a series of ongoing experiments where I am throwing a lot to the ceiling and whatever sticks, becomes my preferred channel till some other experiment gives me a better ROI.

Here's a screengrab of the traffic on my blog in the last 3 months

Here are some of the experiments that I did in the last three months with results:

• Twitter Organic: Looking at the other blogs/newsletters, I felt Twitter will be the most crucial medium for me. I made a list of 10 things that I will do every day on Twitter to grow my follower base and them to drive them to the blog. I also did some paid courses on how to use Twitter for driving traffic to blog organically. But it did not work out for me. I now don't spend too much time or effort on Twitter
• Twitter ads: Ran two targeted ad campaigns on twitter for the eBooks. Extremely high CPC and CPL. So put a full stop to it
• Reddit - Ads and Organic: Reddit has a thriving Behavior Science community. So I started posting regularly there and also launched an ad campaign. I stopped it when I felt that the platform is too abrasive and self-entitled for me to deal with. Also the ads did not get approval by the Reddit team even after 11 changes. So basically I gave up on Reddit
• Quora ads: Quora ads on the other hand have worked well for me. I have put in a rather modest budget on Quora and got way better ROI than expected. The CPC was in the range of Rs 2-2.25 with CPL in the range of Rs 10-15. You can also see the traffic I got from Quora in the screengrab above
• Hackernews/Indiehacker/Growth Hacker: I posted in all three of these, but the posts found traction only on Hackernews because of its diverse audience base. So now I don't post on the other two and only focus on Hackernews
• LinkedIn: LinkedIn has worked well for me and is the number one source of traffic after direct clicks (from emailers). Part of it is because of the DMs and connection requests that I have sent (as mentioned earlier in the article). It is also because LinkedIn has a thriving community of product managers, advertising professionals, Marcom professionals, and behavior economics enthusiasts that makes my content more relevant on the platform. This is where now I spend most time, after the subscriber emailers of course

My two cents here are that (a) Always write a hypothesis on the experiment before you start posting there/running ads. The hypothesis should clearly articulate the objective, process, and expected ROI (leads, CPL, CPC, traffic, etc.). (b) Give each experiment some time. It could be 7 days, 14 days, or any other time period that your hypothesis, budget, and timeline allow. And then stick to that timeline before pulling the plug.

8.0 ?? Get attention share

The make or break for any digital product is the 'attention share' it gets. Attention share is not just the percentage of traffic you are able to drive to your blog, compared to other blogs in that space. It is the amount of time you are able to get from your reader from the long list of things she does every day. Also, your product doesn't have to be necessarily 10X better than your competition to get attention share. If your product is marginally better but is seen 10X times more than your competition at the places which are thronged by your readers/users, it will still give the same result.

My posts are usually at the intersection of simplifying Behavior Science knowledge + real-life advice. There are tons of other blogs/newsletters/youtube channels that also provide this and many of them are much better than mine. I cannot right now match that level of analysis or fluency of writing. But I can for sure be seen much more than them at the right places. This is how I try to achieve it:

• 30 mins: Block 30 mins every day for building attention share. Identify the frequency at which you want to be seen on various channels and then stick to it. Forever. Use these 30 mins to achieve it. For me, 30 mins in the morning work best
• Link your public profile with your blog/newsletter/product: I have hardly posted about anything other than my blog or Behavior Science in the last 3 months on social media. There are people who now know me more as the writer at Seeking North than as a marketing manager at HCL
• Find your audience: Going back to the classic marketing concept of 'Target Group', I have focused energies on building connections with like-minded people or people who share my enthusiasm for Behavior Science. Thus, while the posts may get only 20 to 30 engagements, each of these is worth way more than 100s of engagement from people who are not my audience

Don't obsess about distribution

9.0 ?? Some hypothesis will fail and that's OK

Like any other type of experiments, most of your experiments may not give you the results you are looking for. You will need to learn to be ok with it. If you are a dyed-in-wool corporate executive like me, failure is not something that you find very amenable in most circumstances. I mean, it can cost you your job.

But in this scenario, there are ways to deal with failed experiments. Here's how I do it:

• Set boundary conditions: For every experiment, I note the money and/or time I am willing to tolerate being wasted. For instance, I was ok if I spent US$ 50 on Twitter ads and it gave me 0 leads. This saved me from considerable heartache and headache when I actually spent US$ 50 and got only 4 leads, as mentally I had written away these US$ 50
• Take the outcome of the experiments very seriously: I have been tempted on various occasions to go back to Reddit to push for more traffic. After all, there are sub-reddits on Behavior Science with over 30-40,000 users. However, as my Reddit experiment has failed, I have decided to not look in that direction. There's no point good money chasing bad money
• Be Ok with the fallout of the boundary conditions: The boundary conditions also impose a constraint on the blog's growth. If I had 24 hours to work on the blog or US$ 1000 to spend on Quora ads, I am sure I would have had many more subscribers. But I don't want to spend/don't have more resource and hence, instead of worrying about lack of resource, I am learning to focus more on juicing out the most from each resource

10.0 ?? Ship consistently

Some of you may know that I have run side hustles in the past including a podcast (Masters of Brands), a newsletter (which was also titled Seeking North), and an article summary service (Mltipl). I shut down those after a few months of effort as (a) I could not get the right velocity for scaling up the distribution (b) I under-estimated the effort and time needed to build something of value.

The only way to succeed as a blogger/newsletter publisher is to ship content consistently week after week. This goes back to the attention share point that your content may not be 10X better, but because you are showing up every time, on time, you are able to corner more attention share than the blogs/newsletters you are competing against.

Well, that's all folks!

If you have made it to this point in this article, I believe you have found some value in the reflections I have tried to dispense. Do let me know what you think about it.

Also, if Behavior Science and Product Design interest you, consider signing up here: https://seekingnorth.in/subscribe/

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Till next time

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Rohit