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1k True Fans (2008)

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Re: 1k True Fans (2008)

#41

You only need 1 true fan if it's the right fan! There was a (uploaded to TikTok) video I saw where this guy had 18 followers on YouTube, and just was not getting any kind of traction at all. I mean some traction but not much -- only 18 followers! Was about to quit. Then all of a sudden he got contacted by Oprah Winfrey's people about hosting a TV show about the ideas that he talked about in his videos. It turns out t…

> You only need 1 true fan if it's the right fan!

Also known as an employer.

Re: 1k True Fans (2008)

#42
post #11

This idea reminds me of something I've read on some old blog post about enterpreneurship. So, the guys starting the company were excited, because they said "We know the odds are small, but we don't need much, if just 1 in 1000 buys our product we're rich, as that's like 350K people in the US. And how difficult would be to get 1 in 1000 to buy our stuff with a little marketing? It's a great product anyway! Heck, if ju…

Kelly writes: The truth is that cultivating a thousand true fans is time consuming, sometimes nerve racking, and not for everyone. Done well (and why not do it well?) it can become another full-time job. At best it will be a consuming and challenging part-time task that requires ongoing skills. I'd add now, mostly from unsuccessful experience, what does it take the first fan, and then the next one, and the one after…

The same thing happens in writing.

Hundreds of creators creating content for these platforms, want to know the average rating is Five Stars. Want to know the average viewership? ~100, to even get to the stage of generating money you need to create several hundred chapters, and essentially beat the system to even make a hundred dollars.

For most of them, they will quit writing after their first series doesn't pick up traction, most don't understand the formula and strategy, most dont have the time or money to try.

Average viewership for light novels reaching 30~ chapters is less than a few thousand meaning which might seem like a lot, but it's not. From there viewership gets lower and lower. It's all based on demand and the only thing people want to read is porn.

Re: 1k True Fans (2008)

#43

1,000 true fans is an essay about a thousand die-hard fans paying a content creator $100/year, which comes out to 100k before taxes and expenses. I'd argue that if you're smart enough to be reading this website, you're smart enough to create and sell a piece of software to 10 businesses. If you can add 2% of revenue/quarter or save 5-10% of an expense, you can name your price (as long as it's below the amount of reve…

IF the goal is to just make money, way easier ways than fans/friends altogether. Get an office job; unsexy but it pays better. Even some blue collar jobs can pay better.

Downside vs SaaS is that an employer stops paying you when you stop clocking in.

SaaS customers keep paying until they churn, often with very little support along the way.

Re: 1k True Fans (2008)

#44
post #27

1,000 true fans is an essay about a thousand die-hard fans paying a content creator $100/year, which comes out to 100k before taxes and expenses. I'd argue that if you're smart enough to be reading this website, you're smart enough to create and sell a piece of software to 10 businesses. If you can add 2% of revenue/quarter or save 5-10% of an expense, you can name your price (as long as it's below the amount of reve…

Meh. If you're smart enough to read this web site you should find someone else to leverage some equity out of and a good salary and ride it to IPO then retire and do something else.

[dead]

Re: 1k True Fans (2008)

#46

1,000 true fans is an essay about a thousand die-hard fans paying a content creator $100/year, which comes out to 100k before taxes and expenses. I'd argue that if you're smart enough to be reading this website, you're smart enough to create and sell a piece of software to 10 businesses. If you can add 2% of revenue/quarter or save 5-10% of an expense, you can name your price (as long as it's below the amount of reve…

The article actually defines it as $100 profit per superfan (after expenses)

Quoting from the article:

> First, you have to create enough each year that you can earn, on average, $100 profit from each true fan.

Re: 1k True Fans (2008)

#47

This again? 1k true fans, like the 10k hours rule popularized by Gladwell or the Purple Cow by Godin, etc. sounds better on paper than in practice, but there are always caveats and major survivorship bias. Getting those 1k fans is quite hard, as it turns out, maybe impossible even though it's not that many on an absolute basis. According to Kevin Kelly, a true fan is more than just a Twitter follower or a Facebook li…

But unlike an MLM all the money goes to you and not the top of the pyramid.

Re: 1k True Fans (2008)

#49

1,000 true fans is an essay about a thousand die-hard fans paying a content creator $100/year, which comes out to 100k before taxes and expenses. I'd argue that if you're smart enough to be reading this website, you're smart enough to create and sell a piece of software to 10 businesses. If you can add 2% of revenue/quarter or save 5-10% of an expense, you can name your price (as long as it's below the amount of reve…

Brilliant point. May I ask if anyone is aware what type of businesses to target? SMB? I always thought enterprise has super long sale cycles and won't trust a new product easily ( more decision makers) but to get 10 businesses to pay $833 wouldn't that need enterprise customers not SMB?

Below a certain threshold a Sales cycle length is driven by price, not customer size. I’ve sold a $300 a month SaaS product to Fortune 500 companies like Target and Apple, as well as smaller sized companies with 50-100 people. Pretty much $500 or less a frontline manager can put it on their corporate AMEX and the sales cycle was similar length (1-2 weeks)

Above a certain deal size company type does matter. I was recently invoked with two deals, both around $20K a year. One was to a medium sized company and it closed in about a month. The other was the same amount but with a large enterprise, and that took about 10 weeks, because legal had to be involved. The security team had to be involved, we had to get added as an approved vendor, etc

Re: 1k True Fans (2008)

#50

1,000 true fans is an essay about a thousand die-hard fans paying a content creator $100/year, which comes out to 100k before taxes and expenses. I'd argue that if you're smart enough to be reading this website, you're smart enough to create and sell a piece of software to 10 businesses. If you can add 2% of revenue/quarter or save 5-10% of an expense, you can name your price (as long as it's below the amount of reve…

IF the goal is to just make money, way easier ways than fans/friends altogether. Get an office job; unsexy but it pays better. Even some blue collar jobs can pay better.

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