How to make 6 figures online in 12 months or LESS (3 key tactics every entrepreneur should know)
Have you ever been told “patience is a virtue”?
That’s total BS. No matter who you are, you’ve got a limited amount of time to get stuff done.
Should you really spend it waiting for good stuff to happen to you?
No way. You want big results, and you want them as fast as possible.
That’s why I’m going to show you how to make a 6 figure online business quickly—the same way I did—using 3 key tactics you can use to get started.
But first, some real data from my own business:
As a result of this 3 tactic strategy, I’ve managed to bring in more than $100,000 of revenue less than a year after releasing my first online course — including more than $30,000 in October alone.
Now that you know that I have done it, let me show you the 3 tactics that helped me do it:
6 figure online business tactic #1: Shun passive income (at first)
Yes, I realize how crazy this sounds. We all want passive income. In fact, it’s probably one of the main reasons to start an online business.
But when you’re building a business from the ground up, sometimes it’s faster to get “active” income first — by personally asking people to buy your product.
What do I mean?
Rather than thinking of your online business like passively fishing — where you set your bait (create a product), cast your line (write an email campaign and some blog posts), and wait for people to buy — go on the prowl.
Remember, I hate waiting. I’d rather do something — anything — to make a sale now than wait for serendipity to take hold.
That’s exactly what I did when I first started offering my online course.
When sales weren’t coming in every day, or even every week, I decided to roll up my sleeves and TALK to people about joining my course.
Whenever a reader emailed me with a question or comment, I’d ask them why they hadn’t signed up for my course yet.
Some of them weren’t interested, and that was okay. But many of them just needed a little nudge.
Take a look at this email exchange between me and a reader, who almost immediately signed up for the course.
The day after this brief exchange, I woke up to this lovely sight:
As you can see, conversations like this give you a chance to systematically remove objections in real time. Plus, you’re able to give thoughtful, personalized responses to people. That’s 10x more persuasive than having them read a sales page.
Look at it like this: If someone signs up for your email list, they must have an interest in what you offer. And since you know your product can help them, it’s your obligation to challenge them to purchase it.
By the way, this approach takes just 30 minutes a day, and I’ve found it to be totally worth the effort. More happy customers equal more fans spreading the word about your product — leading to the passive income you wanted in the first place.
Bottom line: To earn a lot of money passively, you’ve got to put in the work and hustle to get active income first.
6 figure online business tactic #2: Blog outside the box
Conventional wisdom says you need to write tons of blog posts to grow your business.
That wasn’t going to work for me.
As I solopreneur and family man, I didn’t want to spend my time writing articles all day long.
My answer to this problem is simple: “Compound Content.”
Compound Content works like compound workouts — you get twice the results in half the time.
What makes Compound Content so powerful is you kill two birds with one stone: You educate your readers (which is what they come to your blog for) and you also make them want to buy your product.
Best of all, Compound Content does this without ever making your readers feel like they’re being sold to.
…but you don’t have to take the same path as everyone else. How would it look if you designed a Rich Life on your own terms? Take our quiz and find out:
Here’s an example from my site: My course teaches people how to make money on the freelancing site Upwork. So I wrote a blog post that teaches people how I became a freelance copywriter in 2 days without any previous experience.
By getting people excited about how quickly they could start their career in copywriting, the post created a reason for them to join my course and start making money.
It’s similar to how bars give you free salted peanuts, which taste great, and also happen to make you thirsty. So you buy a drink. Boom. That’s Compound Content in the real world.
Check out some of the responses I got from that one blog post:
These customers were practically clamoring at the gates to get into my course.
What’s even more amazing is that the post didn’t even mention my course! Yet it’s brought in tens of thousands of dollars in sales. That’s the power of Compound Content.
Bottom line: Why work your ass off writing a zillion blog posts, when you can create a smaller amount of Compound Content that works for you instead?
6 figure online business tactic #3: Streamline PR
Most people think that getting a story about you (or your business) published on a major news site is:
- Something that only happens to big-name bloggers
- All about who you know
- A long, complicated process
None of this is true. Getting massive media exposure isn’t nearly as difficult as you might think.
For example, I wrote an article for Business Insider about how I became a freelance copywriter and started making $100,000 a year.
When you think about it, there’s nothing really remarkable about this. Millions of Americans have six-figure incomes, and millions of people freelance.
And yet you can turn this mundane story into something that’s very “newsworthy” — if you do your homework and present the material in the right way.
Take Jennifer Bertrand’s Huffington Post article about *not* finishing a marathon as another example. What could be more ordinary than NOT completing a race? But Jennifer found a way to make it interesting enough to publish on HuffPo.
To do this, you don’t need to mess around with press releases, social campaigns, or other PR wizardry. Here’s the simple process I used to turn my ordinary story into something extraordinary and get my article published:
Step 1: Scour major news sites for subjects related to your business. In my case, I looked for stories about:
- Freelancers
- Becoming a freelancer
- Working from home
- Working while traveling, etc.
Step 2: Make a list of all the articles you find. Then create a shortlist of the ones that have the most views and comments.
Step 3: Come up with an idea for an article that is RELATED to, but different from, any of the articles on your shortlist. (Remember that something as plain as competing in a marathon can be enough, provided you tell the story in an interesting and relatable way.)
Step 4: Email the person who wrote the article and pitch them your story idea in three sentences or less. Alternatively, you can write your story and submit it directly to the site if they accept guest post submissions. (For example, check out this Business Insider page that tells you how to become a contributor.)
Again, this doesn’t have to be anywhere near as complicated as most people think. It took me just 2 weeks to get my first major article published this way. Big news sites run on content, and they love to hear good ideas from people just like you.
How patient are YOU?
Have you ever felt pressured to be patient, when you really didn’t want to be?
You don’t have to wait it out. You can go after what you want, as fast as possible. Use these tips to accelerate your online business’ growth.
I’m curious: Have you found ways to rapidly grow your business where most people get stuck waiting?
Share your best tip for fast growth in the comments below.
If you liked this post, you’d LOVE my New York Times Bestselling book
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