Chuck and Lucas join this week's panelist episode as they talk about "content creation". They start off as they dive into different ways of monetizing your content. Additionally, they talk about approaches on how to capture the interest of the audience to get them to subscribe to your courses. 

Hey, welcome back to another episode of Adventures In Angular. This week. On our panel, we have Lucas Paganini,

 

Hello, everyone?

 

I'm Charles Max Wood from Top End Dev's, and this week we're going to talk about content creation and how it works and how it may or may not make you rich or whatever. M. Lucas, Do you want to start out just talking a little bit about? I know you have a Youtube channel talking about what what you've done, And you know kind of how that works for you. Then I can talk about what we're doing here.

 

Sure, Okay, let me start with. The biggest question is how easily can that make you rich?

 

Uh,

 

Um,

 

uh,

 

Well,

 

Uh,

 

I don't even know if I can answer that, because I haven't gotten any money from content creation whatsoever until today.

 

Oh, I

 

Like

 

have

 

okay, So maybe you got rich. Okay, you don't have to.

 

Rich. I wouldn't use that word, but

 

Oh,

 

yeah, so so let me talk about that for a minute. I mean, if we're just going to go right for it, Um, so Foma, about twenty, twenty thirteen, twenty fourteen, Um, up until about twenty nineteen M, I made my entire living off of podcast sponsorships right before that I was contracting, so it was working various contracts for various people who hired me to write code for him. And you know, I mean that was Definitely profitable. Um, just to give a little bit more history, I guess, because you know people like stories and I like telling them. so, Um, so we started Ruby Rogues in twenty Eleven Before that, I had been doing show called Rails Coach that I then transitioned to be Teach me to code and Teach me to code was because I took over a video series from a friend of mine who had started a series called Teach me to Code a video series. And so I thought I just brand them the same. So when was the podcast was the screen cast? And um, anyway, I got some sponsorship on that. You know, people paid for ads on the website stuff like that, But it wasn't until Ruby Rogues that the sponsorship thing really started to go. And it was because Ruby Rogues was kind of unique in the space where there weren't other shows that had a panel of people talking about Ruby in the way that we were, and we, we got some of the now fairly well known people in the Ruby community to join it initially, And so M. New Relic actually sponsored us for quite a while, and then from there I was able to pick up other sponsorships, and after a while what happened was Um, because you'll notice Ruby Roke started in two thousand, Eleve, and I wasn't making my full living on it to like twenty thirteen, twenty fourteen. That the difference was was that eventually I had started other shows, so I started Jeviscripjabber and Free Lancers show, and then I freaks, and then adventures in Angular, and then we started React, round up and lixerm, S and H, views on view, And then we, you know, we started a handful more. and so you know, kind of see where that goes. Some of those are still running. some of them aren't. But anyway, effectively, the way that it kind of went was that Yeah, I was finding sponsors and we were lining them up on the shows and we had enough listenership that people were willing to pay. You know what we were asking for it. And so I think in twenty nineteen, this was right before the pandemic. Um, we grosset about three hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Of course, I was paying my team and things like that right, So it wasn't like pure profit, but it was enough to pay my bills, paid for hosting and everything else, and pay my team to produce the shows and do outreach and stuff like that. So Um, you know making money directly from content? Yeah, and then the stuff went down, Covid Hit, and you know, Um, people weren't willing to spend money on marketing And so you know, It kind of slowed down And so we started before the show. We were talking about this, and you know how I'm starting to ramp back up into sponsorship. but the whole sponsorship scene has completely changed, and so talking to people now about doing the same thing we were talking about doing. In twenty nineteen, they'll run ads like they did, but some of them aren't willing to pay as much, or some of them want something unique or right. And so before where it was kind of a new hop Market today it's It's a little bit different in the way that that works. The other way that I've seen people make money on content is by selling some kind of premium right, And so they have a premium model where you get. Um, you know one or two videos per month for free, And then if you want the rest of the content, you pay And so if you go look at now, I'm most familiar with this in the In the Ruby or Rails arena, Drifting Ruby

 

M.

 

is done by one of our Ruby Rogues Co Hosts. He puts out a video every week. The first one of the month is free, and the rest of them you have to have a pro account to get him. Um, there's another one. Go rails. I think they operate kind of the same way. When I was new. it was rails casts, and he did him for free. Did one week for free for ever for like years. And then he, he started talking to people and realized Hey, if I do a second one every week, you know, and make it a pro off off Ring right then, people will tpay for it so that that's kind of how that came out. As far as that goes, that's another way of doing it. And then I know people that, Um, you know, they effectively use the content to promote their own stuff, So that's like West, Boss and Scott to Linski on Syntax, dot f M. their show. They have sponsorships on their show and they do make money that way, but the primary thing that they're doing is they're raising the profile of the courses they sell, and then their Ling that kind of premium content. So those are the ways that I see people doing it and I recognize that like M West and Scott they, I don't know if rich is the right word, but they make plenty of money selling their courses because they have such a good reputation. People like people know the courses or high quality. And so that that's the way that that works out. So so if you're talking about getting rich, I think it kind of depends on your definition of rich, but you know, can you make a living at it? People out there making a living at it?

 

Yeah, definitely, I'm going to pick a lot of things that you said because I think they are very relevant to emphasize. so

 

Hm,

 

first thing, you don't need a course to monetize, so

 

Right,

 

one very already validated way of monetizing your content is to dedicate part of your content to a premium subscription so you can have. You can even do like fifty fifty. So

 

Right,

 

One week you do freeqentet, the other you do paid content. One week you do freecantent,

 

Hm,

 

the other you do paid content. In that way, you can have paid subscriptions. So instead of people paying a single lifetime access to something, they are paying a monthly value to have access

 

Right,

 

to all the content that you produced before, and also all the content that you will be producing from now on. So

 

Right,

 

that's a great way to start, because it takes away a huge Weight which is building your own course. Especially if you already did great courses. then you might think I need to do something that great. Otherwise what's the point? like? there are a lot of um, regular quality courses out there, So if I'm going to do something

 

Right,

 

needs to be like better than all the alternatives, and that can put you in a path which will either take you one year to do that or you would never be launch, Because

 

Right,

 

other things would just come up, and then you ll never do it. So first thing to forget is um, not forget, necessarily, because you can still do a course and still have that as your primary means of monetizing your content, but so not forget about doing a course, but keeping in mind that there are other alternatives to and these other alternatives, they can have a lower bar, two and three. So that's thing one that I wanted to highlight. Another thing that I want to highlight is you were talking about West and Scott on Syntax F, M, and how they are

 

Hm,

 

always producing content so that they can promote their premium paid content. I think this is really important to emphasize because

 

Right,

 

there's this idea that if you create a Digito asset Digital asset, you can abstract that to something that you can offer through digital means. That won't, uh, that you won't need to have employees to deliver that product to the audience. Or maybe if you do like, it's like very short amount of people to deal with all the customers, And then you can just do that forever and you can sell that global. Like this is The definition of a digital

 

Right,

 

asset. And

 

Hm,

 

if we're talking about content creation and education a line, then we're talking about digital assets. There are either a subscription to paid content or um, um, a fixed value so that you can access a paid course. So these are

 

Right,

 

the most traditional ones, the most traditional digital assets when it comes to education Now

 

And there are a million ways to do all of those right. I mean, I've seen courses that you pay. You get access to everything right. It's just like Just go through it at whatever pace. I've seen other courses where you get in and they send you a new lesson every week Right And so they may have recorded thirty of them, but you get one every week. I've seen them where there's kind of a live component to it. I've seen it where they do it in cohorts. Right. So all the people who signed up on March first, which is The day we're recording this right. M. It starts on March first, and it goes till March thirtieth right. And so you get the whole, You know, everybody goes through at the same time, and they all get the live help at the same time. So there are million ways to do this right. There's no right way to do it, except for the way that is going to get people the results that they want, And so they'll come back and buy other stuff from you.

 

Exactly? But what I think it's really important to to consider is that even when you produce that thing, it won't necessarily make you money, and even if it does when when it gets launched, it won't necessarily always make you recurrent money. That's really important to consider to, because if you look at Was and Scott, then You will quickly notice that they are always creating free content on a regular

 

Hm.

 

basis to promote their paid content. So that idea that

 

Right,

 

you're just going to create a digital asset and then you're never going to worry about anything else, and you're just going to leave on the bitch. Then you could, When paid ads were cheap, now that they are not, and you need to get audience through organic reach, so you need to create content so that people can consume, And you can promote your paid content from the from the free content. Now you can't just not do anything any more. There were. There was a formula

 

Yes,

 

to

 

and

 

that

 

no,

 

before. Yeah, okay, go ahead. I want you to de bunk my idea.

 

No, no, I mean you're you're generally correct, right, um, You know, people are way more likely to buy stuff from you If if you're putting up free content, you're giving them some reason to keep coming back. They feel like they have a relationship with you because you're constantly doing things that pay off for them. stuff like that, And the other thing is as if you really pay attention to Scott and West. They're also generally working on the next course right, And so they're trying to come up with another thing that They're You know, dedicated audiences will buy, but I wouldn't just discount paid advertising either. The differences is that you don't have as much of that personal touch, and so your message has to be really really well put together right. It really has to you know. whatever the headline is, it's got to resonate with people and make them want to stop and click. And then whatever they get, once they stop and click has to be compelling enough. Right. This is the problem you have. Oh, wow, you're really speaking to me. And the problem is that I have right. It has to be compelling enough for me to want to click that by button. Right, And so you can set them up, You can run them and they will work. But it takes a lot of time to figure out what that right message is. I mean, sometimes people just you know that they intuitively know it, or maybe luck into it right. And so they put up their first campaign and it actually works, But for the most part what I found is that in order to make those work On the paid content side, it takes a lot of that personal touch where people are listening to your podcast Are watching your Youtube video or what? Have you on a regular basis and going Okay, You know, I trust. I trust Chuck now where I trust Lucas now. And so you know, he offers the thing that I think I need, And so you know, it's not just I'm going to buy this course and hope it doesn't suck it. I'm going to buy this course because I know that Chuck understands what I need and so that's that's the Difference between the two approaches the other. You know. if it's if it's warm traffic, you know where people know who you are and then you you know. Show him what you've got. a lot of times that works on the cold. traffic is just a different story, right and that's generally where you're coming at. You're coming at people you know with paid ads and stuff. And so then it's um. Hey, you know, do these things in order to um to get what you need, But the other thing that I see is that a lot of people they'll do the paid ads to get people into their free content And then you know so so it's a discovery mechanism. And then the free

 

Hm.

 

content is what sells people on it right, And so you know it gives them a chance to follow it by email and get them to subscribe to the podcast and watch their best Youtube stuff Right. And so then after You know having six, seven, eight, nine, ten touches after they've clicked that link, That's when you come in and you say Hey by the way. If you've watched all this stuff and this is what you needed, we've got a paid version of it. that's even better.

 

Okay, um, I agree with all the arguments that you presented My issue is that Nowadays, if you try to run a marketing campaign using paid ads, Um, for example, using Google ads, or Facebookads or Instagramats,

 

Hm,

 

The profit margin that the ads are going to take are so big nowadays, and the comparison that the potential customers they are going to go to your landing page. the level of comparison that they're going to make from your course from your products to other similar courses is so big that you convert lest people, because one thing is, Somebody went to buy your course because they already follow your free content. And they are they really like or free content. So they are ready to buy our course Like, maybe they are going to think about the price a bit, but the chances of them buying are really high. On the other side, You were like on the internet just scrolling on Instagram. and then you were impacted by. Of course, that sounds interesting, but you don't know nothing about the person And quite frankly you weren't thinking about buying a course for that topic right now. And if you decide to buy a course for that topic, maybe you will also search on Google for other courses on that topic before deciding to buy this one or the other. So at the end of the day, your conversion rate if you're running paid ads is much lower than your conversion rate for organic traffic, And

 

Hm,

 

plus, in the organic Traffic you inter, you didn't paid for that traffic. In practice, you did with your time, because you had to dedicate time and energy

 

Right,

 

to produce free content and also to put it out there. So you also needed to have audience for the frequent, which is also not easy. So even if you do frequented, don't think that people are just going to watch your videos like it's It's really hard to get traffic, even free traffic. So at the end of the day, let's say you're selling a course for Uh fifty bucks and then you run

 

Hm,

 

a marketing campaign with paid adds to it. I'm not saying that you won't make sales from it, but your profit margin can be so small from the page traffic that maybe it doesn't pay off, so you would have to increase the value of the course, and that maybe your conversion would drop even more, and then you would again not pay off. So Maybe you can't, if your course is like really top notch, if your product not just your course, but if you're digital as it is really top notch, then Um, you can still do it. Of course, and even if it isn't like, you can still do it like. I'm not saying that it won't work at all. I'm sure that if you are really creative in the ads and in the story telling of your course, and in the quality of it, then sure you can still make it work.

 

Hm,

 

But the idea that we had in the past That you could just create a digital asset, create automated paid marketing campaigns to attract traffic, And then you're done because you have a product. you have automated

 

Hm,

 

a way for people to find, and by or product, so you don't have to do anything any more. And unfortunately I didn't got that wave, So if

 

Hm,

 

I had started maybe ten years earlier, maybe I would be rich right now, But now

 

Yeah,

 

It's like really hard to get that to get that working

 

Right, so, um, yeah, I mean, my experience with this has been that. Um, if just just going to the paid adds again, So the way that I see it, because I agree with you right the way that I see it. I've seen the paid ads approach work, but it's typically a high ticket thing. If you're if you're in it to actually make money out of the offer right, it's a high ticket thing. You know, people are spending a thousand dollars and so you can go, and you can spend a hundred dollars in add Per lead, Right, And so your conversion rate can be small. You still have to have a high quality campaign to get people through. You know, there might be some selling over the phone, or you know, through a web in Ar, or something like that to get people in, But yeah, you know, that's the kind of thing where I'm seeing people actually make enough to you know, make and set aside money and pay for the adds and everything else. Um, if you're doing it at the lower end, which is kind of where I think most People come in, right, They're going to do a couple undred dollar course, or maybe a hundred dollar course, or you know when on going series. where, like I said, people are paying nine or nineteen bucks a month. Um, you know now now we're talking about. Okay, you know what's the break even on this right? And so yeah, you know if I'm spending nineteen dollars to acquire a customer and it's nineteen dollars for my product, I'm breaking. Even. The difference is though, is that I'm getting those people into my system so that I can Get the next thing to him. And so that's where I see the value in that, Um, and then for everybody else, right, the people who know who I am, but may not know what my products are, the warmer traffic where hey've heard of me. They saw me speak at a conference. Things like that, You know, there may be a little less warm, but they're not cult traffic right, And so they have some trust. Some level of. they're willing to give me a chance all the way up to the people who. every time I tell them I have a new thing coming out, They know it. they know what it's about. They know why they Want it right. Those, those are like the hot traffic. Um, and you want to sell kind of to all of them right, So if I'm putting ads out, I'm not trying to get my hot traffic to click it, because I have other ways of reaching those folks right. It's it's to get new people into the system so that yeah, they may. I may get them to make a break, even purchase, you know, and maybe I upsell them on this or that, And so maybe I'm making you know on average ten dollars you know per per person or five dollars or two dollars for every, And that comes in. But the flip site is is that when I come out with the next thing, or I come up with the follow up to what they bought, or you know they get it and they find real value in it. And so then you know, my email, follow up gets them to come back. That's where I'm looking to convert And so those those, I see them as future, um,

 

Future

 

um,

 

customers.

 

ecus. Yeah, future customers are future profitable customers because they become customers when they buy. Whereas you know the other people, We're already in my orbit who already know who I am, who know that I'm going to give them a quality offer. Those people you know, I can, you know they're going to be profitable from day one, And so then all I have to do is make sure that I live up to the thing that I promised them right. And so and that's that's generally what Contents all about anyway, Right is you know? Am I getting out of it what I wanted? What I thought I was going to get out of it. So for example, I mean, even with a free Podcast right, people are listening to be entertained. They're listening because they want to learn something. they're listening because they want to feel like they're staying current. Right. whatever there are, there are ton of reasons why people listen to the shows that we put together at top end of right, but at the end of the day, if we're not living up to it, they'll subscribe right that they'll go away. They'll go find something else that gives them what they want. Um, and it's the same thing for the paid offering, right T? I get. I pay three hundred dollars. They get three hundred dollars or more value out of it right, and if They feel like every time they put three hundred dollars in, they get thousands of dollars worth of value out of it. Then they'll keep coming back right and that to me that that's what I'm in it for. anyway, Right is because I want to see people succeed to a massive scale right. That's why I called it top end, Because I want to give you the pieces and then I want to see you. Just take it to the absolute. You know, stratusphere, you know, just just take things off. And so you know if If your career is taking off after I give you a three hundred dollar course, you know that makes me happy, right. you know, it doesn't make me feel like I should have charged a thousand. It makes me happy that we got you, you know, just blasting off into wherever you want to go. But the other thing is as if I come along and I tell you all right, you've blasted off to this place and here's how you take it from this level up to the next level. You're gonna. you're going to pay me for it too. In that way I get to feed my kids and you get to go to the next level. So

 

Yep,

 

That's the way that I kind of see all of this stuff. Um, you know, and in content it's not the only game in town, but for me, at least it's really rewarding. So

 

Definitely, I like that You mention the part about genuinely carrying about the problem that you solve, because

 

Hm,

 

that's a huge difference from people that are just looking to do content creation just to make some money out of it. Like, not that it is wrong to try to make money out of content. Like why not? But it really makes a difference and you can feel it When you're when you're consuming the content. You can feel it when the person really cares about solving the problem, and that translates to sales to. So if I

 

Hm,

 

am consuming content from someone and I have the impression that this person isn't really trying to help the audience. This person is just trying to get more money and they're just looking for the numbers. They're not looking for the individuals behind those numbers, Problems that they have and the problems that your product solves. Then I really can't buy this product or the service. I just don't

 

Hm,

 

feel like it will be a good purchase. So if you create content, but you can't transmit trust to the audience and transmit that you actually care about them and which are different things, Because one thing is you actually caring and the other is the Dence perceiving that. So if you can't

 

Right,

 

do that then it might not be worth it to create content because

 

Right

 

maybe you can even like you can even make somebody that was ready to buy. decide not to buy. Because of it that happens to. So you really got to care about the audience. That's really important.

 

Right, I agree. Um, it's It's kind of interesting, right because I've been in a place where you know. Yeah, I'm really into the content. I'm really into the people. I'm really into helping people out. of. Really, you know, it lights me up right and then it's just you know. it's not quite making enough money, so that I have to go, and like you know, do other work right. I have to get a full time job, or I have to you know, work a contract with a company that. I'm just you know, I'm not really jazzed about what they do or something like that, Right And so I don't want to just frame it as you know you. You go find something to light you up. Definitely, go find something that light you up if you can, but just keep in mind that at least for for a lot of these content products and content creation, you have to be doing something that really does light your fire. That gets you excited because he. it'll come through. B. Content creation is personal, right, you know, I put a lot of myself into the podcast To put a lot of myself into the other stuff that I do. Um, And so it's It's that way. you know. there's a certain demand to that. You know some people. Um, they pay a higher or lower cost for it for it right. You know, some people that seem to be able to just do it all day And it's it's not emotionally taxing. and then other people, if they pour that much of themselves into something that wears them out right, and so you have to be able to feel it With that. The other thing is is you're going to hit hiccups right. You're going to get to a point where I don't know how to explain this to people, or you know I'm not really interested in this part of it, or this is hard, or my technology is not working or whatever, and if you're not passionate about it, you're not going to stick with it. I've coached a whole bunch of people on starting podcasts and that number one is the reason why they quit Is they get three, four or five episodes in, and they're just like you know. I'm Seeing a ton of traction off of this. I'm not, you know. I'm not seeing the payoff I wanted, blah, blah blah, And what it turns out is is that you know if they had stuck with it for two three months if they had really been so into it that it didn't matter that after five episodes they don't have more than you know. a handful of people listening. You know those kinds of things. Yeah, it will eventually get to where I think people in vision content getting them. But it takes time and it takes a lot of effort to get it Off the ground. And so if you're not, if you're not excited about it, you're not going to stick with it. But, but, on the other hand, yeah, you know, you're just not going to make as good a content because I think one of the things that I've really enjoyed about you know, some of the other content that I've consumed is that I'm consuming content from people that are excited about it and it comes through and I really enjoy watching it Because then I get excited about it and so then I can level up on it. If that makes sense,

 

Yes, Yes, and then there's the other side of contencreation, which is you don't need to make money directly from it. You can also make money indirectly, which is what I do. So Right from the beginning of this podcast, I said that I haven't made any money out of contencration. Actually,

 

Right,

 

I probably lost a lot of money because I have a team of people to help me, The videographer.

 

Hm,

 

I have a content creator to help me with the this caphoding of my ideas. I also invested in a lot of equipment, so expensive camera as expensive microphones. like I built an entire studio in my house. All of that was extremely expensive and I haven't made a single dollar from content creation until today. So what made me in Asked more and more and more of my time and my money on to this. It's not the direct money, it's the authority that comes from it, and the connections

 

Hm,

 

that you can make from it, which open up a lot of opportunities in which you can then pay off the contencration. So for example, Um, I became one of the hosts Nd adventurers in Angular, And that Was a

 

Right,

 

show that I was a huge fan of. I listened to the episodes. I always liked the show. So to me that is a form of payment. The fact that I got into a point where I have enough authority in the subject such that I can be here and I can actually do a good job. and other than that, I get to meet a lot of people Through that, so I get to meet the gainst that comes on the show. I get to meet

 

Hm,

 

the audience that goes to my social media and interact with my content, and follows me and sense messages, et cetera it's also an opportunity to show case my business, which is a softer development company, which by the way is specialized and angular, so everything helps so I can go to a potential client, and I can say, The co of this company Avoid is a host on the most popular podcast about Angler, and that

 

Hm,

 

transmits a lot of confidence that the quality of what we deliver is good, because the co of the company is not just a business man. Not that this is a bad thing, but he is also a developer which is specialized on that. so if he has high standards for him, imagine the standards that he has for his employ. So I'm going to trust this company. So all of that helps to get clients for my company to meet people to find speaking opportunities. Like that's something that I want to do to. I. I didn't went looking for it because of the pandemic, and also because as soon as the pandemic was over, kind of over, but as soon as we could travel and do um, even In personal events, then I was already busy with a thousand different things from my company, so I didn't look after

 

Hm,

 

it, But that helps a lot. If you have content, then it's easier for you to justify. Um, that you can be a great speaker in that conference,

 

Right,

 

because they will ask like, What can you show to us so that we know that you are going to be a great speaker, And if you don't have anything, You can be like at a very high position in a big company, But how can they know if you have good dedatics, So

 

Right,

 

that's important to say, all of these are indirect ways of getting return from content. And this is how I justify my investment in contencration. So that could also be something that the person that is listening to us right now. That might be Then that makes sense to him or her. So maybe you have a product or a service and you're going to create content and this content. If not to attract clients directly, it could be used as a way to help you close the deo, So maybe

 

Yep,

 

you can't attract clients, But once you attract the clients in some other way, you can use your content as a way to transmit more Confidence more quality. And then that can help you close the door.

 

Yeah, and it's It's interesting the way you're talking about. I mean, for one, we kind of talked about selling content selling educational stuff, and what you're talking about is effectively What a lot of these folks do right. They build their authority, they build, you know that trust, and then and then they used it to sell their educational content. But yeah, I mean, I've been on the other side of it too, as a freelancer. Where Um, you know, I told people. Hey, you know, I'm blahblalblah and I, not only am I on the biggest podcast because most of my contracting has been re Rails. Not only am I on the biggest Ruby podcast out there, but I actually run it right. And so you know, Yeah, people are like. Oh, well, then you must be the Ruby guy Right, And do I know people who are more talented than me? Oh yeah, right. Do I know people who are have much more experts than me? Oh yeah, but doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. and the reason is because they. you know, some of them would even go and watch videos that I put out or go, watch or go, listen to the podcast, or you know, Find some of the other stuff that I've done right. some of the open source that I contributed. you know, even though I didn't bring it up because they could find me and then they could find it right, because I'm easy to find on the internet now. And so all of those things. Yeah, they play into that and make people comfortable to trust you. The other thing that I've also found is that doing the podcast. At one point, I remember I had a contract end unexpectedly. right, you know, that Ran out of. I can't even remember they ran out of money or something, but there was a reason. they, just you know, abruptly said we're not going to pay you the right code anymore, And I remember going on Ruby rogues that next week and saying Hey, my contract ended. I need work and literally, I got phone calls that that week And so that's the other thing is you, you do you? It's not just building the credibility with people who don't listen to the show or bidding, building credibility with people who wouldn't know what the show is, But also you build that audience of people who may need the services that are offered right, you know, so In the in the case of unvoid, right, you may get on and say hey, We've got three people who are on the bench who need work. Right because people who listen to this show. Um, they may work on a team that is like we can't. We're having trouble hiring people right now, And so we're talking about back feeling with contractors and they may come to you and say hey, we can use your three people on the bench for a few Months while we figure this out, or we could use your three people on the bench to build this one feature, or you know, micro service or whatever you know. Um, you know this front end piece that we just we know we need, but we haven't been able to get to, And so a lot of it comes. You can directly sell off the podcast, but in a lot of cases Yeah, it's just enough to say. Hey, here's my stuff. One story that I'll tell. Um, I was. I Was putting out screen casts right, so I was recording twotorials Basically, Hey, here's how you do this thing in Ruby n Rails, blah, blah blah, And one of my one of the videos, there were six videos and it was how to build a Twitter clone in Rails, And I haven't even recorded the videos right. it wasn't me on the video. It was Eric Berry. He was a friend of mine, but he started the video series and like I said, he handed it off to me because he got into Grove on Grail's and to teach me to code, Tiens, didn't want Groove content. That they still wanted Ruby content. And so he was like, Hey, Do you want to do this Because I was already podcasting at the time and I said Sure, so I took it over. I was doing it. I just put a little banner at the top of the page that said Do you need a free lancer? Here's my phone number right. It wasn't that fancy. I mean that was it. You had my picture on it. And so I get this call from this guy who says I need basically a Twitter lone built right, And he had a couple of things he wanted different. He wanted to be able to put icons in that would count as a character, kind of like Mog before Mog were really a thing, but it was for try, athletes, and so the ions where I lifted weights or I ran, or I cycled, or you know, Tread mill or whatever, but the thing is is that it would take up one character instead of you know, however many characters, and he had a bunch of other features that he wanted you know outside of what your traditional Twitter did. But then he wanted people to just be able to get in and you know, Just post this is you know. And so he called me up because his brother in law had helped build Dentrix, which is the dental practice management software. Um, way back in the day, And he, so he called him up, right because he was a programmer that he knew. his brother in law said you should build this in Ruby on Rails, So we went and looked up Twitter, Ruby on Rails, right, So I had the content out there with the key words in it. And

 

Hm,

 

then he contacted me and said Hey, I need a Twitter clone built in Rails, And of course he assumed I could do it because I had a video on my website showing people how to do and I wasn't the voice on the video. At that point it didn't matter because he already assumed that I knew what I was doing And so yeah, we went and built the M. v P for that thing And I mean I could tell story after story after story about this. I had a guy called me up because he tried to learn to code so he could build. You know, the software he wanted to build, figured out that it was way beyond anything He could learn to code and then put together himself. Called me up, I mean, because I had my phone number on the website again, right, Um, and he was listening to the podcast right to try and learn the code. And then he called me up because he trusted me at that point to be an expert that could do the thing. And so we built M v P. for that,

 

M.

 

we being, I built an m v p for that. But but you get the idea right that. I mean all of these things can can pay off right. And so were those content like that? I get paid to make content know, But It positioned me as an authority and then the other thing it did is it made it. I made it really easy for people who found the content to find a way to hire me.

 

Nice, And then when you got those contracts then you were probably able to charge more.

 

Hm,

 

then you would have charged if you didn't have the content to put you as an authority. So it's not that you, because maybe the audience would be like. Oh, but I already have a contract. I already have a job like. I don't see that as a benefit. Well, the benefit is that you can charge more Like. What makes you be more Valued as a professional then your colleague? It's your knowledge in an ideal world, but in the practical world is your perceived knowledge, and your perceived knowledge

 

And

 

will be extracted from the experiences that you had in the past on your resume, the way that you wrote them, the way that you communicate the way that you present yourself, and it will also be portrayed by D Amount of things that people that haven't worked with you before can find about you publicly on the Internet. so that surely helps

 

Yeah, effectively, what you're talking about is that I can go and I can verify what you know, right because you have content out there That shows me that you know it.

 

Exactly

 

M. I, also, though you know just down to reputation, right, you build an audience to build reputation. Um. So I talked about how the marketing thing kind of tanked in twenty twenty, Um, and so by July or August of twenty twenty, I was pretty desperate to you know, to get paid. Right was Of squeaking along. I had some money come in from sponsorships, but not a lot, and I was trying to figure out what to do and so actually started applying for jobs, and a friend of mine said that his company was hiring, so I went and applied there and I walked in the door, and you know, he kind of greeted me at the door and walked me back to where the people were going to do the interview. you know, and I expected the All right. Well, you know, what's the difference between this and this and this really deep part of Ruby That nobody would know about. So that we know that you know we were talking about. None of that happened. Literally. The entire interview was them asking me questions about the Ruby Rogues podcast. Oh, when you started it, But what was it like to talk to some one? So every month every week? Um, you know, so I really liked this episode. I can't believe you got this guy on there right. It was all that and then at the end they gave me a job offer and then the reason was Was because they had listened to me so much that they were already comfortable that I was qualified for the job and that they would like working for me, Were with me because you know my personalities out there, that the kind of already knew who I was. They kind of felt like they already knew me, and to a certain extent that's true, right, because I don't really hide my personality behind anything when I do these. And so yeah, at the end of the day they kind of had an idea, you know of what they were getting, and so the interview was basic, A formality where they could sit down and B s with me about something they liked for a half hour before they gave me a job offer. And what I found is that a lot of people who have that kind of thing out there right. they have the Youtube video or they have the podcast? Um, that that is, you know that has an audience. If if you're going to people who are already in your audience even for a job interview, right, because yeah, like you said, it doesn't you know you may not have a course to sell or services to sell, or be a freelancer. It still pays off in the arena of a job. Because of that, The other thing that I've seen is that In a lot of cases people will come to me with questions as though I'm the expert, even though I know that they are people on the team that that have a higher level of experts in some of the areas that they're asking me about, or have a higher level of experts in the domain knowledge of the app that we're working on, they'll come to me with questions because I'm already perceived as an expert and that makes it a whole lot easier if you're perceived as they go to guy or the expert in your job. O, go ask for that. raise another ex Ample. Just to put this one out there. I was working for a company that did lead generation And so they would, You know people would come in and they'd say I want to go to school for culinary school, or you know whatever it. And so they would capture that lead. They'd send it to the university and the university would reach out right, and they get paid for that lead. Um. And so I got a job there. I literally had a year's worth of professional experience and it was from my previous job that I've gotten laid off from. And so I went in. incidentally that job interview. They asked me the questions, and then my, the guy that was doing the hiring. I had tolled him about my videos. My video series. He went and watched one of the videos and called me up while I was still on my way home. Mind you, that morning I had cleaned out my desk from being laid off. He called me up, and some one. can you start? I went to work for them the next day, but while I was there, you know, I had barely a year's worth of experience. you know, I was not the expert by any means, but I Doing the work to learn stuff, and I've been putting content out there to teach people through the Rails Coach podcast, and to teach me to code video series, Um, and within a month they made me the team lead, And it was because I was answering everybody's technical questions with barely a year's worth of experience And the reason was because I was going out. I was doing the work. I was learning the stuff and I was putting the content out That demonstrated that I knew what I was doing And so you know, I just I can't. I can't emphasize Um highly enough. What a difference this kind of thing makes. Um. I also just want to say that not every company will value that or not every company will recognize it, but most of the good ones will. Most of them are going to see the value you bring, and they'll recognize it, and they, they'll take care of you for it. And if they don't then you also recognize that, then you have this social proof of what you already know and what you can do. The you can Used to go find a company that will pay you more of what you're worth and pay you better, and give you more perks and give you better benefits Because they want somebody with that kind of expert tease around.

 

Definitely. It's interesting that you said I only had one year word of experience in that place, and I got this other opportunity the next day that I got laid off as kind of an expert, and one month later I was already the leader. The thing is you had one year of professional experience, but that experience

 

Hm.

 

was much more intensive like During that year you had

 

Hm,

 

A very very intensive learning path than most people. so your one year was worth more than five years of a regular professional. That would just learn the things that they need to learn on their daadaybasis. So

 

Hm,

 

that and then you also had the proof that you were able to learn more in that one year, then Just what you would expect from a regular person in one year, because otherwise, if you did a thousand courses during that one year, and you had gotten to the same point that you got, but we doubt the social proof, then you probably would not be in another company to day after you got laid off and a

 

Right,

 

leader one month afterwards, Because you, you wouldn't have the proof of it, so that that also makes a difference. So the intensity Your professional career, the intensity of uh, how fast you can learn things, and how deeply involved you get into them, and how much you can show for everyone else that wasn't working with you about your knowledge on it.

 

M, Yeah, absolutely. so I do need to start us wrapping up because I have a call coming up. but is there anything else you want to add to this? I mean, I could go on for days talking about content.

 

Oh man, I know that I haven't said as much as you, but like you've been doing this for so so longer than than I've been that, I think it was in the right proportion if you look that way, If you look at the amount of time that you

 

I

 

spent

 

don't know.

 

on that, and I actually think that all the most relevant things that I had to say about my experience with content creation, where that. so to me,

 

Hm,

 

definitely the most valuable race On that I get is the indirect return, and it's also important to know that I planned that beforehand. so one thing is just you start creating content and you just see how that takes. you See where that takes you, And another thing is, you already know what your end go, and then you can clearly evaluate if the opportunities make sense or not. So I already had a company and then it was really easy to make that decision of. Should I take one more responsibility, and also have this weekly Pat Cast episode about Angular, which will, which will probably demand more time than just the actual recording, Because

 

Hm,

 

I'll be talking about things that are very advanced, so maybe I'll have to stop in research and be always super up dated Like. Is it worth it? Well, if I didn't knew my end go, then it would be really hard to answer that. But if you already know what you want, My case was, I have a company which is specialized in Angular, So that helps a lot to market

 

Hm,

 

that company. And yeah, for sure, like you, make total sense. So it's a definite. Yes, So having that helps a lot. So just knowing where you want

 

Yep,

 

to get. Otherwise you're just creating content And then yeah, I'm creating because I like it and I want to help people that school, but I think it's very valuable if you have a better picture of where you want to get. So I want to Build a course and I want to sell it. Okay, What's the course? About? The course is about web animation. So am I going

 

Hm,

 

to create content about view? Well, maybe not like. Maybe that's not going to help you. So that course.

 

Right,

 

So have a clear idea of why you're doing this. See if that aliens with your end go and then you can make this decision because it's a lot of effort.

 

Yeah, I agree. incidentally. I started podcasting because I thought it was cool and I was helping people. Um,

 

Yeah,

 

you know, kind, kind of the reverse of what you said, But podcasting was new. I was new to my career and it was fun right and so that? That's not to say that you can't do that, but I completely agree. If you can figure out where you want a head, then then just use it to super charge your journey, And then that makes a ton more sense. A Couple other things I'm going to put out there. I am not a huge fan of Blogging to do this kind of thing and I'll tell you why, Um, effectively blogging you. For one, it's harder to get noticed right, because you either have to write a blog post and then you have to do the work to put it in front of the people who are going to share it and disseminate it. So that's one thing. the other thing is is that there really aren't great directories that show all the blog posts that help people get discovered, Whereas podcasting there's a directory. Youtube has the Youtube search right, and so you have Better discover ability, And then the last thing is is that the reason that you do the content is so people can get to know you and what you can do and who you are and identify with you, and and start to care about. care about you, and blogging is much more impersonal than the others. Now I understand that that also means that a lot of people are worried because they're worried that they're going to have to take the risk of effectively being rejected after they say something or get on camera. But what I find is Most people are pretty friendly if you're trying, and if you're sincere, and the other thing is is that, Um, everybody starts out imperfectly Everybody starts out with poor video quality, poor audio quality. I'm still figuring out lighting on this thing right. doing the video. You know stuff like that. The point is is to get started and get going. and then and then you can get the help that you need to kind of level up. It's like Hey, what's what's the next big thing that I And do? That's going to make the difference And you know people will help you out, but you know, don't be afraid to just start and and put something out there and just be consistent because at that point that's where people are really going to find you and want you to be a part of whatever they're doing. So anyway, I'm gonna wrap us up there and head us into the self promotion. So Lucas, what are you working on that people should know about

 

I will plug the two things that I plug every week. So as I said throughout the podcast, I do have a company which is highly specialized in two things, functional programming and Angular. So if you have a project and you need more developers, for whatever reason, maybe you want to completely out source that project, or you just want to augment your stuff. You just want to have more people, All Have your own dabs, or you and your team and have more people. Maybe you don't want to bring people forever Like you just need them for a while, and maybe you won't need them after a couple of months. Then that's the perfect scenario for you to hire our company, So you can just go to void dot com and fill out the contact form and then we can see if it makes sense for us to work together. The The thing that I'm going to plug is my web animation scores, so Not done. Figure that, I'm going to say that it's not yet done for a while, but yeah, like it's taking a lot of time to do this properly in the quality that I want to deliver the value that I want. But if you're interested in learning all about the fundamentals of web animations and I know that same fundamental sounds like it's basic, but it's not, Is the fundamentals, because it will give you the base, and then we'll take it to more advanced levels. but we do need Have the fundamental s really well structured, and then you be able to code any webanimations that you want you. Just you don't have to look up on the internet. How can I do this particular effect and that particular effect? How can I do like a comfaty explosion? How can I do a rip effect? How can I do like a check box animation? That's all cool. But what if you want to do something that you? you can't find a tutorial teaching you exactly how to do it. Then how do you do it? And that's where the score? Um, that's where you will benefit from doing this Course is when you be able to create any types of animations that you want and deeply understand the fundamental, so that you can even improve the code that you get from the Internet and see the things that can be better, that can be more performance that can be more accessible. So that's what you get from doing this course. So join the waiting list on Lucas Paganini dot com, Slash Web animations. Guarantee a huge discount when the course launches.

 

Awesome? All right? Well, I'm going to throw in some things that I am working on. Um, So as I said, we talked about this actually before the show, but I'm working on some basically on going series. I mentioned, you know, Rails casts, and you know, they did a video every week that was free in a video every week that was paid, And I really like that structure. Um, I, also, just for me, I like being able to talk to people and just you know, help people Rough stuff. So the the series that I'm starting here soon are the Ruby and Rails series and I can't decide if I'm going to do one or two Right if I'm going to do a rails. If I'm going to do Ruby or I'm going to do both. Um, anyway, I'll figure that out and then the jobascript one is sorry series talking to me, So I'm not just right in my ears anyway. so so yeah, so I'm going to be putting together those series. We're going to be talking about Java script in the one and then I think that's the most relevant folks. We're going to go from kind of the fundamentals of how Jovascript works all the way up to. Hey, here's how you you know. build stuff with Express, or whatever you know. Maybe pull in some like Scully. Your next J. s, you know, and just do some examples with that stuff you know, and then the same thing you know with Ruby and Rails So well we'll see where those go. I also really want to do and I don't know exactly what the shape. it's going to take. Probably the same shape. but do a series on like V, S code Right. And so it's here's how you do a thing in V. S code. Have one free and one paid every week, and we may get into some of the more common extensions like some of the Get extensions or darker extensions or things like that. But but those are the ones that I want to put together, And you know, just looking at pricing for For where people are at, it will be nineteen bucks a month, but it will also include a call every month. We'll have a call every month where we can you know, get in and talk about stuff. And like I said, just do a little bit of a presentation on. Hey, here's how you do a thing with. You know, whatever the things about. So so those those are the? That's what I'm putting together. and yeah, I've talked a bit about like workshops and meet ups and things. I'm kind of setting all that aside for right now. I just want to Ocus on doing just the one thing and just nailing it down. And then if I feel like I can bring in some of the other stuff, then I'll do it. I'm probably also going to put together just series on how to build up your career and personal brand and stuff like that, and that will also be nineteen dollars a month. And so, if you're feeling like you're stuck, you feel like you know what. I don't know. What's next? Maybe your senior developer and you feel like I've topped out and I don't know where to go from here, or you're a junior developer and you're like, You know how I find a better job that pays better. You know how do I get a raise Because I like the company I'm working at. We'll put that content in there. So those are. Those are the four series that I'm really focused on and once we get those going, then we'll kind of see where we end up, But the career one is the one where I feel like lights me up the most, but I love writing stuff in job script. I love writing stuff and Ruby, M and N. I love just mastering the tools and feel like I can just fly through my code. So that's what I'm doing. The other ones. Let's do picks, Lucas. Do you have some picks?

 

Um, My pick is going to be a microphone that I use. I have this microphone for so long like I was in high school. When I got it. It's the audio technique Eight twenty twenty, And the cool thing about it is that you don't need any of the other fancy audio equipment to connect it to your computer. You can just get it in the U S. B version and then you can just hop on a call and use it. So it's a real Professional microphone. That's the one that I'm using right now. During the podcast. I also have another studio equipment connected to like a bunch of other more expensive audio gears, which I'm using as a back up microphone, but connected to my computer. That's the one and I can't say there is really portable. It's kind of big, so you can't really put it into a small bag. But if you have like a back back then And just throw it in there and take it to coffee shop. If you want to to work from there. And yeah, like this is going to be my pick. I think that for everyone that is working remotely having a clear crisp sound really makes a difference, and this microphone

 

Hm,

 

gives you that. for not such an expensive price. I can't say how much it is today, because I bought it like ten years ago, but I imagined that it would be cheaper And also like just the fact that I bought it ten years ago and it's still tis good like that. Say something about the durability

 

Hm,

 

of this thing. Yeah, audio techniqua, eight, twenty, twenty.

 

Yeah, I used to have one of those. I really like it. It's a cost effective microphone. Sounds terrific and they can take a ton of abuse. I used to travel with one, and you know, I don't know how how often I got banged around while I was traveling, But yeah, that was the one that I used when I was traveling. So like that, Mike. For sure, I'm gonna start out with board game pick, just like normal. the game I'm going to pick. So this last weekend, Mike, Wife and I every February we go down to Saint George. They have the Saint George Parade of homes, which is effectively where you go and you walk through the homes that the home builders down there want to show off. This time there were thirty homes on the parade of homes, and Yes, you just walk through the house and you drive to the next one. You walk through it to Um, and my brother in law and sister in law. You know, we always bring games and we play games after because they close Dow Like seven p. M. Right, So you know, we go sit in hot tub for a while and then we play board games, And they bought brought this board game and it was it was really fun. I really enjoyed it, so I'm going to pick it. M. it's called The Quacks of Quedlinburg, Um. It came out twenty eighteen, and effectively what you're doing is you're trying to build a potion. Um, and if you add too many white ingredients to the potion explodes, and if you explode, you don't get as many of the bonuses at the end of the round. And so you Basically fill up your pot as full as you can without exploding it right. And so if you manage to do that, then you get all the bonuses at the end of the round. And so you just you know, you play a bunch of rounds until somebody wins and there there's a certain number of of around that you play. And you know you get more white ingredients about half way through the game and you just randomly draw them out of a bag and put them on your board, and they all do different things. Give you a different advant. It is, except for the white ones that just advance your. You know, they fill up your pot a little bit more, which is a good thing for you until you get too many of them. So anyway, um, it's It's a relatively simple game. Um. there is some you know interplay like the black ones. If you have more black ingredients than your neighbors than you get bonuses for that. Um, Anyway, so board game geek ranks it or weights it at one point nine five. So it's right there right at. Hey, Casual gamer. like to play it with a group of friends. I don't need to have them be heavy duty gamers. This is right in there. It's a fun game. M. And so I'm going to pick that and probably going to buy it at some point because I really liked it. Um, as far as other picks go, Um, I have been moving all of our infrastructure over to linoad off of digital Ocian. Um, I had a long talk With the guys over at Lined. Probably going to turn into some kind of sponsorship. just you know as a fair deal, but their set up has been real nice. I've been really happy moving my stuff over and so and I'm going put out some videos on. You know. hey, this is. this is how I moved my stuff off of digital lotion and on to lined. Um. One thing that people may not be aware of is that Lina was recent recently purchased by a kami, which his kind of enterprise infrastructure Stuff. And so you know, I'm expecting to see some changes out of that, but yeah, I've been really happy with them And so I'm going to pick that And then the last thing that I'm going to pick is we're moving a lot of our infrastructure for the podcast as far as like invitations. and Um, you know, scheduling and all that stuff. I found a C. R. M was a customer relation manager that has all this stuff built in and so Silly going through and canceling like six services is going to save me a few hundred dollars a month, is called Pipeline pro M. My affiliate link in the. I'll put it in the chat, so, or in the in the show notes, So you can go sign up if you want. Um, I love affiliate links. That's something we didn't talk about. You can sell stuff on affiliate links and get a cut of the action. Um, And it's nice to, because it typically doesn't cost your your audience members anymore. You just they just pay you for referring them. And so it works out nicely for everybody. And so anyway, Um, definitely worth checking out. if you're trying to build relationships and get people to sign up for stuff and things like that, And then I think that's it. I think that's all I've got, so. uh, yeah, let's go ahead and wrap it up here. Thanks for Lucas.

 

Thanks for inviting me. Well, I don't know if it can say inviting me now that I'm regular, but yeah, it's always a pleasure to be here. check,

 

Yeah, it was a good chat. all right folks.

 

Uh,

 

Well, if you have any other content creation related questions, I'd love to hear him until next time folks max out.

 

Right.