And why you need to study them
It’s no secret I’m a Justin Welsh fanboy.
In August, I wrote a 21-minute article about how he’s made over $1.28 million from his online courses.
In The Saturday Solopreneur, he shares actionable tips to help readers build, launch, and monetise their internet businesses. It’s the only weekly newsletter I read religiously.
A couple of months ago, he shared five rules that completely changed his life. It’s quite possibly his best newsletter yet.
Here are those rules.
But first, a little context…
Three years ago, Justin came across Naval Ravikant’s now-famous Twitter thread — How to Get Rich (without getting lucky).
At the time, Justin was working 80-hour workweeks as an executive. He was making a good living, but he was also burning out.
Naval’s perspective knocked him for six.
“Code and media are permissionless leverage. They’re the leverage behind the newly rich. You can create software and media that works for you while you sleep.
“An army of robots is freely available — it’s just packed in data centers for heat and space efficiency.
“Use it.”
— Naval Ravikant
Justin started thinking about “an army of robots” and how he could use them to his advantage.
“I’m not a coder. I don’t build software. But I do have some knowledge that would be valuable to others.” — Justin Welsh
This realisation took him down a long, winding path of making money online.
A path that involved reinventing his lifestyle.
The American Dream is a trap
This reinvention is driven by fear.
Justin wants to avoid the average “American Dream trap” at all costs:
“Go to high school
“Go to college (maybe)
“Get a job and work 40–70 hours per week
“Switch jobs
“Buy ‘stuff’
“Save money (most people fail)
“Try and retire (most people fail)
“Finally, retire at 66
“Die at 78.
“12 years to enjoy your hard work. No way.” — Justin Welsh
Embrace the new path
To begin creating his own income, Justin gave himself permission to try something new.
Here are two simple lessons that helped him embrace this new path. You can use them too:
- The internet will give you access to 4.95 billion new prospects for anything you create
- The biggest competitor working against you is yourself. Your own mind. Trying anything new is difficult.
“Once I was armed with these simple facts and accepted that I was my own gatekeeper to success, I thought about a new set of rules…”
— Justin Welsh
The Five New Rules
To outline his new rules, Justin sat down with a pencil and paper. He then started brain-dumping everything he thought could be related to his new intention.
After days of thinking, here’s what he came up with:
Rule #1: You earn 33% of the day. Move to 100%. (Scale yourself)
Up until August 2019, Justin earned every dime between 9am and 5pm.
That’s only 33% of the day.
Outside of that time, making an income ceased. He had zero scalability. 8 hours of earning in a 24-hour day. He was spending 67% of the day not earning.
“You can create software and media that works for you while you sleep. An army of robots is freely available…”
In order to scale his earnings, he needed to use his knowledge and the army of robots to his advantage.
Plus…
Rule #2: Building is less risky than working for companies that don’t care about you. (Diversify yourself)
As Justin points out, building something of your own has always been deemed “risky” by society, but is it really?
“Look at what has happened in 2020 and 2021 with COVID. The number of people who were laid off is staggering.”
“We’re all familiar with the phrase, ‘Don’t put all your eggs in one basket’, but that is precisely what the average person does with their income.
“Diversification is necessary in such uncertain times. And diversifying is not difficult.”
— Justin Welsh
Rule #3: Nearly anyone can offer an online product in 2 weeks. (Invest in yourself)
The number of internet tools has never been more open and available to people.
You can build your entire tech stack (landing page, email automation, blogging, products) on Gumroad for free.
Here’s how Justin sold products back in 2020 before he had a personal website:
You can set up your entire Gumroad page in less than 30 minutes, and ship your first product in 14 days or less.
The best part about building knowledge products is the scale…
Rule #4: Your products are digital salespeople that work for you 24/7/365. (Replicate yourself)
Creating an online business means taking advantage of the internet.
The assets you create are available all over the world, 24 hours a day, to 4.95 billion internet-connected people.
With social tools that let you schedule posts at all hours of the day, you can create a promotional machine that runs while you sleep.
If you can create a product or two and promote them online, your income scales massively.
Rule #5: The hourly value of your asset goes up every time you make a sale. (Increase yourself)
Unlike traditional service-based work, producing a product means an ever-increasing hourly value.
For instance, Justin created his latest course, The Content Operating System, in about 97 hours.
He sold $101,000 during that 30-day period for an average hourly value of $1,041/hour.
Since launching, he’s sold another $177,000.
Aside from one update (about 6 hours), he hasn’t spent any extra time on the course. That’s increased his average hourly value to $2,705/hour and continues to grow with every sale.
Key Takeaways
Justin is well aware this path isn’t for everyone:
“If following the traditional journey and working a 9 to 5 is your chosen path, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that.”
However, if you’re open to considering a new path or building online income streams, Justin has a roadmap for you.
In summary, it looks like this:
- Scale yourself
- Diversify yourself
- Invest in yourself
- Replicate yourself
- Increase yourself