Read Time: 4 minutes

July 08, 2023

In this week’s issue, I’m going to take an idea originally shared by my friend Justin Welsh: how to make your first $1 online. However, I'll take it a step further and show you how to leverage AI to enhance your results.

Now, you might be wondering, “Why should I learn to make money online when I have a job that already pays me well?”

One word: options.

It pays to have a side income and, according to a recent survey by Bankrate, nearly 2 out of 5 adults have a side hustle. Interestingly, 53% of this group comprises Gen Z, while 50% are millennials.

Safe to say, it’s not just a good idea, but also a very popular one.

In his article, Justin explains that if you can make $1, you can scale it up to $10, $100, or even $1,000. By mastering the skills to earn that initial dollar, you unlock unlimited potential for making money online in the future.

The principles for online income generation are well-established, and creators like Justin Welsh have successfully applied these principles to achieve a comfortable lifestyle.

However, for many "aspiring online creators," this reality remains elusive.

Why 99% of people fail to make even $1 (and it’s not for lack of trying):

In his article, Justin highlights 4 major challenges:

• They don’t understand people’s problems

• They have grown zero social media audience

• They don’t have a collection of interested people to sell to

• They overcomplicate the process, especially the technology

But, I’ve noticed 4 nonobvious reasons for these challenges:

• They don’t know where to start

• They don’t know how to grow an audience

• They don’t even have a product to sell people

• They don’t know which tech is worth their time

I’m going to break down each of these challenges Justin originally highlighted (pre-AI) and show you how to use AI to guide you in tackling each one of these in a fraction of the time.

Let’s dive right in:

Step 1: Use ChatGPT to highlight customer pain points + offer potential solutions

In the past, if you wanted to uncover common issues people faced, you had two primary options:

1. Manual research: This involved searching through websites like Quora to identify the questions people were asking, which provided insights into their challenges.

2. Direct interaction: You could go out and personally ask people about the issues they were currently experiencing. This method involved conducting market research by engaging with individuals.

Now, both of these are still very relevant and you should still ask people and do some of your own market research.

However… we can streamline this with the help of AI using this prompt I came up with:

Hi, I am a {InsertProfession} who helps {InsertTargetCustomer} do {DesiredOutcome}. I understand the challenges you face and have solutions to address them.

Pain Point: {Describe a common pain point experienced by {InsertTargetCustomer}, highlighting the challenges or difficulties they face in achieving {DesiredOutcome}.}

Solution: {Suggest a specific solution or approach that addresses the pain point and helps {InsertTargetCustomer} overcome the challenges. Provide relevant details and benefits of the solution.}

Pain Point: {Describe another pain point experienced by {InsertTargetCustomer}, emphasizing the impact on their {DesiredOutcome}.}

Solution: {Present another specific solution or approach that addresses this pain point effectively, explaining how it benefits {InsertTargetCustomer}.}

Pain Point: {Identify a third pain point that often arises for {InsertTargetCustomer}, hindering their progress towards {DesiredOutcome}.}

Solution: {Propose an additional solution that tackles this specific pain point, highlighting its advantages and how it can help {InsertTargetCustomer} achieve their goals.}

By customizing solutions to your unique needs, I can help you overcome these challenges and make significant progress towards {DesiredOutcome}. Let's work together to find the best strategies for your success.

To make this prompt work, only fill out the first paragraph of the prompt above with your information. This will customize the answer to your specific solution:

You can take the suggestions generated from the prompt above and narrow your focus down further by asking ChatGPT to expand on a specific solution or you can ask it to expand by providing more solutions.

Step 2: Begin building a small audience by using AI to fuel your content creation

Just like Justin says, once you understand people’s problems you can offer a solution.

The best way to do this: creating content online.

One huge issue people face is they don’t really know where to start.

But, how do you come up with new ideas every day to share with people? This is where AI comes in with the help of this prompt created by my friend The AI Solopreneur (check out his newsletter here):

I need your help to generate content ideas.

[CONTEXT DESCRIPTION]

I'm an Project Manager writing a weekly newsletter for small businesses, employees, and solopreneurs who wish to begin using AI in their daily work. The newsletter covers different tips, tools, and story that will help you to use AI to grow your business and take you from beginner to advanced with AI. [REPLACE THIS WITH YOUR CONTEXT]

To generate ideas, I want you to imagine a "Content matrix" table. In this table, the X axis contains types of content, meaning ways to expand on a topic. The Y axis contains content topics to be matched with the X axis.

The X axis has these content types, formatted like this: [NAME] (explanation on how to use it)

1. [Actionable] (Ultra-specific guide teaching readers HOW to do something)
2. [Motivational] (Inspirational personal or industry stories about people who did something extraordinary)
3. [Analytical] (Informational breakdown of a topic, explaining to the reader WHY something is/works the way it does)
4. [Contrarian] (Go against the common advice and say something contrarian to the common beliefs on the topic, and explain why)
5. [Observation] (Observe a hidden, secret, or silent but IMPORTANT trend in the topic/industry)
6. [X vs. Y] (Compare two entities, styles, frameworks, companies, apps, or something else within the topic)
7. [Present vs Future] (Compare the status quo with a prediction about the future, and explain to the reader why that is)
8. [Listicle] (Provide a useful list of resources, tips, mistakes, lessons, steps, insights, frameworks, or something else about the topic)

[Y AXIS]

The Y axis contains the topics:

1. Artificial Intelligence for Solopreneurs
2. ChatGPT for writing
3. ChatGPT for solopreneur operations
4. Social media growth

_

Now, I want you to write out this table and write out a content idea at the intersections of the X and Y axises. You match each topic with a content type.

For example a content idea matching the topic "Content Strategy" with the content type "How can people do it?" would be "7 things you need to know to create your content strategy"]

Using the prompt above, you can generate multiple potential content formats that will act as a guide for what you could talk about. All while remaining under the same overarching topic you want to focus on.

Step 3: Use the cheapest, most popular, and simplest tech stack starting out

In the beginning, you’ll be making closer to $1 online rather than $1,000. So, we want to make sure we are being wise with our tech investments.

I personally recommend sticking to as many free services at the beginning as possible, while you work on perfecting your product, building trust with customers, and narrowing down your overall focus.

Here’s what I currently use:

• Writing: Notion (All your ideas in one place and it’s completely free)

• SEO Optimizer: Coschedule (Free to use for your first few newsletter headlines)

• Post Scheduling: Buffer (Completely free to use for up to 10 prescheduled posts - perfect for your first 6 months)

• Writing Templates: Typeshare (Free for the first few weeks, but great for structuring your first few posts and newsletter articles)

• Carousel Templates: Figma (Completely free to use and offers the best control over creating multiple carousels in one place)

• Generating Content Ideas: Save to Notion (Free Chrome extension that lets you save posts, Tweets, and articles directly into your Notion workspaces)

There are plenty of other tools that I and other creators use, but when starting out the simpler and cheaper the better.

Our goal is to get started, not create a perfectly oiled machine.

Conclusion

As Justin admits in his original article, this is just one way of many to make your first $1 on the internet, but I’d also argue that it’s one of the most accessible and low-risk options out there.

The principles that Justin Welsh shared in his original article are still relevant today. However, you and I have the benefit of taking them one step further with the help of AI.

What would’ve taken you hours or days, now can be done in an instant. AI won’t build your business for you, however. It’s still up to you to start implementing these steps on your own.

That’s it for this week.

Happy creating.