Entrepreneurship Journal, 2/1/2018

In 2016 I started selling an ebook about how to use Angular and Rails together. Between June 2016 and December 2017 I sold about $8K worth of the book and related video package. I sold (and still sell) these products at AngularOnRails.com.

In July 2017 I decided to put AngularOnRails.com on the back burner for various reasons. I then proceeded to flail around wildly for a while. I tried several new business ideas, all of which I ended up deciding I didn’t like.

I eventually basically said, “Okay, fuck it. I give up. I’ll just go back to the thing that was working—AngularOnRails.com—even though I’m maybe not super crazy about it anymore. It will be easier to grow this existing success than to try to make a new one.”

So I went back to AngularOnRails.com and tried to think of how I could grow its revenue. At that time revenue was at a couple hundred bucks a month (although it varied quite a bit from month to month). The two products I had for sale were a $49 ebook, a $99 video package and a $249 “corporate” package which no one had ever bought.

I figured the easiest way to grow revenue would probably be to add a higher-tier product (~$500) that people would actually buy.

I had gotten the impression that most people who were learning Angular + Rails were doing so because they wanted to get a job. So I sent an email to my list. The answer was an overwhelming yes. Over 50 people responded (out of a list of a little over 2000) saying yes, they were in it for a job.

So I thought maybe I could add some sort of “get a job” course as a higher-tier item in my product ladder. But then I realized there’s nothing specific to Angular + Rails about getting a job. So rather than add an item to my product ladder I decided to create a whole new product ladder.

I decided to call the new site Six Figure Coding, drawing some inspiration from Million Dollar Consulting. I emailed my AngularOnRails.com list. Over 100 people signed up for the SixFigureCoding.com email list within the first two days. The intention was to make the site all about how to get a higher-paying programming job (or how to get your first programming job).

Then, later, I decided I didn’t like the name Six Figure Coding. I renamed it to Code with Jason.

Then I realized that if I wanted an instant traffic injection for Code with Jason, I could just move some of my best-performing blog posts from AngularOnRails.com to CodeWithJason.com. That’s what I did and it worked.

Then, slowly, it dawned on me: I don’t have to completely abandon the audience I’ve built up at AngularOnRails.com. I can just retroactively decide that I’m just renaming AngularOnRails.com to CodeWithJason.com. I can still offer the same products, which are still selling, and I can still use the same lead magnets, which are still working. My email list can continue to grow as always.

But the advantage to the new domain name is that now I’m no longer limited to just talking about Angular + Rails. I can do a course that’s just Angular if I want. I don’t think the job search idea was a bad one but now I’m no longer sure that I want that to be the primary focus.

So my plans for the near future are:

  1. Launch my job search book, which I already have 95% done
  2. Move all the products at AngularOnRails.com over to CodeWithJason.com
  3. Move all the lead magnets at AngularOnRails.com over to CodeWithJason.com
  4. Start experimenting with an Angular-only product

I don’t imagine creating a product called “Learn Angular” or something like that. It will almost certainly be something more specific like Angular testing or observables or something like that.

One thought on “Entrepreneurship Journal, 2/1/2018

  1. Phil

    So, if you did it all over again, would you go for the x-on-x domain theme/site name at all, or just start with the more general domain name?

    Thanks for writing your experiences. Found it on IH, have poked through most of it and found some good stuff.

    Reply

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