How to 10X Your Revenue As a Creator

The Blueprint to Scale Your Creator Business

Nov 05, 2023

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Most creators have a gazillion ideas for products. Moreover, they come up with new ideas every day.

The problem is that not every product is going to 10X your business.

All of them will indeed increase the revenue of your business. Some of them by 10%, others by 50%.

But what if you want to 5X your business? Or 10X your business?

What will get you there?

So, in today's edition, I want to dive into a framework that will allow you to pick products that can 10X your creator business.

This concept is called the Value Ladder - a concept by Russell Brunson described in his book, 'DotCom Secrets: The Underground Playbook for Growing Your Company Online.'

Let's see how it can be applied to your creator business, whether you're a YouTuber, a newsletter writer, or a course creator.

What is the Value Ladder?

Essentially, the value ladder represents the progression of your products.

Each step in the value ladder is a new product designed to help your customers achieve a specific desired outcome.

(I know this is boring. But bear with me — it will get more interesting later.)

If your products serve different customer outcomes, then you have several value ladders. If all your products serve the same outcome — you have one value ladder.

Here's an illustration of the value ladder concept:

On the left-hand axis, we have value, and on the bottom axis, we have price.

As your customers move up the value ladder, you will provide more value, and you will charge more money. The higher the price your customers pay, the more value they will receive.

Here’s where the 10X potential lies…

The next product on the value ladder should be significantly more expensive than the previous product.

Think 10X more expensive.

It doesn’t need to be precisely 10X more expensive, but multiplying the price of the previous product by 10X is a good exercise to understand the price range for the next product in the Value Ladder.

Now, the cherry on top.

Here’s the real power of the Value Ladder…

There’s no end to the value ladder. You can introduce more and more expensive products. If you keep providing more and more value, people will spend more to keep working with you. Keep thinking of higher and higher levels of service, and you can charge more and more.

The theory is over.

Now, let’s look at a real case study.

How Graham Stephan Makes Money

Let's explore some of the Graham Stephan businesses - one of the biggest YouTubers in the finance/real estate niche. In this post I won't go into all of his businesses because he has quite a few.

In this edition we'll focus on Graham’s products for a business audience.

Here are Graham's products that target a business audience:

The Iced Coffee Hour YouTube channel ($0)
Affiliate links (let’s estimate $5 - $500 earnings per sale).
Iced Coffee Hour Club: Official Member ($5/mo, $54/year)
Iced Coffee Hour Club: Pro Member ($10/mo, $108/year)
Iced Coffee Hour Club: VIP Member ($500/mo)

Now, let's outline them on the Value Ladder:

Now, let’s see how you can apply the Value Ladder concept to your creator business, whether you're a YouTuber, a newsletter writer, or a course creator.

Let’s say Olivia and Oliver are two creators who want to grow their businesses.

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How Oliver Masters the Value Ladder for His Newsletter Business

Oliver is a newsletter writer about personal finances. He helps people manage their personal finances.

He has two products: a free newsletter where he shares tips on how to manage personal finances and a paid/premium newsletter ($11/month, $110/year) where he answers reader’s questions and helps them read their finances, build investment strategies, etc.

Here’s what his subscribers achieve by reading his newsletter: better management of personal finances.

Both free and premium newsletters serve the same goal (better management of personal finances) and serve the same audience. So, Oliver has one value ladder.

Here’s how Oliver’s value ladder looks like:

Free newsletter ($0)
Premium newsletter ($11/month, $110/year).

How Olivia Boosts Her Online Course Business with the Value Ladder

Olivia is a YouTuber and a social media marketer helping creators grow their social following.

She has two online courses: a free online course on how to create organic content for Instagram and another online course on 49 ways to grow followers on Instagram organically ($249).

Both courses serve the same audience (creators who want to grow their following on Instagram) and the same goal (grow on Instagram organically). But if one of her courses was about running ads on Meta, then she would have had 2 value ladders: one for creators interested in organic growth and another one for those interested in paid traffic growth. Some followers will be interested in organic growth only, while there will be others interested in ads only.

Let’s look at Olivia’s value ladder…