How a Broken Neck Led to a Side Hustle Adventure (Episode 197)

Transcript

Jeff Bullas

00:00:05 - 00:01:29

Hi, everyone and welcome to The Side Hustler Corner. Today I have with me, Philip Wride, who is English, but lives in Dubai. And we're gonna find out why he got to move to one of the hottest places on the planet where it's six months of the year, he hides inside from the heat. But maybe the hint lies somewhere in the fact that it rains a lot in England and he enjoys the sun. So Phillips, in transition from the consulting/marketing agency he wants, he's moving to a side hustle that is coaching, course creation and authors. So he could say his next new thing is a digital side hustle. He's just put out a new book and we're gonna find out more about that and it focuses on breaking free of the nine to five and different types of businesses to support that. So Philip, welcome, it's great to have you here and interested to hear your story of how you got to where you are today and some of the fun and challenges of being in a digital world and trying to escape the nine to five of running a digital agency. So Philip, tell us a little bit about what got you into, I suppose, a digital agency or a consulting agency initially. What was the inspiration for you to start that career?

Phillip Wride

00:01:30 - 00:03:55

Passion, really. So I've actually been an entrepreneur since the age of 16, starting in the video games industry which not a lot of people will think of. But I have always been someone who's enjoyed playing and that naturally led me to them going online, starting to play in competitions. And so my first, I guess venture was creating events, online ones, offline ones, doing tournaments, hosting those. And I did that through my formal education and through university, I also then got headhunted to run some of the world's top gaming teams which if we look at the press now is a much larger industry than it was, then this is back in sort of 2001 to 2003. And at the end of my undergraduate degree, I sat there and went, do I want to try and get a real job or do I want to try and create something myself and see what I can do? So I created my first consultancy business here, sort of a digital agency doing events, doing consultancy for brands and set that up in 2007. Had it going through to 2009 in the financial crash. So what, you know, I had client projects that I was working on. So I think it was that mindset for me to say I have some experience here. I have something that I can offer that's of value to a certain type of client, a certain type of company. So I ended up doing projects for Microsoft and Intel and Telefonica until the financial crisis in 2009. It's like, okay, great, guess what? You're part of a marketing budget. What's the first thing that gets cut from a marketing budget? So it was a challenging time and I actually ended up closing that business and moving to a different part of the games industry. I went to work for EA Sports on FIFA video games. But I think that mindset has always been there of being an entrepreneur and trying to build something, grow, something. It just happens that the agency and the consulting was something that I found quite naturally having conversations about the industry I was passionate about came easily. So it made sense for me to say, okay, how can I offer this and support people who want to understand how this industry works, how they can get involved in things not to do and the things to avoid. So it sort of was just a natural progression from some of the existing, you know, community and fan and passion based stuff that I was already doing.

Jeff Bullas

00:03:56 - 00:04:05

Right. So what was your undergraduate degree and is that, I'm glad to hear an interesting answer. I'm sure.

Phillip Wride

00:04:05 - 00:05:02

Yes. So my original undergraduate degree was meant to be computing visualization, which is computer graphics because I wanted to go into the industry and start creating games. But I couldn't do the Maths. I actually failed a 2D and 3D graphics module twice and had to change course for my final year. So it ended up becoming computer studies, which was more business focused. So in hindsight, that was actually beneficial for me then going in and, you know, into the real world outside of university and saying I'm going to set something up if I'd have continued on my original course, I wouldn't be here right now. I would be on a very different path ‘cause I would be in the industry, creating the games and doing all sorts of other things. So it was a challenge at the time ‘cause it's like, oh, yeah, congratulations. You've done XY and Z, but you've not ticked this box and therefore you're going to have to change course. So for yes, for my final year of my undergraduate degree, I changed course.

Jeff Bullas

00:05:03 - 00:05:09

So you, when you finished it, this is that when you started the consultancy it naturally came out of that?

Phillip Wride

00:05:10 - 00:06:06

Yes. So I finished that degree and it was like, okay, yeah, now what? I can try and get a job in the industry that I'm passionate about, but I wouldn't be able to get a job in the development side because obviously I'd failed that degree. So I had nothing to say, look, I can demonstrate the competency that's required to go into game development. I've got something that says, maybe understand a bit of business. I have some experience in a part of the industry, okay? I can try and get the jobs or I can just create something myself and go and try and do the business development and see what I can make of it. So I did that through some of those conversations. I also realized what I had for my undergraduate degree wasn't quite enough. I had the industry experience but not the business experience. So I then also did a masters in international marketing. I did that at the same time, full time as well as trying to grow a business. So sometimes I make strange decisions and make life difficult for myself.

Jeff Bullas

00:06:07 - 00:06:12

Yeah. Well, the thing is that, nothing's really a failure. It's just a learning opportunity really, isn't it?

Phillip Wride

00:06:13 - 00:06:32

Yeah. And that's something I guess I now come to appreciate at the time. It's tough and, you know, other people listening may be in that same situation. It's like you're going through something and it's tough at the time. But if you can get out the other side and look back, you're like, you know what actually. Yeah, I learned a lot from that experience.

Jeff Bullas

00:06:32 - 00:07:33

Yeah. I started doing accounting and realized I sucked at it and I hated it and I am so glad I didn't do it because my brother did it and I think he's hated it for the last 40 years. But that's okay. Within one year of doing the accounting, my accounting degree, I went, I cannot see myself doing this. It was like, slash my wrists and go and hide under the dua, right? It was just horrible. So you leave, you start the agency. So the agencies are challenging out. They're very project driven generally. Cash flow is tough. What, so you got this business but then you came to the realization that you really didn't want to keep doing this and that's led you to where you are today, which is to start your own side hustle. Tell us about that moment you said I'm just over this. When did that happen?

Phillip Wride

00:07:34 - 00:09:07

So I guess the main realization for that was through COVID ‘cause of the lockdowns. So a lot of the business was still event focused. So suddenly all of the events disappeared. I managed to get some projects to do online-things. And that's the great thing about the video game industry is that a lot of the things can also be done online, you can have competitions, you can have marketing campaigns, you can work with influencers, all that sort of stuff. So I was able to secure some projects. But it was tough because people were also looking at their marketing budgets and going, there's a level of uncertainty. We don't know what's going to happen with COVID. Do we want to spend or do we want to save it and see what happens? So, yes, that period was really challenging for the business and it was like, do I keep going on this path and see what I can do or do I decide to start making changes? And there are a couple of other things that happened in my life in that time period. So actually, just before COVID, I broke my neck playing sports, couldn't afford the surgery, didn't get the surgery and left it to heal naturally. So that's along with COVID. So that was January 2020. Obviously, we know COVID happened sort of February, March onwards. Those two things together started to change my whole perspective of both life and business ‘cause it's like I've been given a second chance, but my business isn't working. Maybe I need to start making changes in the business and see what I can do. So I guess those two things hand-in-hand started to change the direction that I was heading.

Jeff Bullas

00:09:08 - 00:09:35

Where did the idea for the side hustle that you have today and tell us and maybe that includes the title of the book because it maybe sounds like that distills the essence of what you are trying to get across to people from your own experience of running a nine to five business that didn't work, COVID hit project based. So what was the initial idea for your side hustle that you've started now?

Phillip Wride

00:09:36 - 00:13:21

So it is coaching. I am an author. I've just launched my second book but that period, you know, if we could take COVID as being mostly 2020 into 21, I started my own personal development journey in 2021. So there's some things through that, you know, the courses that I took myself and some learnings that I did, you know, people that I started to follow and understand their approach to the space. The thought process has started to be there of, okay, well, yeah, how can I contribute? How can I add value in a slightly different way? My vehicle or my mechanism has been, I'm gonna go and sit in an office. I'm gonna ingest everything from a business that I'm gonna write you a strategy or you're gonna give me a brief and I'm gonna come back to you with an event proposal. It's like that's great. But yes, feast and famine project based. How can I take everything else that I've done? The experiences that I've had, the challenges that I've faced and package that in a slightly different way. So the first part of this journey into I guess the side hustle and creating a different type of business was in the education space. So my partner is a teacher. She needed a math lesson for her students. I knew they all loved a particular game. So I helped her create some resources which then led me to start creating courses around using video games to improve math skills. My first book was about that and supporting parents with managing screen time and online safety. So I was already starting down that path of saying, okay, how can I create assets and resources that other people can buy? Whether it's a course, whether it's downloadable, whether it's a book. And then through that process, I was doing an online challenge for parents, a four day online challenge. Again, screen time, online safety thinking about math skills with video games. And I created a new model and framework, which is the 12 chains. And I looked at that and realized it was actually a model for life. And when I saw it, I was like, freedom has always been my highest level value. That's why I've been an entrepreneur so long because I wanted that freedom and flexibility to choose my projects, how I use my time, even if the financial side has been a bit more challenging. And so I looked at this model and went these chains, some of these I've worked through in my own life, some of them, I'm still working through, but maybe I need to share this to help other people understand some of the things that may be holding them back so that they can take their next step. So that process from starting my personal development journey in, it was probably about April 2021. I launched my first book at the end of 2022. That was all in there, the education space and sort of supporting their parents. Halfway through 23, I created the 12 chains model. So since June 23, the, again, it's gone from education to our freedom. Now, this sits a bit more closely with me. This is something that I've always valued. This is actually what I feel I need to support the world with. So I've written a new book which is Finally Find Freedom. It talks about those 12 chains and part of it focuses on business. So the learnings that I've had from the projects work and the challenges of that business model and what I'm now growing on the side to say, how can I create those assets? How can I create the leverage that I want so that I have something that I can sell and make available? But it doesn't always take all of my time. So, you know, that's I guess the journey that I've been on and that realization to say what it is that I have been doing, it's been great. It's given me some amazing experiences and opportunities, but it also doesn't work in terms of the stability that I want and the freedom that I want.

Jeff Bullas

00:13:21 - 00:13:33

Right. So how are you funding the side hustle? Are you still doing a few projects just to keep fit bread on the table? Is that, so how are you funding it?

Phillip Wride

00:13:34 - 00:14:55

Exactly that. So the existing I guess structure of the business and doing the client projects and things like that is still there. So that is in the background, funding the move to the side hustle. And I recognize that that's something that I would need to do in the interim until I can build the side hustle to a point where it's like right now I can make that move across. So, you know, is that gonna take six months a year? I don't know, but at least I have the clarity now on what it is that I'm building and where I want to go and that decision that says this agency thing, I don't want to keep doing this. There will need to be a point where I switch and it may be that actually, okay, I have to go and get a job that may just be the reality of it, but it gives me the stability to be able to then also use some of that, you know, if we think about it from a monetary perspective, some of that, the revenue from being Philip into the side hustle to continue growing that. So how and where and when I get that side hustle to a point where I can switch over, I don't know yet, but I'm committed to saying whether it's through the agency I already have, even though that's been hit and miss with projects or I get a job, I will find the funds to help grow the side hustles so that I can make that switch across.

Jeff Bullas

00:14:56 - 00:15:16

So obviously, one of the most important things for a side hustle generally is they come out of not necessarily wanting to make money per say, but more for one of the key elements you said was freedom. And obviously, you sound like you're very passionate about it. How important is this passionate purpose for you in terms of sustaining your journey?

Phillip Wride

00:15:17 - 00:16:29

I would say it's a core driver for me now because of the experiences that I had of having that injury where I could actually have just been laid on the pitch and not been able to get up ever ‘cause breaking your neck could have been the end of everything that changed your perspective of life. So now it's for me, I want to double down and find the freedom that I'm looking for and want in my life. But I also feel compelled to try and support others ‘cause I know that life is challenging, it throws us curveballs. So if I can help other people and say, you know, here's a way to look at things differently, maybe work through some of the challenges or the situations. Obviously, I hope the money will come because that will also enable me to have the freedom that I'm looking for. But that contribution and trying to add value to other people, that's now the key driver. So it goes hand-in-hand with the freedom that I'm looking for, you know, the ability to say, oh, I've got the time to do a podcast or get on stage and do a presentation or create a new course or whatever it is, that's freedom for me. But it's also at the same time aiming to add value to others.

Jeff Bullas

00:16:30 - 00:17:17

Right. I think that's very important because quite often the journey people overestimates a great quote by Bill Gates saying people overestimate what they can do in 12 months, but they underestimate what they can achieve in 10 years. So basically, that's why a passionate purpose that gets you up in the morning is important to be able to run the marathon, which is what it really is. So take us through and I think what would be good if you have access to it is I'd be intrigued by and I'm sure the audience would be too. What are the 12 chains that you talk about in your book and you've got access to those to talk about?

Phillip Wride

00:17:18 - 00:27:14

Yeah, absolutely. So, there's 12 chains that I identified, again, partially through my own life and just thinking about life situations. I split them into three levels. So the first level of the chain are those that are focused on self directed actions, the things that we have more control over and those chains at level one are knowledge, convenience, speed and relationships, okay? So knowledge, we often think we have all the knowledge that we need. That's very rarely the case. So some of the exercises that I do with people and I take them through this in the book as well is creating that vision for the future. What is it that they want to do? How do they want to spend their time? What is it that they want to have an experience? Some of those things they may need new knowledge for. So to break through the knowledge chain, it's about identifying that knowledge that we need to get to help us move forward towards. What it is that we want to achieve. So if the vision is living on a desert island and turning a side hustle into a main hustle again, there may be things that we need to understand. Maybe it's how to blog, maybe it's how to move to that new country and tax laws and immigration and all those sorts of things. It's like very rarely do we have all of the knowledge that we need. And I had to break through this myself. When I wrote my first book, it's like, well, how do I list on Amazon? What do I need to do? What are the requirements, the formatting? So I had to go on that journey myself to say there's knowledge here that I don't have, I need to gain it if I want to take that next step forward. And it's a self directed action because we have the ability to control whether we seek out that knowledge and gain it or not. So that's why it sits at level one, which is that the self directed actions, convenience, pretty much as it sounds, that extra slice of pizza, that extra episode of Netflix, you know, on demand, instant delivery, all those sorts of things that make our life easier. But actually, we run the risk of giving in to them that extra episode of Netflix. Well, that could be 45 minutes working on your side hustle. So if we can recognize those things again, we can start to make changes and think about where we spend our focus, our energy, our time, speed is an interesting one. And I look at this from the perspective of things that will always happen in a way that they're meant to happen. And at the time that they are meant to happen, you can't force it because in one breath, we're like the world is moving so quickly. Technology, you know, new versions of the iPhone and changes on social media and everything else and new social media platforms. And then in the other breath, we're like my business is not growing fast enough. Well, hang on, okay, so there's two different speeds there. Sometimes we just have to accept and say things will happen in the way that they're meant to happen. Your business may not be able to take off right now and grow as fast as you want it to because there's a conversation that you need to have with someone and that person hasn't yet come into your life. But that one conversation could change everything. So you need to become comfortable with speed in terms of sometimes, yes, you will move really quickly and other times you're just gonna have to wait until certain things fall into place. So again, being comfortable with that and knowing that we can follow a path and continue with that helps us break through that chain ‘cause we have the ability to control our actions, relationships, the final chain at level one positive and negative relationships, we all have them. And so the exercise I take people through is a simple rating, rate all of your relationships, one to 10, if there are six or less and they start to drain you, even if it's family, maybe it's time to spend less of your energy and your time with them because it's clearly not helping you. I've had to do that with business relationships, you know, the agency side, one of my biggest clients every time the phone rang and I could see the caller ID, I was like, oh, what's the request gonna be now? And it just wasn't helpful. So I actually had to fire that client because I needed to be comfortable in myself, even though it was gonna be a hit on the revenue personally, it was not helping me in any way. So relationships are one of the chains. And again, we can control that in terms of who we spend our time with and how we manage those situations. Moving to level two chains. At level two are external influences. So the chains here, again, more about the people around us and the environment. So time, how we use it and who else influences it. Location, whether we choose to be in a location or whether we're being dictated to, maybe it's the job, maybe it's the family and then we have responsibilities and priorities, responsibilities and priorities are interesting because responsibilities, there are two types, those that we willingly take on and want and then those responsibilities handed to us by other people that we may not necessarily want. And so over time we go, I really don't want to do this. I don't enjoy this. This is not what I wanted. And so again, we start to have that negative energy and vibe around some of the responsibilities and that can hold us back, you know, ‘cause we can look at something and go, somebody's asked me to do this. I really don't want to. It also means that I'm using time for something that I don't want to do that I could be spending on my side hustle or with family or doing something else, an activity that I'm, you know, really passionate about. And the same is then true of priorities, those things that we prioritize, our priority list, and those things that creep in that are actually a priority of somebody else that we've then made our own priority. Like, ah, the boss wants to report before the end of the day. Well, hang on. That's their priority, again, I'm speaking if we're still in the nine to five here, but that request from somebody else, it was never on our priority list. It's not something that we probably care about, but suddenly they're expecting us to make it our priority, which again can cause us frustration ‘cause it's like, yeah, but that's not how I want to use my time. My priority list is completely different. So, thinking about that and understanding it breaking through is all about, okay, which are the things in my priority list that actually I've been given and I don't want, how can I find a way to mitigate that? Can I hand it back? Can I almost expect it to happen? And therefore I can preempt it and do some ground work beforehand. Sometimes if we're thinking about the side hustle, it's what are some of the things that I've got coming up that I may be able to preempt? Ah, I'm focusing on speaking at events. Okay. So having a speaker bio and a one sheet, maybe that's a great way of preempting some of these things because, you know, otherwise a priority comes in and I have to try and move it around in my list. So those chains are at level two. So they're more external influences. And then the chains at level three are about the mental images that we create. So risk, fear, perception and pressure. Fear is an interesting one because a lot of the time it is just a mental image that we create in our head. Standing up on stage and everybody laughing at us. Is it likely to happen? No, but we get worried about it. And I've been the same. I have forced myself to get up on stage, I guess more recently as we're having this conversation because I knew it's something that I needed to become more comfortable with to be able to set up my own events and be a speaker for the long term. So that's part of my goal. So I had to put myself into that position to say it's gonna be uncomfortable. I, you know, I, yes, I have that image of people laughing at me or falling asleep or just spending all their time on their phones. But I also have a message that can impact maybe just one person then it's worth it. But we also create images about all sorts of other things in the book I write about skydiving. I was fearful of skydiving because I'd created that mental image of going splat of the parachute not opening and me falling to earth. And that was just a horrible mess on the ground. But it's like, how often does that happen? How likely is it that that's going to happen? It's not. But a lot of the time we stop ourselves because we create these mental images. Perception is another great one. We create images of situations of people based on what we see, based on what we experience. We also then create images of what we think other people think of us. And we again, let that stop us. Are they gonna think bad about me if I do XY and Z? Who cares? You can't control that. They will make a judgment about you regardless. Just do what you need to do. So again, I wrote about this in the book. It's like I was invited to speak at a conference with three other panelists. It was a games industry conference in Dubai. So it was quite warm and there was a Panelist from Google who was focused on game marketing. So in the Google Play Store and things like that. There was a game developer and there was somebody from a company who works on the marketing side and supports, I guess brands getting into the games industry and potentially some of those integrations of saying, oh, let's put a Coca Cola or somebody inside a game experience, okay? So sitting alongside these panelists, they were all wearing black t-shirts and jeans and I was sat there in a flowery shirt and pink shorts because it was 6PM in Dubai and it was really warm and the stage was outside. It's like there's no way I'm gonna sit in jeans. So I said, I also don't care. I will wear my pink shorts. I wore yellow trousers on an early date with my partner because why not? So perception again is something that we can break free of. But a lot of the time we let it stop us ‘cause we're worried what other people think they're gonna make a judgment irrespective and a lot of the time we can't control that so that those chains at level four are about the mental images that we create and that we then let hold us back.

Jeff Bullas

00:27:15 - 00:27:19

So, yeah, so what you're really talking about is being human.

Phillip Wride

00:27:20 - 00:27:38

Pretty much. Yes, just framing it in a different way so people can go. Oh yeah, I hadn't thought about it in that way ‘cause that's the key thing. Sometimes it's just a comment or an experience that changes our perspective and we can go, ah, that makes sense. Okay, maybe, yeah, I can start to do things differently.

Jeff Bullas

00:27:39 - 00:28:03

So, really, yeah. So, what I meant by that too is that really, you're talking about what holds us back from being fully human and doing what we really want to do and we build all these barriers to not do them because we're afraid of change. But if there's enough passionate purpose about what you wanna do, you work out a way.

Phillip Wride

00:28:03 - 00:28:27

Absolutely. You know, one of the guys I listen to quite regularly is Dean Graziosi. And he often references it like it's just about being resourceful, you know, time is a resource, money is a resource. How do we use those things? If we're passionate about something, we will find a way, we will be resourceful to make things happen.

Jeff Bullas

00:28:28 - 00:29:00

Exactly. So let's look at, you've got the book, you've got, obviously, a presentation, you've got a bunch of resources that you can market. And as we quite often realize as solo-preneurs is that it's hard to scale yourself if you're doing all the work. So tell us a little bit about how you promote your book and your business. Now, the side hustle, what's your marketing and promotion look like now?

Phillip Wride

00:29:01 - 00:31:55

So for the book, it's, you know, free promos every quarter ‘cause Amazon enables you to do that it's looking to list it on some of the other marketplaces, you know, Barnes and Noble and, you know, where there's availability to say it doesn't cost me a lot to be able to list so that I can have that visibility. The book itself is the model and the framework. But it's also lead generation because I encourage people to download the supporting worksheets to do the exercises in the book. So that's a capture mechanism that brings them into the community and funnels them into, you know, the membership community that I have, which is called the Freedom Hunters Club. So there are things that I'm trying to piece together, you know, to ensure that it's not necessarily taking up all of my time. But also, the marketing that I do is focused. At the minute I'm going through, you know, I set myself a challenge also to demonstrate to myself and others consistency. I'm doing a year-long challenge of posting a two minute video a day, which is something that I'd never historically done. So getting in front of the camera and just recording a message every day and posting it. It's like, again, I'm working through fear, I'm working through and demonstrating consistency that in itself is lead generation ‘cause I can have some interesting conversation on the back of those people who comment and like and all those sorts of things. So there are a couple of things that I'm trying to put in place to ensure that there's visibility ‘cause at the end of the day, marketing is about visibility. Yes, there's a message that you're trying to portray, but you still need visibility. So I'm trying to look at the things that I can do that make the most sense. So, podcasting, yes is one having the book and potentially doing some paid advertising around that is two, doing some things on social that I can control and the message that I put out, yes. General paid advertising, not right now until I can get the business to a point where it makes sense to do that because again, there's a test and learning process for that. That says, what's my ROI? Am I bringing in the type of people that I actually want, am I being able to deliver the service in the way that it needs to be delivered? ‘Cause you can suddenly go right here's 10-15 thousands, you know, $20,000 or whatever. And you may get an influx if all your adverts are great, but you can also hear nothing. In which case, it's money, then not necessarily well spent, you'll get some learning, but that doesn't necessarily help the bottom line. So it's about being considered in the incremental steps that you take. So a lot of it right now is what minimal spends to demonstrate that there's interest and there's traction. So a lot of that will be focused on the book and the spend will be there. Everything else is just about my time and how I choose to use it. So creating some of the videos being on podcasts, speaking at events and then building out from there.

Jeff Bullas

00:31:56 - 00:32:22

So what are some of the platforms and tools that you're using currently? Let's deal with the platform. So things like websites, blogs, what social media platforms do you find important? First of that and the second question once we deal with that is, you know, what are the different tools that you're using to help you scale yourself?

Phillip Wride

00:32:23 - 00:36:15

Yeah, so I can actually, I guess combine some of those in some senses, one of the main platforms I'm using is ClickFunnels because it enables me to build sort of, you know, the traditional sales pages and that funnel flow of, okay, here's you've just registered for the free resources from the book. Okay, great. I'm gonna show you another page. It's your thank you page. And now it's like I if you want other stuff here are your options. So it's quite quick and easy to build those. But I can also have my membership and community on the same platform. So I can easily guide people through a flow and a process into that membership community. I can host my courses there and some of the other materials that I'm making available to people. So that's a big one for me ‘cause it enables me to do multiple different things. From a social media perspective, you know, my daily challenge that I've set myself that's going onto TikTok. It's onto in, excuse me, it's onto Instagram as well. I'm posting into a number of Facebook groups who have the type of people that I'm trying to support. Am I on every social media platform ever? No, I looked again at Twitter and I was like, historically, Twitter was the one that I loved ‘cause I could have conversations, it was short form content, but I as a person that changed since then. So when I was working at EA Sports, my role as a community manager, I had my own branded account because I was the, you know, the liaison and the go between the game developers and the players. So Twitter was, you know, a platform, X as it is now, was a platform that I spent a lot of time on and was quite comfortable with and enjoyed using it. Now, thinking about starting fresh when there's so many other things that I want to spend my time and effort on. It feels like a slog, thinking about what I'm going to write every day and having that consistency and knowing that I need to post multiple times a day on every other platform, I only post once a day because I also don't want it to drain me if I have to spend too much time thinking about it. That's not a positive. Again, I'd rather go and spend my time doing something else or thinking about something else. Writing another book ‘cause again, that's what I find reasonably easy and enjoy. So yes, I'm not on every social media platform focusing on a couple to start with and then we'll build out from there. ClickFunnels is a great tool. I use a couple of other things. So I use ActiveCampaign for my emails. So there's integrations there and I have some of my automation set up. So if you come through and register anywhere, you'll probably get a couple of emails that say, hey, thanks very much. And okay, did you know this about me and have you seen this and you know, all those sorts of things. There are a couple of tools that I've experimented with. So UpViral is one of those for doing viral giveaways and referral programs and things like that. So if somebody was to, you know, download a free copy of my book or, you know, the worksheets or anything else, they will get a referral link, then if they go and share it with their network, you know, I potentially give them a free copy of this or a t-shirt or something else. So again, that's I've set it up, I've made it available, I may promote that. But then the hope will be that the people who get involved in that download the resource or whatever it is will spread that further. So then I'm not necessarily spending as much marketing budgets on those things. So that's something that I've started to have a play with and see how it goes. So there are a couple of core things in there. There are other minor tools, you know, some social media management tools that I've been playing with Metricool, SocialMenials and various other things. But the core is ClickFunnels ‘cause I've got my community there and I can do my sales pages. I actually moved my personal websites away from normal web hosting onto ClickFunnels and now it's just a one pager and so everything again ties into that and then I have ActiveCampaign as my email platform currently.

Jeff Bullas

00:36:16 - 00:37:13

Yeah, it can get very overwhelming especially if you're not in a digital game. And you've obviously been playing in digital for quite a long time now. So what, let's have a quick couple of quick questions before we wrap it up. One, what is, so you're trying to do a short video, I mean, as we know, you know, when I started my blog, text was all the rage, blogging was hot. And typically what we've moved on from there is mobile phones came out, bandwidth increased, price of data decreased so able and then tools like Instagram came out, they started with just images. Then when they moved on to reels, TikTok came out. So where do you get most of your engagement from? Which is which the data and analytics will tell you about where you're getting the most engagement from your marketing and content creation.

Phillip Wride

00:37:14 - 00:38:37

So far, it's in some of the Facebook groups that I'm part of. And then TikTok and there's, I'd say there's a couple of considerations here because I don't feel really comfortable with these platforms. I'm doing what works for me. So it's a two minute video which actually counts against me ‘cause I can't post a YouTube short, I can't post reel, you know, because it's too long. So some of those platforms I'm not using in the best way possible because I myself aren't yet at the point where I can do it. Here's 60 seconds, here's my three tips for XY and Z. It's like that doesn't feel comfortable to me yet. I may get to that point. But right now because I like to waffle, you'll have recognized that on this podcast. It's easy for me to do a two minute video. And so I just post those and have to see what happens because it doesn't fit within the nice box that those platforms want in terms of the content that's submitted to them. So, yes, the Facebook groups are slightly different in that respect, ‘cause you can scroll through, you can see the post and you know, what's interesting to you watch it or not watch it. Some of the other platforms it's very hit and miss. TikTok is the one that seems to be in that comparison between TikTok and Instagram. Again, that may be the way that I've set things up, the way that I'm posting all the hashtags but certainly the engagements on TikTok seems to be a little better.

Jeff Bullas

00:38:38 - 00:39:48

Yeah, it's really interesting about content and we're experimenting a little bit of AI created content, taking long videos and then cutting it up into snippets which are typically 30 seconds to a minute that we can then post across YouTube shorts, Instagram reels and TikTok. So, but yeah, putting that together is very time consuming and also it gets very frustrating going nothing happening and yet behind the scenes, everything's happening in terms of people sharing, they are spreading. We live in a very, very crowded digital world now and it's only gonna get more crowded. And that becomes a real challenge. So on, let's just one question I'm curious about is, do you blog at all? Do you write long form content? Because you can write long form content, there could be a chapter of a book each day and then you could just actually aggregate that and turn it into a book. Do you write blog posts at all or guest blogs? Do you do any of those?

Phillip Wride

00:39:49 - 00:41:14

Not anymore. And so long form content, I enjoy writing. I've written my second book. I actually used to blog regularly. So, you know, in previous roles focusing on community building and things like that, I had a personal blog and would post, you know, two times a week based on what was happening in the forum that I was managing and the conversations with other community managers and things like that. And so yes, I started to build up an audience around that. But I've also got to that point. It's like if I'm blogging, I also have to think about the SEO game. Do I want to spend my time doing that? Not really, I'd want to focus on something else. So again, I've made that decision and every time I've launched a new version of our website, I've gone, alright, I'll blog a bit. Oh, and then I get three minutes into it. And I'm just like, man, I'm drained again. So I, that's why I've just moved to just a one page, personal website, because it's like, I don't want the hassle. I understand the benefits if I can commit to it, but I'd rather spend my time doing other things. So, yes, I understand the power of blogging. Am I doing some guest articles elsewhere? Yes, because those people already have an audience that I can tap into. But for me personally blogging and trying to grow something myself, I've made the decision to not focus on that anymore.

Jeff Bullas

00:41:15 - 00:41:49

Right. Yeah. It's a very, very long game and the algorithms of Google will do your head in just like the algorithms of social media will do your head in. So just to wrap it up, Philip, what are some top tips you'd offer to other wannabe side hustlers that are already or those that are already on the side hustle journey, they're trying to fund it. They're feeling frustrated, they have doubts like we all do, it's called being human. What are some top tips that you'd like to share with the audience just as a final takeaway?

Phillip Wride

00:41:50 - 00:44:30

So the first one would be about the type of business or the type of side hustle. Is it something that works right now in terms of your life situation, you know, if you're still in a nine to five as an example and you're creating a side hustle and you have that goal to move across to it, is it something that you can keep doing in the long term or as it grows? Is it going to suck more of your time in which case you've just replaced your job? So think about it from that perspective and say, is there a way that I can structure this and the exercises that I've done for my own business, create assets and make things a little easier. So, it doesn't necessarily need to be coaching and courses. But it could just be, there's something that I repeat on a regular basis. There's a process, there's an on boarding for a client. Now, can I create a form that I can just give to everybody? And it frees up my time ‘cause I don't need to do an initial call with them. What are some of those things that you can create as assets that will make your life easier? I mean, you don't necessarily need to spend all of your time in every situation. The second one would be thinking about the change, thinking about the things that are actually impacting you from taking the action that you need to take. Maybe it's reaching out to people, maybe it's getting on video. What are some of those things that are holding you back? So obviously, that's a plug for the book 'cause it still helps you uncover all of those and we've been through some of them in this session. But I will go into some more detail with some more stories. So if we can identify those things in ourselves again, like anything as soon as we see it or understand it, it enables us to start making changes. And then the final thing that I would talk about is from a side hustle perspective. How are you making your revenue? Is it consistent? Is it one off? You know, is it a subscription thing? Is it service based? What is gonna be generating the revenue for you? And is it gonna be feast and famine? Because if it's feast and famine, it's gonna be more difficult to grow it to a point where you can move across and it's become your main gig. If there's something else that you can do, retain services are much better than project based subscription models, again, much better may take longer to build. But trying to have that consistency enables you to think about making that switch over. Because if you say, oh, I've got one big project and it pays me for the next six months or a year, you then still need to find what comes after that. So if you make that move across, there's still that risk of getting to the end of the project, the contract and saying, okay, now what? I've been in that situation, it's not fun. So those would be some of the things that I would say.

Jeff Bullas

00:44:31 - 00:45:27

Thanks, Philip. There are three really great tips and congratulate you on taking the step into starting your own side hustle. And it sounds to me like it was a life crisis that tipped you into this. And you mentioned that you broke your neck and then you had to take a little bit more. You had time, I suppose the headspace to think about life in a much deeper way and quite often the opportunities of life don't come out of the good times. They come out of the hard times and it sounds like you've, what could have been a life threatening injury has turned into an opportunity to start your own side hustle and create your own journey for freedom and happiness. Thank you very much for sharing your story. And I look forward to hearing more about your next books and the success of what you're doing. Thank you, Philip. It's been an absolute pleasure.

Phillip Wride

00:45:28 - 00:45:29

Thank you, Jeff.