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What It's About
Niche online courses that help people live more organic lives.
Business Model
Service
Skills Required
Communication & Beekeeping
Complexity
Medium
Profit Potential
Medium
Words of Wisdom
There are still plenty of niche industries that are relatively underdeveloped online, so if strong competition gives you pause, look for markets with a minimal online presence and make yourself an authority there. And if you're not sure where to start, go to Amazon and look for niches and books that have lots of comments and a following that lack decent online courses in those topics online.
Fun Fact
Organic Life Guru allowed Chris and Samantha to spend an entire winter in Costa Rica so that they could collaborate with an instructor in the rainforest and create a really big course for their site.
Notes from Chris
Episode 328
Today’s story comes from Chris Badgett in Belfast, Maine. By day, Chris is the CEO at LifterLMS, a WordPress plugin for online courses. (This was originally a side hustle before it became his full-time job.) His new side hustle is Organic Life Guru, a website offering online courses in organic gardening and permaculture from the world’s top organic growing experts. He wanted to do something that that aligned with his values and liked the idea of starting a membership site. Chris has a degree in sustainable development and describes himself as an environmentalist. He runs this hustle with his wife, Samantha, an organic farmer. Chris works on the website and the marketing, and Samantha is responsible for course content, instructor relationships, and customer support. OLG offers courses in topics ranging from beekeeping, permaculture design, organic gardening, food forest design for cities and suburbs, organic soil building for backyard gardening, how to grow a medicinal food forest, and more. The nine courses range in cost from $20 to $225 and offer anywhere from two hours of content to about 20 hours of content. The profit is roughly $1,000 to $3,000 per month, and the sales volume fluctuates based on whether or not they’re doing a promotion or new course launch. A launch brings higher income, but also more work. They’re able to structure their side hustle life around what’s happening with the rest of their life. For them, it’s the best of both worlds, and it also aligns with those values of teaching people about the earth.MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
- Organic Life Guru: Take a page out of the books from some of the world’s leading organic growth experts when you check out Chris and Samantha's online courses
- Screenflow, iMovie, & Final Cut Pro: Three of the programs that Chris and Samantha used to edit the videos for their courses
- Vimeo Pro: The video platform that Chris and Samantha used to keep their videos exclusive to course purchasers
- KingSumo Giveaways: The Wordpress plugin that they used that allowed people to enter for a chance to win a course for free
- Unconventional Guides: A very small business with the goal of helping people do more of what they are most excited about
- Show Me the Honey: Houston Beekeeper Buzzes to $4,000/Month: In this buzzworthy episode, a Texas woman creates a $4,000/month side hustle as an advocate for sustainable honeybee habitats
- Published Author Adds Income Source; Makes Additional $21,000 Her First Year: A successful novelist teaches an online course about productivity for writers, reaching 3,700 students in year one
Quote of the Day
"We took on the publisher mindset where we partnered with experts to publish courses with their material and expertise. When my wife asked me what to say to the #1 author in the world on permaculture, I made a joking comment to say, ‘Just ask him where we should send the checks.’ She sent that to the expert, and he said, 'Yes.'"
—Chris Badgett #SideHustleSchool
