Community is a j-curve business

Here’s what I’ve learned in the 3 months I’ve been on Skool. Maybe if you’re just starting out this will help you avoid the same mistakes.

Slow growth > fast growth

I grew my group to 50 people in around 90 days but they weren’t the right people. Most people weren’t even filmmakers and they came from Skool. I had to kick 40 of the video and start over with only the active members who are dedicated.

Be extremely picky which who you let in. Number of members doesn’t really matter if they’re not actually using the group. The community is value when it’s tight-knit and focused. For example filmmakers who make cinematic videos on YouTube and want to monetize their passion without trading time for money.

Wait to monetize (j-curve)

When you start your group you’re not making money. It’s a loss because you’re paying $99/month and getting nothing in return. But I would argue that you should wait to make it paid until you’re 100% sure that you’re providing an excess of value to your members + your members are verifying this with organic testimonials in the group.

Plus when you think in this mindset of “I need to make money from this because I’m paying for Skool” everything gets worse. Now you’re in a position of scarcity and urgency. When I was thinking like this my content got worse and I started to focus on money instead of the thing I actually want to focus on which is filmmaking.

I want to be an amazing filmmaker. That’s the main thing. By posting my best work I will naturally bring in traffic to my community. It’s a slow process and that’s okay. There’s no rush. I’ll say it again. There’s no rush whatsoever. Enjoy the process of building and don’t stress. It’s supposed to be fun but we make it hard on ourselves.

What people buy and what they need are two different things unfortunately.

I want to sell “master your craft” but people only really buy from the eternal markets of health, wealth, and relationships. So by adding in the monetization piece it makes your offer more appealing. What people really need to do is focus on mastery because that leads to monetization. But you have to “sell” the outcome not the process. At least that’s what I’ve learned.

That’s it. Hope this helps some one!

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