Advertise on podcast: Creator Science with Jay Clouse

My guest is Dorie Clark, a Wall Street Journal bestselling author, 4-time Thinkers50 honoree as one of the world's top business thinkers, and longtime faculty member at Duke and Columbia Business Schools. Dorie is, by her own description, a LinkedIn person. She has close to 500,000 followers there, which puts her in the top half a percent of accounts on the platform. But in January 2026, she decided to learn Instagram. She started with 22,000 followers on an account she'd had since 2015 that was mostly personal photos. For the next 4.5 months, she treated it like a part-time job: 10 to 20 hours a week, 99 Reels. Her net gain was about 350 followers. Thirty-five percent of those videos earned her exactly zero new followers. Then in June, it turned around. She gained more than 146,000 new followers across June and July. By September, she was past 400,000. The reason I was excited to talk to Dorie specifically: she didn't win by buying production value. She films and edits all of her videos herself, all of it self-taught over the past few months. Her approach feels like one we can all actually learn from. In this episode, we talk about: The 4.5-month slog where nothing worked and the single data point that gave her permission to keep going Why celebrity reactions are a growth hack for strangers, and the Dolly Parton video that got her on TV in Chicago Her complete workflow: from raw idea capture to batching, scripting, filming, editing, and posting The 30-page AI context document she built to keep her voice consistent and her hooks sharp Why she outgrew her team's video editing and what taking it back herself unlocked By the end of this episode, you will have a practical, doable framework for building a high-growth Instagram presence without a production team, a big budget, or a hot take machine. Dorie Clark — dorieclark.com @dorieclark on Instagram The Long Game (Dorie's book) Nausheen Chen — Instagram growth story referenced Sandcastles by Kallaway — research tool Dorie uses Recognized Expert — her flagship course and community Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Cold open: money is not the variable buying you success (00:27) Introducing Dorie Clark (03:29) Why Instagram after a decade of LinkedIn dominance (05:37) The 4.5-month slog: 99 Reels, 350 followers (07:21) Eating her own dog food: The Long Game in real life (12:30) Cross-posting Reels to LinkedIn and what transfers (21:53) When things turned around — and why (23:24) Celebrity reactions as an entry point for strangers (27:36) Early business results: CNBC, Chicago TV, sponsorships (32:11) The full workflow: idea capture to posting (35:10) The 30-page AI context document and how she built it (39:48) Filming in batches with wardrobe changes in New York (50:59) Dorie's immutable laws of Instagram growth *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #316: Kallaway’s EXACT System For Going Viral (Almost Every Time) *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU'RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞 Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

My guest is George Blackman, a YouTube scriptwriter who got his start writing full-time for Ali Abdaal and has since written scripts for creators from 30,000 to over 10 million subscribers. This is George's second time on the show. Three years ago, we talked about scriptwriting fundamentals. Since then, George has started writing his own videos with AI, and he's spent most of this year building PlayWriteAI, an AI scriptwriting app with more than 700 people on the waitlist. Building it taught him something most creators haven't noticed yet: AI will tell you, very confidently, that it did ten things it never actually did. This episode is his full process, from voice memo to a script that's ready to record. In this episode, we talk about: The framework behind every educational hook George writes Why the setups and payoffs inside each segment matter more than the hook The ending George puts on every single video, and a twist I want to try on mine Where a human still has to make the call, and why AI will keep "improving" your script forever if you let it By the end of this episode, you will have a repeatable system for writing scripts with AI, and a clearer sense of which parts of the work you should keep for yourself. Free download: YouTube Script Partner skill + George’s Claude project files PlayWriteAI Claude Scriptwriting Project Setup The Exact Claude Project Setup for YouTube Script Writing Free YouTube Script Template Free Audience Avatar Template The YouTube Scriptwriting Playbook AutoCut by 1of10 George's Website / YouTube / X⁠ / ⁠LinkedIn⁠ / Newsletter / Community Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Introduction (02:32) George's process today (05:10) Easy mode vs. advanced mode (09:53) The 3 blocks of a YouTube script (11:04) Target, transformation, stakes (18:06) Why setups matter most (19:52) Inside George's scriptwriting app (22:34) Rethinking the payoff (28:16) How many segments a video needs (33:00) How George ends every video (35:14) Ending on a sales video (38:34) Where humans still matter (43:50) How George really feels about AI *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE 162. George Blackman: How to script your videos like Ali Abdaal and Ed from Film Booth *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU'RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

My guest is Jessica Lackey, founder of Deeper Foundations and author of Leaving the Casino: Stop Betting on Tactics and Start Building a Business That Works. She helps coaches, consultants, and service providers build expert-led businesses on strong foundations. Jessica tried the social media game. She hired a social media team for two years, ran Ship 30 for 30 on Twitter, tested Instagram. She never cracked 1,700 followers. So she built her business a different way: 50 guest podcast appearances, 50 guest teaching spots in other communities, 20 to 30 programs joined and participated in over four years. Every visibility opportunity landed 10 to 20 new people on her email list. It was slow, linear, and intentional. Today she has 2,000 people on her email list and 200 paying members in her membership. That's a 10% conversion rate on her list, against the creator industry standard of 1 to 3%. Her business has earned over $300,000 for three consecutive years. Almost nothing she sells is one and done. The whole thing is built on renewals and retention, not growth and virality. In this episode, we talk about: How she built from 200 to 2,000 email subscribers through relationships and guest appearances, not social media Her 3-offer stack (1:1 consulting, 6-month cohort, and membership) and how each piece supports the others Why she does a 30-minute welcome call with every new member at $50 per month — and how she thinks about the economics The KPIs she tracks with clients instead of followers and views: outreach count, visibility opportunities, and what she calls seeds, sprouts, and fruits The trade-offs she's made by choosing this model and why she's made peace with them By the end of this episode, you will have a clear picture of how a small, deliberate audience can support a thriving six-figure business — and what it actually costs to build one that way. Deeper Foundations Leaving the Casino Deeper Foundations Membership Aggressively Human Community as a deliberate Business Model “For You” or “By You”: The K-Shaped Content Era The Zone of Enoughness Sacred Sales Hour LinkedIn Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Cold open: the trade-off Jessica has chosen (00:19) Introducing Jessica Lackey (02:34) Why the social media game didn't work for her (04:05) The relationship-first growth strategy (06:53) Her offer stack: 1:1, cohort, and membership (09:39) Revenue breakdown and pricing (10:52) How the membership grew from 30 members to 200 (12:52) The 30-minute welcome call that doesn't make economic sense (18:29) Free monthly workshops for 4 years: the Deeper Business Dialogues (20:21) The KPIs that actually matter for an expertise business (22:26) Is there a ceiling on this approach? (26:45) Why Jessica has chosen her ceiling on purpose (43:53) How to follow people around the internet like a puppy, not a stalker *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #319: How Tamara Grominsky Predictably Grows Her Membership Each Month *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU'RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞 Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Altizer is the co-creator of Thumbnail Academy and has quickly become one of the most sought-after thumbnail designers around. David’s clients include Kurtis Connor, Jolly, Max Fosh, Hayden Hillier Smith, and now me. David’s thumbnails have earned nearly 350 million views—and in this video, he’ll show you why creating thumbnails is actually easier than you think. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Full transcript and show notes⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠Hire David⁠ ⁠Join Thumbnail Academy⁠ David's ⁠⁠Website⁠⁠ / ⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠ / ⁠Twitter⁠ / ⁠YouTube⁠ *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Intro to David Altizer (05:20) Rule of Thirds Explained (06:26) The Key to Composition (11:07) Special Offer on 1of10 (15:02) Different Styles of Thumbnails (19:39) Clickbait is Good, Actually (22:05) The Key to More Clicks (24:27) Thumbnail Text Strategy (29:44) Learning from Far Side Comics (32:57) Mastering Thumbnails and Outliers (35:41) Working With Thumbnail Designers (45:46) AI's Role in Thumbnail *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE → ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠#280: How to LEGALLY Protect Your Channel (YouTube Lawyer Tyler Chou Explains)⁠ *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE → ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Submit your question here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ *** WHEN YOU'RE READY 📬 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Creator Science Newsletter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 🚀 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Get CreatorHQ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ (creator operating system) 🧪 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Join The Lab⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Get a Personalized Offer⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ *** CONNECT 🐦 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Connect on Twitter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📸 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Connect on Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 💼 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Connect on LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 📹 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Subscribe on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ *** SPONSORS 💼 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

My guest is Tamara Grominsky, founder of PMM Camp — a private, application-only membership for senior product marketing leaders with 280+ members. Tamara spent 15 years in product marketing, eventually landing at Kajabi as VP of Product Marketing. She went there with a specific agenda: study how the best creators build their businesses, then reverse engineer it for herself. She started a newsletter, surveyed her audience, learned the thing they needed most was connection, and launched a membership in March 2023. Six months later, she left Kajabi. Her model isn't always-open or quarterly-launch. It's application-gated, opens for exactly five days on the first of every month, and runs on Kit workflows and Circle. She's been on this monthly cadence for nine months and now forecasts her revenue 12 months in advance. She's hit every number this year. Tamara is also in our Lab mastermind, which means I've watched this system get built in real time. This conversation is nine months of mastermind updates compressed into a podcast episode. In this episode, we talk about: How she went from VP of Product Marketing at Kajabi to building her own membership — and why leaving a job she loved was still the right call The monthly open cart model: application-gated, waitlist-driven, four emails, five days, and why it turned a chaotic launch calendar into a predictable business What a personalized onboarding document looks like, and how she gets 90%+ of new members onto a welcome call Her hypothesis about why her conversion rate is stuck at 30% — and what she's testing next By the end of this episode, you will have a complete model for running a membership like a product — with systems, baselines, and experiments that make revenue forecastable. PMM Camp (Home) PMM Camp Community (Membership + Pricing) PMM Leadership Bootcamp (6-Week Cohort) Newsletter Archive (188 editions, every Sunday) Tamara's LinkedIn Tamara's X Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Introduction (01:26) What product marketing actually is (04:43) From Kajabi to PMM Camp (06:49) What she learned studying creators (11:28) The decision to leave (13:23) Finding the founding 25 (16:47) Inside PMM Camp today (18:29) The welcome call and onboarding doc (25:25) Why evergreen broke her business (27:52) The monthly open cart model (33:17) The Kit workflow behind the cart (36:09) The conversion rate problem (44:54) The visibility hypothesis *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #313: How Tom Ross Doubled His Community Engagement and Retention With Training Pathways #318: The $9/month membership earning more than $500k/year AND buying Smart Passive Income — Pt. 2 featuring Liz Wilcox *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU'RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

My guest is Liz Wilcox, the creator behind Email Marketing Membership — a $9/month newsletter template subscription she’s kept at the same price for six years, that now generates close to half a million dollars a year. Liz built the whole thing as a single parent with no support system and no reliable internet, working from library parking lots and Lowe’s lots during nap times. She launched in February 2021, kept the price at $9, maintained a 5% churn rate, and grew to over 4,400 paying members. She and her sister run the operation — no upsells, no masterminds, no group coaching. Just the membership. Then in April 2026, she quietly closed a deal to buy Smart Passive Income — the 18-year-old creator education brand Pat Flynn built from scratch. She spent five months operating as SPI’s director of community before anyone outside the deal knew it had happened. This is Part 2 of a two-part conversation. Last week, Pat and Matt told the seller’s story. This week, Liz tells the buyer’s. In this episode, we talk about: Why the $9 price point has worked for six years — and why she’ll never raise it How she grew a half-million-dollar membership without social media, using podcasts and a 50% affiliate program What had to be true before she’d pull the trigger on buying SPI How she’s thinking about merging EMM with the SPI community — and why she doesn’t have the answer yet By the end of this episode, you will understand how a $9 offer can compound into a half-million-dollar business — and what it actually looks like when someone buys a legacy brand and tries to honor it. Liz Wilcox Email Marketing Membership Smart Passive Income Episode 317: Pat Flynn & Matt Gartland — Part 1 Superfans by Pat Flynn Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Introduction (01:14) The $9 membership (03:48) The retention rate (07:54) Low stakes for both sides (11:06) The four thousand member math (12:39) AI and the membership (14:55) Who this model isn’t for (16:38) Growing without social media (20:23) Single parent, no backup plan (31:41) Buying Smart Passive Income (34:51) What made the deal happen (43:49) Why she hasn’t cross-promoted yet (48:34) Merging the two memberships *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #317: Selling Smart Passive Income (And What We Can Learn From It) — Pt. 1 featuring Pat Flynn and Matt Gartland *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU’RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week I’m joined by two longtime friends — Pat Flynn and Matt Gartland. Pat is the founder of Smart Passive Income, the creator education brand he started in 2008 and ran for 18 years. Matt came on around 2018 — first as an advisor, then as CEO — and spent years making SPI operationally strong enough to stand without Pat at the center. They spun SPI out into a separate entity called SPI Media, pivoted from courses to community with recurring revenue, and quietly prepared the business for a sale they weren’t sure would ever happen. In September 2026, they announced that SPI had sold. The deal had closed five months earlier. The buyer is Liz Wilcox, an email marketing expert who spent those five months operating publicly as SPI’s “director of community” before anyone knew the deal had closed. The community doubled in size during that window. Part 2 is next week, with Liz. In this episode, we talk about: How Pat and Matt deliberately structured SPI over 8 years so it could be sold — including spinning out a new company, removing Pat’s face from the website, and making the community the hero Why Pat turned down multiple VC and PE offers worth more than the final sale price The deal mechanics: seller financing, no broker, 160 documents of due diligence, and how it closed in 6 months when deals like this typically fall apart What creators who operate entirely under their own name are missing when they eventually want to exit By the end of this episode, you will understand what it actually takes to build a creator business that could outlive you — and what the groundwork for an exit looks like years before anyone is thinking about it. Smart Passive Income Liz Wilcox — the buyer (she’s on next week’s episode) Deep Pocket Monster — Pat’s Pokémon YouTube channel (2.4M subscribers) Built to Sell by John Warrillow — the book that shaped their thinking on making a business sellable Superfans by Pat Flynn — his self-published book, part of the deal’s licensing terms Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) The news (01:44) The first seeds of the idea (03:10) The VC and PE offers (05:52) Building for optionality (13:20) Running two companies at once (18:11) Why real partnership is the unlock (21:17) Who to hire first (38:16) Why the negotiation wasn’t about money (40:38) What seller financing actually means (41:24) The due diligence process (45:26) The transition strategy (47:37) Part 2 preview: Liz Wilcox next week *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #122: Pat Flynn and Matt Gartland – Courses, community, and the future of education *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU’RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Meet Kallaway, the creator behind the Kallaway Marketing channel and the founder of Sandcastles — an AI research tool that helps creators find and validate viral video topics before they ever hit record. Kallaway started 4 businesses. All 4 failed for the same reason: no one knew who he was. No audience meant no customers, no leverage, no second chances. So he made it his mission to understand how audience growth actually works. He cracked short-form content at scale after years of building online businesses, and he built the research system he wished he’d had from the start. Now he has over a billion views, a 50% viral hit rate, and he built a tool to help other creators do the same. This episode is the full system. In this episode, we talk about: Content minutes — the framework for mapping how much trust your audience needs before they’ll buy at each price point on your offer ladder The modern content stack: why short-form and long-form both need to funnel into email, and why that’s the golden goose The 3 metrics that actually matter for content creators — ranked in order of importance, with views coming in third A live walkthrough of Sandcastles: channel watchlists, outlier score, deep video analysis, and how to use the MCP to run research through Claude By the end of this episode, you will have a clear research system for finding validated, high-trust video topics — and a framework for staying creative while using data to de-risk almost everything else. Book a free discovery call with 1of10 StrategyTry Sandcastles for free Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Intro to Kallaway (01:03) Introducing “content minutes” (02:12) The modern content stack (03:45) Why you want a narrow ICP (05:40) The 3 metrics that matter (14:38) Sandcastles demo: building a channel watchlist from scratch (16:14) Why you study mid-size creators, not mega-famous ones (22:18) Deep video analysis: hook formula, storytelling structure, contrarian angle (24:59) Kallaway’s research flow (30:47) Solving structure and scripting problems using your own channel’s data (36:34) Data-enabled creativity: the thesis behind the whole system *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #303: Riley Brown — The AI Content Creator Who Doesn’t Write With AI *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU’RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Caleb Ralston is a strategist and brand builder for some of the biggest names in business. His breakthrough was back in 2018 when he grew GaryVee’s TikTok from 300k to 3.5 million followers in just 3 months. In 2022 he joined Alex and Leila Hormozi’s team as content employee #1, where he grew their audience from 1.2 million to 11.5 million. Caleb just doesn’t miss – and now that he’s out on his own, he’s here to help YOU. In this episode, you'll learn the content strategy he used, how to improve your content, and where to start if you're feeling overwhelmed. ⁠⁠⁠Full transcript and show notes⁠⁠⁠ Caleb's ⁠⁠⁠Website⁠⁠ / ⁠⁠Twitter⁠⁠ / ⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠ / ⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠ / ⁠Instagram⁠ *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) The Secret Man Behind GaryVee and the Hormozi’s (01:11) How Often Do the Top 1% Post? (03:31) The Brand Journey Framework (05:18) Being Intentional With Your Content (08:51) Is It Possible to NOT Niche Down? (13:55) Say the Same Things in Different Ways (18:07) Tracking and Analyzing Data (22:36) Maintaining Quality While Increasing Quantity (24:27) What it Actually Takes to Perform like the 1% (27:21) Where to Start (30:22) Building a Personalized Team (34:54) Agency vs Full Time vs Contractor (41:58) Developing a Content Strategy (45:15) Width Content vs Depth Content (46:55) Scaling Trust Using Educational Content (50:02) Best Call to Action Strategy (52:10) Email and Web Traffic Strategy (55:27) How Caleb is Going About Hiring His Own Team (58:53) The Correct Way to Give Feedback to Your Team (1:03:17) How to Take Inspiration from Others (1:04:55) Which Platform Has the Biggest Opportunity (1:06:57) Audio Content Strategy (1:08:47) Why You Need to Collaborate with Others *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE → ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠#175: Angus Parker – Ali Abdaal’s right-hand man shares a YouTuber’s guide to hiring.⁠ *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE → ⁠⁠⁠Submit your question here⁠⁠⁠ *** WHEN YOU'RE READY 📬 ⁠⁠⁠Creator Science Newsletter⁠⁠⁠ 🚀 ⁠⁠⁠Get CreatorHQ⁠⁠⁠ (creator operating system) 🧪 ⁠⁠⁠Join The Lab⁠⁠⁠ (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ ⁠⁠⁠Get a Personalized Offer⁠⁠⁠ *** CONNECT 🐦 ⁠⁠⁠Connect on Twitter⁠⁠⁠ 📸 ⁠⁠⁠Connect on Instagram⁠⁠⁠ 💼 ⁠⁠⁠Connect on LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠ 📹 ⁠⁠⁠Subscribe on YouTube⁠⁠⁠ *** SPONSORS 💼 ⁠⁠⁠View all sponsors and offers⁠⁠⁠ *** SAY THANKS 💜 ⁠⁠⁠Leave a review on Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠ 🟢 ⁠⁠⁠Leave a rating on Spotify Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Our first-ever 6-figure launch started with a cold email I didn’t respond to. Twice. The third time, I wrote back. A few months later, we ran a 3-day free virtual summit that drove $101,666 in revenue — with a $78,400 margin. This is the full breakdown of how it happened, what we’d do the same way again, and what we’d change. Joining me for this behind-the-scenes recap is Anna Reich, the integrator here on the Creator Science team. This was Anna’s first launch — 3 and a half months into the job — and she was right in the middle of all of it. We ran this summit in partnership with a third-party team called After Harvest, who pitched us on the whole concept via cold email and worked on a 15% performance-based fee. In this episode, we talk about: The full mechanics: $101,666 in revenue, $23,300 in costs, and the exact offer stack that got us there What we’d absolutely do the same — the VIP ticket, aggressive email volume, and the live pitch with a day-2 bonus What we’d do differently — a simpler structure, a new webinar platform, and building the presentations before everything else The 80/20 version: what a stripped-down, repeatable launch playbook actually looks like By the end of this episode, you will have a clear-eyed view of how a virtual summit launch actually works from the inside — with all the numbers, the chaos, and the lessons on the table. Work with Sean and the After Harvest team Build a Beloved Membership — 50% off the self-paced version Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Introduction: the first-ever 6-figure launch and what this episode covers (03:44) Registration and attendance numbers: 3,145 registered, 1,000+ live on day 1 (04:34) Revenue breakdown: $63K cohort, $9K upsell, $17K downsell, $11K VIP tickets (08:29) Cost breakdown: After Harvest’s 15% deal, $1,800 in affiliates, $7,800 domain (10:01) Timeline: cold email in February to contract in April to summit in June (13:56) Things we’d do the same: VIP ticket, compelling web work, full offer stack (16:12) Why the $47 VIP ticket was the biggest surprise of the whole launch (20:54) The live day-2 pitch — 30 minutes, almost no drop-off, and why the bonus mattered (24:30) Things we’d do differently: simpler structure, drop WebinarJam, build launch capability in-house (36:24) The core mistake: building all the assets before locking the presentation content (42:10) The 80/20 version: what to lock in before you open registration (52:28) Skipping affiliates for high-ticket offers, and why one-click opt-ins backfired *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #144: Bari Baumgardner – How to create the perfect 3-day event (IRL or virtually)#191: Breaking down my $60,723 product launch *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU’RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Richard is the co-founder of ⁠1of10⁠, a research platform built by YouTube strategists, and his team has quietly been behind the scenes for some of the biggest channels on the platform—helping creators accumulate over 2 billion views through a repeatable, data-backed system. In this episode, Richard walks through his complete four-phase ideation system—audience identification, outlier research (using five distinct methods), idea remixing, and validation—and backs every step with real examples. We talk about what happens when the wrong audience floods your channel, why creators should double and triple down on formats that work, and how a single title change took one creator's video from 10,000 views to 150,000. He also shares data from 300,000+ YouTube outliers on the ideal title length (hint: shorter than you think) and where the sweet spots are for video duration across different niches. ⁠Save 20% on 1of10 using code JAY20⁠ ⁠Schedule a 1of10 Strategy Call⁠ ⁠Full transcript and show notes⁠ *** TIMESTAMPS (01:12) Where 80-85% of YouTube success comes from (01:50) Phase 1: Audience (03:19) When should you start a fresh channel instead of pivoting? (04:09) The danger of going viral with the wrong audience (05:40) Phase 2: Research (07:37) Format vs. Interest Topic (08:00) Method 1: Inside your own channel (10:52) Tripling and quadrupling down (12:33) Method 2: Inside your niche (13:45) Method 3: Adjacent niches (16:00) Method 4: Outside your niche (17:37) The "Japanese Rule" format (20:56) Method 5: External inspiration (22:07) Phase 3: Remixing (23:00) Escalation, inversion, and interest topic replacement (24:10) Viral vectors: concepts that work across all niches (25:28) Phase 4: Validation (27:00) Optimal video duration by niche (30:45) Why long videos are making a comeback (31:39) Total Addressable Viewership (34:36) Titles: Fear, Curiosity, and Desire as the three core drivers (37:17) Data: Title Length (37:51) Three methods for generating title angles (42:11) Thumbnails: Composition and Elements (45:11) It's never too late: title/thumbnail changes (46:10) Live demo: 1of10 thumbnail generator (48:10) The full 1of10 workflow *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE → ⁠#282: David Altizer — How to Make Great Thumbnails (For Non-Designers)⁠ *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE ⁠Submit your question here⁠ *** WHEN YOU'RE READY 📬 ⁠Creator Science Newsletter⁠ 🚀 ⁠Get CreatorHQ⁠ (creator operating system) 🧪 ⁠Join The Lab⁠ (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ ⁠Get a Personalized Offer⁠ *** CONNECT 🐦 ⁠Connect on Twitter⁠ 📸 ⁠Connect on Instagram⁠ 💼 ⁠Connect on LinkedIn⁠ 📹 ⁠Subscribe on YouTube⁠ *** SPONSORS 💼 ⁠View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Most productivity advice operates in one of two categories: you’re missing a skill or system, or you have a mindset problem. Cat Mulvihill thinks both camps are right — and both are incomplete. There’s a third category that almost nobody is talking about, and she argues it’s the one most likely to be the actual culprit when you’re stuck. My guest this week is Cat Mulvihill, a speaker, trainer, accountability coach, and licensed Immunity to Change facilitator who has been leading workshops for more than 20 years. After being formally diagnosed with ADHD in 2024, she developed the Momentum Formula — a framework separating the reasons we fail to follow through into three distinct categories: logical, biological, and psychological. Cat is a longtime Lab member and led the second-highest-rated session at this year’s Lab Offline event in Boise. In this episode, we talk about: The three roadblocks to follow-through — and why the biological one is the category almost everyone overlooks How to diagnose which roadblock is actually keeping you stuck, and why the order you check them matters The “dreaded identity” — the hidden, subconscious version of yourself you’re afraid of becoming — and how it quietly kills follow-through Why knowing your tendency from Gretchen Rubin’s Four Tendencies framework changes which accountability strategies actually work for you By the end of this episode, you will have a concrete diagnostic framework for understanding why you’re not doing the things you know you should be doing — and what to try first. Cat Mulvihill — website and upcoming workshops The Four Tendencies quiz by Gretchen Rubin Immunity to Change by Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey LinkedIn bookmarked search overview LinkedIn Instagram — @catmulvihill X — @catmulvihill The Momentum Experiment Podcast Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) “Are people going to think I’m a sellout?” — the dreaded identity, cold open (00:19) Introducing Cat: the Momentum Formula and why the biological roadblock gets missed (01:59) The 3 roadblocks — logical, biological, psychological — and where brain chemistry fits in (04:29) Diagnosing which roadblock you’re facing: why Jay thinks his problems are “just chemicals” (08:04) How to check the roadblocks in order — and the patterns that signal it’s not logical (10:55) A real Lab member example: when great systems still don’t get used (14:40) The Four Tendencies (Gretchen Rubin): upholders, questioners, obligers, rebels (19:25) The “dreaded identity” — the hidden psychological block most creators can’t see (21:14) Working through all 3 roadblocks with a LinkedIn example (25:44) Energy management and the biological roots: dopamine, blood sugar, sleep, environment matching (32:17) How to work with obliger tendencies instead of against them (36:18) The Immunity to Change framework and next steps for going deeper *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #171: Nir Eyal – Writing books, persuasion vs. coercion, and how to be indistractable *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU’RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Closing the doors to a membership is supposed to hurt signups. But one of Tom's clients did exactly that — closed it, added an application, doubled the price, then reopened. His next launch sold out in 4 minutes. Same community. Same people. Just different mechanics. My guest this week is Tom Ross, the founder of Learn.Community, where he helps community builders design learning experiences that actually stick. His clients have reached millions of people and generated tens of millions of dollars in revenue. Tom has been building online communities for 20 years, and he's been a member of The Lab since 2022. In this episode, we talk about: Why an application process might be the most underused retention lever in the membership world The “bacon medicine” framework for making your membership both sellable and sticky long-term Tom’s “delight, direct, connect” onboarding philosophy — and what almost every community gets wrong How he rebuilt his course into learning pathways, drove completion from 20% to 50%, and turned a siloed module into the main engine of community engagement By the end of this episode, you will understand exactly why most membership churn is decided before someone joins, and what to actually do about it. Learn.Community Tom's Community Compass Framework Tom's YouTube Channel The Lab Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) “People inherently don’t know what they don’t know” (00:29) Tom's background: 20 years building communities, what we're covering (04:06) Most retention problems start before someone joins — the targeting failure (07:51) Application process as the biggest membership lever — and how to handle rejections kindly (10:09) Closing doors creates demand: one client’s launch sold out in 4 minutes (14:43) The “bacon medicine” approach to membership positioning (24:28) Tom’s “delight, direct, connect” onboarding framework (29:01) Responsive vs. linear onboarding — why static sequences break (33:01) Learning pathways: reinventing the traditional course (36:47) AI agents, deep worksheets, and vibe-coded SaaS tools inside the pathways (40:02) Turning off course comments and routing engagement back into the community (50:49) Real results: completion up from 20% to 50%, churn down, engagement way up *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #260: Detailed Breakdown: Our First Offline Event (And What We’ll Do Differently Next Time) *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU’RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞‍♂️ Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, my wife Mallory joins me for only her second podcast appearance ever to break down everything from The Lab Offline Powered by Circle — our second annual 2-day in-person retreat for Lab members, hosted June 8–9 at Hotel Renegade in Boise, Idaho. Mallory planned essentially everything: seating charts, venue contracts, menus, swag, run of show. She's been at it for roughly 6 months. In this episode, we talk about: The full economics of running a community retreat (we lost $8,300, which is actually an improvement) How we took breakfast from a 4.8 to an 8.1 rating — and what we'd cut to reduce costs next year What ranked #1 for attendees 2 years running, and why trivia (our favorite activity) came in 7th Whether we'll keep doing this in Boise — and what Columbus, Toronto, and doing 2 events per year might look like By the end of this episode, you will have a clear picture of what it actually costs to run a high-quality community event, what's worth paying for, and what we'd do differently. Circle (event sponsor) Hotel Renegade Boise Craft and Commerce Conference The Lab Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Cold open: people were moved, tears were shed (00:53) The Lab Offline explained: 2-day member retreat, goals, and agenda (06:44) Initial impressions: a reunion feeling, smoother logistics, zero fires (13:08) Attendee feedback numbers: 9.3/10 overall, 91% returning, 34% said underpriced (18:46) Event economics: $30,459 revenue, $38,800 costs, $8,300 loss (23:05) Top cost drivers: hotel catering, travel, venue rental, dinners (26:52) Planning challenges: acoustics, dietary restrictions, every decision is a trade-off (36:52) What to keep: assigned seating, Kat's Immunity to Change workshop, Fighting Off the Sleepies (42:04) What to improve: more mastermind sessions, less solo writing, better acoustics (47:49) Open question: should the event stay paired with Craft and Commerce? (53:49) The case for Columbus, 2 events per year, and an international option *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #260: Detailed Breakdown: Our First Offline Event (And What We’ll Do Differently Next Time) *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU'RE READY 📬 Creator Science Newsletter 🚀 Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) 🧪 Join The Lab (private membership community) 🧞 Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT 🐦 Connect on Twitter 📸 Connect on Instagram 💼 Connect on LinkedIn 📹 Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS 💼 View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The highest month of membership revenue in Lab history was also the setup for the highest month of churn. One year later, February delivered both records. I have been building community in some form since 2012. I ran Startup Weekend events in Columbus, led online Mastermind groups, consulted on the launch of SPI Pro, and spent 2021 leading the community team at Smart Passive Income before going back out on my own. In early 2022, I launched what became the Lab, a membership for creators earning at least $10,000 per month in non-service revenue or with 10,000 followers on a single platform. The Lab now has around 340 members across three tiers and is still standing after years of waves of communities coming and going. In this episode, we talk about: Why scarcity and urgency drive signups but can crater your retention a year later The two onboarding "secrets" I kept quiet for a while The mastermind paradox How to think about scaling a community without accidentally eroding the culture you've built What I would tell anyone thinking about launching a membership before they write a single line of copy By the end of this episode, you will have a clearer picture of how a membership actually works over years, not just at launch. Subscribe to Growth in Reverse Watch on YouTube The Lab Membership⁠ ⁠The Lab Membership Teardown (free)⁠ ⁠Circle (community platform)⁠ ⁠Kit Craft and Commerce Conference⁠ ⁠Chenell Basilio on Creator Science⁠⁠ Full transcript and show notes *** TIMESTAMPS (00:00) Introduction and episode context (02:08) How Jay started the Lab (from Startup Weekend to SPI Pro to Creative Companion Club) (09:37) The scarcity play: record revenue month followed by record churn (10:38) What actually works as a marketing lever for a community (13:46) Why Jay runs applications and has a 90% conversion rate for accepted members (16:30) The design philosophy: reduce effort, increase impact (24:19) Mid-boarding: the missing piece between onboarding and renewal (35:13) Jay's onboarding framework and the two secrets he's been keeping (40:46) Why offline events matter for retention (not necessarily growth) (47:00) How to think about scaling community without destroying culture (49:19) Who shouldn't launch a membership (and what to figure out first) *** RECOMMENDED NEXT EPISODE #292: Chenell Basilio — The state of email in 2026, growing your list without social media, and new predictions. *** ASK CREATOR SCIENCE Submit your question here *** WHEN YOU'RE READY Creator Science Newsletter Get CreatorHQ (creator operating system) Join The Lab (private membership community) Get a Personalized Offer *** CONNECT Connect on Twitter Connect on Instagram Connect on LinkedIn Subscribe on YouTube *** SPONSORS View all sponsors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices