The antidote smells a lot like cheese (I'll explain)
I've been reporting on my side hustle income since the beginning of 2024.
Starting in 2025, I began reporting on my profit and loss.
And it hasn't been pretty. Every single individual month has been a loss.
I'm batting a thousand. Five straight months of more expenses than income.
And the sixth is shaping up to be horrible.
My strategy isn't working. Something needs to change.
(The links to the reports are at the end if you want to rubberneck.)
It's all about cheese, really.
Maybe you've heard of the littlepeople Sniff, Scurry, Hem, and Haw from Dr. Spencer Johnson's Who Moved My Cheese?
With regard to my online side hustle activities, unfortunately I'm mostly like Hem, the stubborn holdout who refused to accept that the cheese had been removed from Cheese Station C.
The activities that brought me success before, mainly blogging on WordPress sites and affiliate income, aren't working the way they used to.
Yet I continue to believe that they will. That someday AdSense will be more than a dollar a day.
With it looking more and more like I'm bringing a gun to a knife fight regarding SEO, it's unlikely that will happen.
What lies at Cheese Station N?
Sniff and Scurry found the new Cheese Station N first. They explored the maze even when there was still cheese at the old hangout Cheese Station C.
In terms of online content creation, WordPress blogs are Cheese Station C and Medium, Substack, Skool, and product sales are Cheese Station N.
Medium and Substack are still works in progress, and Skool is going to be a while. I'm convinced that kind of thing can be successful if you have a following in a niche, but otherwise it will just be a $99/month expense.
Products, on the other hand:
- Just take time to conceive and put together
- No up-front monetary cost necessary
Littleperson, here's your sign.
In what was one of many times I'd read about product creation, Jamie Northrup is starting a June Digital Product Sprint with a focus on templates in his Skool community.
So, I'm embracing my inner Scurry and creating a product for the sprint.
I'll be creating a set of Obsidian templates for content creators to help reduce the friction of maintaining a personal knowledge management system.
The first customer will be me. I'm needing to get more efficient with my content creation, and I see Obsidian and a modified Zettelkasten structure as helping me to get there.
If I can get it to work for myself, I'll have more confidence that it will help others to solve their content creation issues.
If this product has any success, I'll do it again.
And I'll have fresh, money-smelling cheese going forward. 🧀
Interested in taking it further?
I need to spend less on courses, but there are so many good ones!
Anyway, check out Solid Cash Tips for regular insights on spending less (!), making more, and living well!
AND … if you subscribe through the link above, I'll make sure you get a nice introductory price on my templates when they come out!
Oh … I promised some rubbernecking.
Here are my in-the-red profit / loss reports:
I may receive a commission, at no additional cost to you, if you purchase a product or sign up. Just so you know!
Photo by Aliona Gumeniuk on Unsplash