I quit my job, started a business, built my own website, and now I'm growing a community... AMA!

@milena_mitova What are you working on?

@jandemiralp My startup: https://www.campaigntrackly.com.

@james_liao Thanks for sharing James. What does you site focus on?

@monkey_crypto Hah! Well, it sounds kinda crazy but all things in my life pushed me in this direction at the same time. After two years of doing work I loved, I was moved onto a project at work which I found deeply unfulfilling. The books I read started to resonate deeply with me and give me the confidence to pursue my business further. This and many things gradually planted seeds in my mind and over time they got too big to ignore. There was a lot of doubt and scepticism from my family and which knocked my confidence as well. But I kept a vision in mind for what I wanted to do and I had a group of cheerleaders in my life who kept picking me up when I fell down - namely my partner and two very close friends. One of the big traps I've had to side-step is the unsolicited advice you find everyone online from hustle-culture business gurus who thrive on selling you short-cuts. My advice is to side step these people as much as you can and run any advice you hear through your own internal filter. Hope this helps!

@monkey_crypto @jandemiralp How you handle some scepticism when it comes from your close one, such as family. I think it's quite mentally break down? For you, is that your responsibility to explain on them. Or just let follow your dream and answer their doubt by the result ?

@timo_luick Thanks for letting me know about the bugs. I'll have a look to see if I can do anything about it. I started off by building something for myself to help me get my life in order, and then gradually I realised that this was something I could share with others. During this period of my life I was going through big life changes - changing country, jobs, and changing family dynamics (I was supporting my parents through a divorce). I was going through so much that I struggled to organise my thoughts and was barely able to sleep at night from the stress. One thing that really helped me was an external system to empty my mind within and to focus me on the things that really mattered (big picture). That's how I got started. The desire of Inner Compass was to share this system with other people, and now it's grown a bit bigger than that. I'm now looking to build a community to support people through life transitions and offer courses to share some of my perspectives and lessons from my own journey. But overall... the initial step for me was recognising that what I had created for myself could also help other people. My personal opinion is that if your first step is "how can I make money from this thing", you're going to fail. Money is an important factor, but I see it as a bi-product of a product or service that delights the customer.

Do you build your platform by optimization through notion? So sorry for so many questions. Because I am so amazed. lol

@ammanahalfian Well... My initial intention wasn't to actually build a journaling community. It kinda emerged rather organically. My initial intention was to build the Life Compass system then share it with other people through courses. However, I soon realised that I wanted to create ways to connect more deeply with people which is where the idea for the community came from. But having a community without some kind of activity that brings people together on a somewhat regular basis is a recipe for people gradually drifting away and becoming inactive. Which is why I started hosting regular journalling calls each week as a way to add a human touch.

@ammanahalfian Hmm not sure I understand the question here. I first built the notion system for myself and then started to think about how I could modify it for other people. This is where I began thinking about how to raise awareness around it and share it with others through the format of a business.

@sebastian_el Thanks for the question Sebastian! This has been a tricky one for me. Communities on the internet are difficult to build and maintain I've come to realise. Especially ones where there is a sense of openness and trust between members. Within my community, I make the effort to greet every person who joins with a personalised message (intentionally not automated by a bot) to strike up a conversation. I also host free weekly guided journaling events every Sunday which community members are welcome to join. In my opinion, creating open invitations is important (not manipulating people to be at an event by selling false promises) and creating a sense of consistency for people. For instance, as someone in my community, I know that every Sunday an event is happening. Even if I don't join for a month, I know that it's still going to be happening whenever I choose to join again. Hope this answers your question! You're more than welcome to join my community and take a look around. Here's the link: www.innercompass.academy

@jandemiralp Appreciate the detailed answer, Jan! It seems you are really focused on adding human touch wherever you can, well done! Excited to check Inner Compass out!

@ricoche Promising in what sense? Making money you mean? If so, then yes (but gradually). The first year I was working on my business I basically made no money. The only income came from friends and family. And now finally, I am getting money in from a couple of streams. What's been a challenge for me is to find ways to market my business in non-coercive ways. The work of Rob Hardy was a big inspiration for me regarding this. You can find his content: https://ungated.media/article/bu...

@jandemiralp If you're making some money that's amazing. That's what is important. Non-coercive? How are marketing it nowadays 😀

@ricoche What I mean by non-coercive is that I don't tell people that joining my community will change their life, improve their health, and help them make lots of money etc. I don't use fake count-down timers in my marketing emails, telling people that they have 24 hours to claim a discount when in truth, the discount will be there for the next month. To put it simply, coercive marketing tries to manipulate people to buy a product using very emotive language sneaky techniques to tempt people into buying. Non-coercive marketing offers invitations for people to buy but leaves the decision in their hands. Nowadays, I market myself by creating content (videos, posts etc) across various channels for the B2C side of my business. And for the B2B side, I leverage my network to arrange workshops with companies.

@jandemiralp Yeah, that's some good insight. Me too, I just didn't know that's how it's called. I find that many people can see right through the BS and the pretence. I have seen companies even say their digital product is running out of stock 😂😂

@dp286 Hmmm good question... I'm not sure really. I would say, I wish I knew what an emotional rollercoaster it would be, but then I'm not sure I would have done it if I had known all the challenges that come along the way hah! A big piece of advice I would give past me (and anyone looking to start a business) is to focus primarily on your health before you launch, and as you grow your business (your mental, physical and emotional health). Some people say that starting a business takes a lot of time. To an extent this is true, but from my experience, the more accurate observation would be: starting a business takes a lot of energy! When I've been in the right head space, I can do a week's worth of work in a day. When I'm feeling overworked, tired, or out of balance - things grind to a halt for me. My advice can be summarised as this: treat self-care as a superpower! Disconnect to recharge. Go do things that bring you joy. Explore new places. Meet up with friends and just chill. Don't make your life just about your business. You'll find that things will flow better when you take care of all areas of your life. Hope this helps! :)

@shajedulkarim_ Wow, Karim, this is exactly what I needed to hear! Thank you for your thoughtful and heartfelt words. They spoke to my soul. Much love brother <3

@elavarasan_vk I'm glad to hear! What kinda projects are you interested in working on?