RC #021
How will you measure your life?
Welcome to issue #021 of Rational Creatives, a weekly newsletter that empowers curious people to make a living doing work they love.
Hey friends,
Hope you had a phenomenal weekend!
I know you usually get my emails on Sundays, but my schedule has been changing a lot and it’s becoming increasingly hard for me to stick with it. So for now, you’ll receive your weekly dose of rational creativity every Tuesday.
Last week was huge for me — I launched my first digital product and made my first $500 as a creator. I wrote a couple of atomic essays reflecting on the experience and the lessons learned:
And here are the 10 coolest things I found this week:
Pricing strategies by Ryan Gum. One of the trickiest aspects of launching The Online Writing Bible was coming up with a solid price strategy. In this atomic essay, Ryan explains the psychological concepts behind some of the most effective pricing strategies for creator products. If you are planning to eventually start selling your own products or services as a creator, you should definitely read and bookmark this one.
Going from 0 to $20k revenue in 3 months. I’ve been watching Janel’s growth from the very beginning and it’s been a wild ride. She went from having <50 followers on Twitter to 6k+, and passed $20k in revenue for Newsletter OS in just 3 months. This essay analyzes some of the strategies behind Janel’s product success.
Launch checklist by Jim Raptis. This a great resource I found last week. It’s an Airtable database curating 80+ actionable tips from different entrepreneurs so you can kill it on Product Hunt with your next product launch
They're not cheap by Atoms. Would you normally pay $120 for a pair of shoes? Probably not. But afer reading this, you’d at least consider it. This post is a great example of how you can increase your product’s perceived value. Plus, their copy is just delightful.
You're not late by Alice Lemée. You see all these superstar creators with massive followings and naturally think “Man, I’m too late”. But you’re not. Alice actually crunched the numbers for us. Her conclusion: It’s still very, very early.
Webflows' 2021 design portfolio course. Webflow is one of the most potent and flexible no-code tools around. They recently launched this free design portfolio course where they teach you how to build your own beautiful website in just 21 days.
Do you like to listen to music while you write? Got something for you: Julian Shapiro's Writing Flow playlist. 600+ hand-picked tracks from one of the Internet’s best writers.
Hijack social. We all check Twitter more than we should. This cool extension may make you feel less guilty: it replaces the ads from your Twitter feed with beautiful posts that remind you of your to-dos.
How Will You Measure Your Life? by Clayton M. Christensen. In this essay, the author of The Innovator’s Dilemma shows you how to apply some of the most impactful mental models in business to your personal life. Specifically, he wants to help you answer three big questions: 1) How can you be happy in your career? 2) How can you be sure that your relationship with your family is an enduring source of happiness? And 3) how can you live your life with integrity? This is the deepest, most thoughtful thing I’ve read in a while. If you only open one link from this list, please do this one.
15 most useful razors by George Mack. George’s noise-to-signal ratio is remarkable. He tweets once a day mostly every day, but all his content is interesting, insightful or both. In this thread, he shares 15 simple but powerful mental models that will blow your mind.
A quick reminder before I let you go:
Also, remember to always be kind, stay curious and have fun.
Until next time,
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Thanks for the awesome links! I have bookmarked quite a lot for next week's reading.