What is it that Nick Huber of The Sweaty Startup has ripped back the curtain on what it means to be

Sep 5, 2022

Find out how author Nick Huber uses his experience building a successful small business to support other entrepreneurs through content and courses.

Small business owner and investor in real estate Nick Huber started his Real Estate Masterclass by creating the result of a Google document.

A week later, he'd written 10,000 words.

Three and a quarter months after, the course was ready to launch.

"I didn't overthink it. I didn't spend too much time in the grass. I cleared it," Nick explains.

The course took off. Nick made $350K in course sales during the very first month.

However, sales of this kind do not just appear out of out of the blue.

Learn more about the ways Nick increased his followers through making his work public, as well as his strategy for launching his courses, and advice for other creators.

Let's talk about "unsexy small business"

Nick doesn't believe in keeping secrets.

The founder of The Sweet Startup , he gives a glimpse behind the scenes of the process of running an effective small-scale business via his blog, newsletter with Twitter, YouTube channel, podcasts, online courses and an communities on the internet.

But Nick was never a creator.

Before starting The Sweaty Startup, Nick was already a successful small-scale business owner. He started a student storage business with a friend during the final year of his college. Storage Squad expanded to 25 colleges; and after 10 years The duo decided to sell it at a price of seven million dollars.

Along the way, Nick realized that there aren't many resources available on how to build what he describes as an "unsexy small-scale business". Then he decided to begin filling this gap by going the public domain: sharing his experiences of establishing a successful small business while navigating the market of real estate investments.

In the year 2018, Nick was on a meeting with his young brother who owns his own company, when inspiration struck for The Sweet Startup podcast .

Nick was sharing the things they learned in the process of building his own business. If his brother was learning about Nick's experience, surely other small business owners are hungry for that kind of material.

"I'm really enthusiastic about small business. This is why I decided to create content around the thesis of "unsexy business"."

"A majority of the content on entrepreneurship includes startups, tech, Shark Tank, and new ideas and inventions," Nick explains. "And I'm sort of within the view of thinking that the only way a lot of people get rich in small towns or in our neighborhood, is by doing boring, small business."

The podcast was created by The Sweaty Startup Podcast to discuss "the fundamentals of strategies, tactics, and strategies used to grow successful companies."

Then, Nick started writing articles about small-scale businesses, entrepreneurship, and the real estate market on his blog . A couple of years later the founder of the newsletter decided to launch a new one to send exclusive content and offer his course to his subscribers.

Today, the podcast contains nearly 300 episodes and over 1.5 million downloads, and the newsletter is averaging 22K subscribers.

Most of them found Nick via Twitter, where he grew his follower base to 245K. He tweeted information in the form of an "self storage owner/operator through the medium of a modest, unsexy business".

Turning Twitter to the"top of the funnel" with the transparency

When Nick created his content, he saw that he needed to build an audience with other entrepreneurs.

"The most challenging thing about being an entrepreneur is it's a lonely journey."

The time spent on Twitter confirmed Nick's opinion that few entrepreneurs share candid insights on what requires to build a successful business.

"I believe there's a stigma in entrepreneurship that, you must remain secret about your business," Nick says. "You aren't going to want to reveal your work too often because people might take it away."

Then Nick began to tweet about his experience in small business and real estate. He shared what he calls "an uncomfortable quantity" of details about how both he and his business partners, Dan, ran their company.

Dan was naturally a initially sceptical.

"When I began blogging and sharing all the details about our business, Dan called me and told me, "Nick, you have to explain this to me. What are you going to gain by telling people how we run our business?" Nick keeps in mind.

"I was thinking, 'Dan, you don't understand. I'm meeting other people doing massive tasks. And they're starting to trust me. I'm beginning to establish relationship with the people. This will surely help us in what we're trying to accomplish. And he trusted me."

Nick's risk was rewarded: He has more than 245K fans as well as 20 million monthly impressions on Twitter. He calls the platform the "top of funnel for Nick Huber's brand. Huber branding".

The audience that Nick was able to reach grew increasing numbers of people contacted Nick for investing advice in the amount of 30 messages each week. It was evident that many would like to know more from him.

And Nick was eager to instruct them.

Iterate and ship, then create something perfect

Being aware that there was a crowd willing to take his advice, Nick focused on getting the course to them -but without rushing to make it flawless.

Nick made $350K in course sales during the initial month.

"It's not for everybody," Nick acknowledges. "It's intended for those who really want to consider buying a property. For people who want to make an investment in real estate a piece of their journey."

Now, Nick relaunches his masterclass each year. He keeps the content up to date and relevant and makes it an ongoing source for people who invest in it. "I've probably invested twice as long in the past, working to make it better by adding sections, and changing segments," he says.

The instructor can monitor students' development and observe how they interact with the materials, which can help him ensure they get the right information to be successful.

"I can't think of any thing I dislike at the moment It's fantastic," says Nick. "The value prop is phenomenal and the cost is phenomenal."

(Want to be able to follow in Nick's steps? Sign up to get a FREE account .)

Nick's tips for fellow creators

Nick has two recommendations for the entrepreneurs around him:

Build an audience

Make online in a course

There's no need to complete all of them at the same time: "When it comes to making a course to write regardless of whether you possess an audience, it's still important to make sure you've clarified your thoughts."

Nick says that writing course content helps him organize his ideas around an issue and help identify the gaps in his understanding.

To build a business, though, creating that content isn't enough. It requires an audience to share it with.

"If you want to make profits, you must have an audience," Nick advises. "I thought that people with large followers on social media and YouTube made content solely for entertainment purposes. But I was unaware of how it can amplify your job."

"I found how much I shared with others and the more I shared, my network increased and I met amazing people to invest with me, collaborate with, teach me, and just become friends with me."

"Opportunities are created by people sharing their knowledge, sharing and collaboration, and the internet is the place where this can happen."