How to Make a Million Dollars as a Gen X Creator
Hey there, Gen X! This guide gives you some essential numbers to help you answer the age-old question, “How to Make a Million Dollars.”
Why one million dollars? It’s an arbitrary number, to sure, but it has become an industry benchmark of sorts. The media loves writing annual updates about the number of new millionaires. And ther (e are a lot!
In fact, there were a half million new millionaires in the U.S. last year. That brings the total number of American millionaires to nearly 7.5 million.
So the next time you ask yourself, “Do I have what it takes to make a million dollars,” what you really should be asking yourself is, “the real question you should be asking is…”If 7.5 million people figured it out, shouldn’t I be able to figure it out as well?”
Whether you’re looking to up your existing game or you want to get started on that post-retirement side hustle, here are some tips and strategies on how to make a million dollars.
One Million Dollar Calculator
Any financial advisor will tell you to diversify your revenue streams, and the same goes for your entrepreneurial career. Have revenue coming in from multiple sources.
Below I’ve outlined the path to one million for each revenue type.
Create a custom plan with the interactive MILLION DOLLAR CALCULATOR.
Hourly Rate
Many creators start their million-dollar journey by offering hourly services. This helps supplement your income as you amp up your creator career. (Think of your hourly rate as the side hustle to your side hustle.) However, hourly rates should be a short-term plan. Instead, focus on transitioning to signature offers and passive income streams to scale your revenue faster.
How to Make One Million Dollars: If you charge $100 per hour, youâd need to work 10,000 hours to hit $1,000,000. (That translates to 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year, for four years.)
Fastest Route to $1,000,000: Reach out to friends and former colleagues and tell them you are open to work. If that well runs dry, utilize freelance platforms like Upwork or Fiverr to seek new clients.
Resource
Check out Nick Loper’s site, Side Hustle Nation, for great ideas on starting one or more side hustles.
Project Work
The goal is to get away from hourly rates as quickly as possible. Your next step could be to start project-based work. This approach allows you to charge higher fees and work fewer hours.
How to Make One Million Dollars: You can charge anywhere from $1,000 to $50,000 per project depending on scope and expertise. Completing two hundred $5,000 projects will get you to the $1,000,000 goal.
Fastest Route to $1,000,000: Tap into your current contact list to promote your tailored, high-value solutions.
You Need a Signature Offer
Instead of husting to find clients for your hourly services, think about positioning yourself as the go-to expert in ONE area. (This is called branding). Develop a signature offer – a stand-out service or product – which will allow you to grow faster. It will also help you build trust with potential new clients. Plus, this signature offer will set you up as a topic expert when you dive deeper into your creator career.
Physical Products
Although this post focuses primarily on the passive income side of the creator economy, there’s nothing wrong with selling physical products. Not sure what to sell? Sell anything that solves a problem, helps a person in transition, or just makes the world an all around better place .
How to Make One Million Dollars: Whether you sell art, merch, or handmade goods, the math is all the same. If your average product sells for $50, youâd need to sell 20,000 items to make $1,000,000.
Fastest Route to $1,000,000: You’ll need an eCommerce store, either on your website or in partnership with a site like Etsy. You can also sell direct from your social media accounts. Aim to grow an email list or following of at least 10,000 customers and market new products regularly.
Surface Pattern Design for the Win
Get inspired by Bonnie Christine, an artist, pattern designer, and teacher, who runs a successful blended business teaching creatives how to be pattern designers and how run successful ecommerce businesses.
Individual & Group Coaching
Those who can, do and those who can’t teach? Not anymore. Those who teach free up their valuable time so they can make significantly more money.
As you build your expertise and your reputation, one growth option is to shift away from DOING the work to TEACHING others how to do it. Coaching can offer significant financial returns while you handle fewer clients.
How to Make One Million Dollars: For individual coaching, you can charge anywhere from $500 to $10,000 per client, depending on the format. Signing one hundred clients at $10,000 a piece will get to $1,000,000. (That’s jus 25 a year or two a month over four years.)
With group coaching, you can charge less or more, depending on the format, per person than you do with one-on-one coaching. Charging $10,000 per person and enrolling 100 clients will still get you to the million-dollar mark, but so much faster than when you do one-on-one coaching.
Fastest Route to $1,000,000: Use webinars or live workshops to attract coaching clients. Aim to grow your email list to at least 5,000 people – less if you are aiming for $10,000 sessions – to nurture these leads through strategic follow-ups. With a higher price point, youâll need fewer clients to hit your million-dollar goals.
Sell Your Smarts with John Meese
If coaching sounds like it might be your jam, then John Meese is the guy for you. He teaches people how to run successful high-end coaching programs tapping into their existing knowledge. Hop onto his free (or paid) trainings whenever they become available. You won’t regret it!
Online Courses
Digital products like online courses are the mac daddy of the passive income world. This is a HUGE category and could include e-books, webinars, full courses, mini courses, mini workshops, and really any kind of education program or platform you can think of.
How to Make One Million Dollars: If you price your course at $100, youâd need to sell 10,000 courses to reach $1,000,000. (That’s about 1,800 a month or 450 a week if you want to hit your million-dollar goal in a year.)
Fastest Route to $1,000,000: To achieve 10,000 course sales, you’d need to grow your email list pretty quickly. For ten thousand sales, you would need a pretty big list, like in the tens or hundreds of thousands. Doable? Yes. Short-term revenue? Probably not.
How to Make a Million Dollars: The Digital Course Academy
If you’ve been longing to add Digital Course Educator to your LinkedIn profile, then there is no better person to check out than Amy Porterfield (đ€Gen X Certified đ€). She is the queen bee of course creation, and her education programs are very helpful in getting you to your goal.
Once a year, Amy offers Course Confidential, a $50 how-to-launch-your-course overview (but you’ll want to upgrade to her VIPers Q&A, for an extra $50, to go full throttle.)
Amy’s super, duper, turbo-charged program is Digital Course Academy. This is going to be a bit of an investment, for sure, but it has everything you could possibly need to hep you unleash your inner course. (I haven’t taken it but I got SO much value from the Course Confidential, I plan to to take DCA next year.)
Build a Community
You’ve probably seen a dramatic increase in so-called experts asking you to join their communities of late. No, this is not the same as creating a group on Facebook or LinkedIn. The membership model allows you to offer continuous benefits, while you own the relationships with your audience. (Yes, you’re still leasing space, but you get to keep all the contact info of your members, unlike social media.) Plus you build regular, recurring revenue. Nice work if you can get it. đ” And you can it if you try. đ”
How to Make One Million Dollars: If you charge $50 per member per month, and you have 1,667 subscribers, youâll reach $1,000,000 in a year.
Fastest Route to $1,000,000: Build a loyal community by promoting your community through social media or via your blog. Then convert followers into paying members by offering even MORE value than you do on social. Aim to grow your email list to at least 10,000 subscribers. With a 2% conversion rate, this would translate into about 200 members.
People Magic
If you’re a people person, head on over to Mighty Networks to check out their “People Magic Masterclass.” With the tagline, “What if everything you needed to build a $1M community could be learned in just 9 simple steps?,” makes a pretty compelling case for starting a community. Plus, Gina Bianchini (đ€Gen X Certified đ€). the CEO and Co-Founder of Mighty Networks, is a master storyteller.
Also check out Stu MacLaren, the creator behind The Membership Experienceâą who has helped with tens of thousands of creators build recurring revenue. Myself included.
Brand Sponsorships
Once you grow your digital presence to a healthy number, whether that’s newsletter subscribers or social media followers, you’ll start attracting brands who will pay you to promote their products. You can also start investigating affiliate sales, which is where you mention or promote a product using a special link, and you’ll earn a commission if a follower buys the product after clicking that link.
How to Make One Million Dollars: Sponsorship rates vary, but you could earn upwards of $5,000 (or more) for each sponsorship. Complete one hundred $10,000 brand deals to reach $1,000,000. Affiliate marketing is a complicated machine, and the formulas are beyond the scope of this piece, but there are many affiliate opportunities for Gen Xers.
Fastest Route to $1,000,000: Focus on growing a social media audience or email list of at least 50,000 people. With a 1-2% engagement rate, youâll start to see more interest from brands and affiliate partners.
You Tube Star
If you’re channeling some Dire Straits right about now…
That ain’t workin’, that’s the way you do it
Money for nothin’ and your chicks for free
Now that that ditty is in your head, maybe YouTube is the place to augment your million-dollar earnings. If you build a solid audience on YouTube, you can earn revenue through their ad network but you can also incorporate the other channels above, by promoting those links to your fabulous YouTube following.
How to Make One Million Dollars: Ad revenues are low-ish (around $3 to $5 per 1,000 views), so youâd need around 200 million views to hit $1,000,000 solely from YouTube ads. But say you only get a quarter of those views, that’s still a very substantial audience for your courses or coaching programs.
Fastest Route to $1,000,000: Focus on niche content that delivers high value and attracts engaged viewers. Build your audience and integrate your email list-building strategies. Collaborations and viral videos can accelerate growth.
YouTuber in a Nutshell
Sunny Lenarduzzi is a fantastic resource for learning how to grow a profitable YouTube channel.
Ali Abdaal is a top affiliate marketing expert who shares how to ethically grow this income stream.
Did You Notice My Resource Boxes?
That sums up the MAIN ways you can make money via the Creator Economy. But the point here is Creator, as in you can create your own path!
By the way, If youâve been clicking over to the recommendations in my resource boxes, these are all people I subscribe to and have learned from.
But thereâs a bigger lesson here as well.
Branding.
Each of these creators made it onto my list because they built strong personal brands. As in they are known for ONE thing. (More or less. It seems when creators meet big goals, they expand their focus.)
Why is branding important?
- It gets you on recommendation lists like this one.
- It helps you stand out in a crowded market.
- It builds trust and authority over time, opening doors to partnerships and new opportunities. And a stronger creator persona.
Want to stand out? Get clear on your branding and strategic positioning early in your creator career.
How to Make a Million Dollars: The First Step?
What do all these income streams have in common? An email list. Building and nurturing an email list is the heart of a successful creator businesses. Without an email list, you will always battle a major deficit.
ConverKit For the Win
ConvertKit (soon to be Kit) is my email provider of choice and I recommend it highly for all Gen Xers. It has a robust support team, lots of easy-to-follow tutorials, and even the occasional training webinar. Plus you can collect up to 10,000 names free of charge. Great deal, right?
What About Social Media
Social media can help grow attention for your products & servicesâbut it doesnât have to be your main focus. Especially as you are starting out.
It is Not Just About MAKING $1MM
Itâs Also About Keeping Your Money
The challenge with building a million-dollar-creator career isn’t just about making lots of money; itâs about managing that money wisely. (And saving more than you spend.)
Yes, a million dollars sounds lovely, but be mindful of the fact that taxes, business expenses will quickly eat away at your long-term success. For financial advice, consider resources like Shay Port. Final Disclaimer
Also, this guide is for informational purposes only. It is not financial advice. Results vary, and income is never guaranteed. Always consult a financial professional for personalized advice.
Final Disclaimer
This guide is for informational purposes ONLY. It is not financial advice. Your results will vary, and income is never guaranteed. Always consult a TRUSTED financial professional for personalized advice.
It doesnât matter how many times you strike out,â wrote Mark Cuban in his book, How to Win at the Sport of Business: If I Can Do It, You Can Do It. âTo be a success, you only have to be right once. One single time and you are set for life.â.