The Way Millie Adrian Made $400K by Training aspiring social Media Influencers
Millie Adrian is on a mission to teach future social media influencers how to make money using Instagram.
Her passion for creating content started young; in 2008, she started a YouTube channel with her young brother. It lasted 9 years. "It was just for fun," she says. "We made funny videos, skits and mock-ups and tried out various ways to live our lives. ."
When she was offered a corporate job in her early twenties and was bored with the artistic opportunity that video-making gave her. So it was that she decided to give it a go Instagram blogging on the side of her work. She promoted herself as a lifestyle blogger , and posted "anything and everything," posting photos about food, fashion, travel, coffee, wine, books and her dog.
The account she used, @itsmodernmillie quickly grew and soon she was being asked many questions by the people who follow her. The followers wanted to learn why she was growing, how she was taking specific photos and why she was getting the amount of interaction. To give her followers the most relevant answers she decided to start an additional YouTube channel. Soon, teaching about Instagram was her focus.
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"My YouTube was growing, my Instagram began to expand which led to an entire snowball effect, helping more people," she explains. "I was just going to check which platform was the most successful and then go on to the platform that was successful. But they really just interacted naturally over a ."
In October of 2019, she quit the corporate world and was an all-time creator of content. Sincethen, she's accumulated an Instagram following that is 117K. She also has an YouTube channel that has 246k subscribers andhaving launched online courses in 2021 -- has enrolled 600 students and generated more than $400,000 USD. "Next year, I'd like to make seven figures," she says with a smile.
Here are 10 of the ways she made multiple six figures in her first year of selling course materials:
Skip ahead:
- Her gut instinct was the one she followed
- She has launched three courses
- She did market research in order to find the right pricing
- She developed her content in response to what her target audience wanted
- She is constantly improving the learning experience for her students.
- She was generous with her expertise
- She created a simple sales funnel
- She offered freebies for every course
- She was able to overcome burnout
- She is steady
She listened to her instincts
While working for her company, Adrian created content for Instagram as well as Youtube during the weekend. This outlet began to reignite her creative spirit, as she began to crave more time to do it.
While she loved the 9-5 work schedule however, she noticed an unsettling "gut sense" of knowing she was meant to go on. "I couldn't sleep because the inside of me told me I had the potential to dream even more," she shares. "I realized there was plenty more to offer me in the ."
She decided to quit once she was consistently making at least half of what she was earning at her previous work as a content creator for a company. "Everyone is going to have many different requirements for this transition," she says.
Once she achieved this objective, she quit her job and stepped into the world of self-employment on October 4, 2019. With a hearty following and more time on her hands, she decided that the next step in her path was an online course creation.
She also launched three different courses
Presently, Adrian has three courses: The Modern Influencer, that is her most expensive course priced at $997 USD. Email List 101, which is her mid-ticket course at $297 USD, in addition to The Reels Roadmap which is her cheapest course priced at $197 USD. Each of her courses teaches people how to grow as creators of online content, but The Modern Influencer is the one she focuses on most.
The original plan for the Modern Influencer -- which was launched in June 2021 began as a 6-week group coaching session for $597. Then, she decided to turn the group course into a 3-month one-on-1 coaching service. However, Adrian quickly realized that she wasn't in the ability to train hundreds of people one-on-one. Adrian decided to transform"The Modern Influencer into a pre-recorded class instead.
While searching for the perfect online course hosting platform She was attracted to ; she'd taken a number of online courses while a student was her favorite.
"From students' perspective, it's the easiest method of learning and easiest to master."
Apart from offering three courses, she also has additional materials available for upsells at checkout to increase sales, like Pitch Email Templates, Pitch Slide Deck Template and Kit Guide for Media, Kit Guide, and 100+ Caption Ideas.
She did market research in order to find the best price
For pricing The Modern Influencer The Modern Influencer, she conducted market research. She wanted to know the prices other creators charged for similar programs, and she compared her course to what they were offering. "I examined what other creators were teaching, and my own teaching style about," she says.
"I could never locate a class that covered brands and Instagram collaborations, and mine combined both," continues Adrian. "That's the way I learned to gauge the right cost ."
Her content was created in response to what her target audience wanted
Adrian designed her courses, not based on the things she wanted to teach, but on what other programs were not available.
She asked the audience whether they took a class on Instagram and the information they would have liked to know but did not. After that, she developed The Modern Influencer's syllabus using "brain-dumping" all the information she had into sticky-notepads. "The table was full of sticky notes" she jokes.
She organized the sticky notes starting from A to Z, covering all the information required for someone to move from having no knowledge about Instagram to being a full-time creator of content. Each A to Z topic became modulesand the other sticky notes became lessons. Though she states that her course is primarily focused on Instagram, it's constantly evolving and every year she will add more lessons. In addition, she could see her adding more lessons to YouTube and TikTok because they're what their users are asking for.
Her courses are presented in various media; she alternates between her videos, her speaking or slide show, as well as screen recordings. "It is all about the subject and how I feel the learner is most likely to absorb the material," she says.
Furthermore, her videos are completely pre-recorded and has only an occasional Q&A segment which she holds in her Facebook group.
She continually improves the experience of her students
The group on Facebook is the place where The Modern Influencer students are joined. They have lifetime access to the group and it gives them a place where students can ask any questions regarding creating content.
In addition to the Facebook page She's also played about with various strategies to keep people interested within The Modern Influencer She's considering the creation of an Modern Influencer certification to show they've taken the course and are recognized as an influencer. Plus, she wants to link those who have completed the certification with brand agreements in a list of PR. "I do not want to become an agency, but I just want to give people that next step," she says.
She also wants to give her students the opportunity to be affiliates of the class, which means that Adrian will offer students a portion of the tuition cost by referring people. "Those are just a couple of ideas we're playing with, and we'd like to come up with solid strategies next year," she says.
She was generous in sharing her expertise
Her followers are young influencers, or that is, content creators who want to become the face of their brand's online presence.
"I am not a business or anybody who doesn't want to be on camera as a majority of my strategies are about creating a personal connection with the camera's viewers," she declares.
Like her students, creating Adrian's fan base required stepping outside of her comfort zone yet, as she says, "you don't grow from places of comfort."
She says she built her audience through investing in herself and her learning. "For a long time, I was taking those free webinars and studying how other people's activities were being done," she says. "I instantly noticed a change when I started buying online courses that would yield the results I was looking for. ."
Her top tip to help content creators build their reputation is to share their ideas for what they would like to share She strongly believes that creators should avoid being guardians of information.
"Don't keep a secret about what you know, share the information you have.Once I told myself'screw it' and just started teaching everything I had learned without any goal of earning money, my audience found me."
She designed a straightforward sales funnel
Instead of being intimidated by fancy sales funnels, Adrian decided to keep it easy.
In the months leading up to when the launch of The Modern Influencer, she made a waitlist with a Google form and put the information on her website along with all of her social media channels. Then, once she launched the course, she was greeted by an enthusiastic audience who were waiting for her email.
She suggests that course designers stay clear of funnels that scare them; rather it is recommended that they create a simple funnel like waitlists so they can make leads and ensure that they have customers willing to purchase their course when it's released.
She gave away freebies to each of the courses.
The sales funnel of Adrian is now a bit more elaborate and she offers free resources that are in line with her classes. "When people download the offer or takes part in it, they'll be put in an automated email system that will then upsell them by sending them emails" she says.
For the Modern Influencer, the host of the webinar is a 60-minute one in which she will teach the 100-day Instagram strategy -which is i.e. all the steps needed to hit 10,000 followers and earn $1,000 within 100 days. When they've completed the free course, participants are upsold the program.
For her Email List 101 course, she has a free 10-page PDF that shows individuals how to begin growing and maintaining the email lists. Then, for The Reels Roadmap course, the course is free and will help people to boost the number of views, attract attention and help their reels be viewed by millions of people.
She overcame burnout
Even though Adrian's enterprise has been growing quickly but it has come at the cost of her mental well-being.
While she worked hard to get her dream job but she fell into an over-working pattern. "I was working every single minute of every single day," the woman says.
Following a series of burning out and panic attacks for several months after the first time she launched her course and she decided to employ an assistant to manage the back end of her enterprise. "If I'm not making content, my business dies," she explains.
Today, she's a digital business manager, a funnel strategist, an engaging and community expert as well as a virtual assistant video editors as well as a brand collaborations coordinator as well as an SEO expert, and a Pinterest manager. Since hiring a team, she's been able to set more personal and professional boundaries around taking care of herself. As a outcome? A greater freedom to concentrate on content creation instead of being in the weeds. "I've learned a lot about myself to not hit those tipping points again," she says.
She remains constant
One of the key points that Adrian discovered during her experience in creating content- and burnout experience -was that it's a marathon not a race. She suggests other creators adopt this approach, also, especially in avoid burnout, and creating businesses that last.
"You're doing this for the long run," she explains. "You don't need to see outcomes right away and neither do you require immediate satisfaction."
She advises makers to tackle their company every day, in tiny chunks. "It doesn't have to all be done at the same time," she adds. "This is the long-term game. If this is the thing you're trying to achieve, get 1% better every day. When you focus on it one step at a time and over three years you'll have so much more success than anybody attempted to achieve it all at once ."
The biggest achievement is getting the YouTube Play Button -- an award given to the platform's most popular channels. "It was the most complete moment of my journey," she recalls and smiles. "I wish I could go back in time and inform twelve year old Millie that those dreams she had in her heart could happen ."
Another thing she wished she could return to in time to tell herself is to be a believer in the process. If you're aspired online creator She suggests that concentrate on the outcomes that come from slow, regular growth. "Don't focus on how long it's taking you," she advises.
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