We were lucky to catch up with Quentin Allums recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Quentin thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. The first dollar your business earns is always special and we’d love to hear how your brand made its first dollar of revenue.

When I got my first client, I had no idea what I was doing or how to get clients. So I created an offer (I don’t even think I knew what that word meant at the time) where I would grow a Twitter account by 1000 followers in 14 days. I only charged $10. My first client wrote me a check for $10 and that was one of the best days of my life. I grew that account and bought myself a coffee with the money. When I was just starting though it showed me that I could do this. I could sell something. Without that I don’t think I ever would have built an agency, or stepped on stages to speak, create content online, or gone onto coach creators and entrepreneurs (what I’m doing now). I needed to know I could do it.

Quentin, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I was one of the very first LinkedIn video creators. I used the platform to go from starving entrepreneur, to a “star.” Organizations flew me out to speak at their events. I got to work with some of my dream clients: Snapchat, LinkedIn, Heineken, Lewis Howes, and so many more. After my agency I became a fulltime creator. I used to run experiments like: Can I make $1 million in a year. Or can I make $10k from my first digital product. Or what happens when we get 30 strangers in a room to talk about mental health.

Then I burnt out. My little brother passed away. Covid happened. I closed down my video agency. I realized that I didn’t like who I had become and I didn’t align with what I was creating anymore. So I disappeared for a year. That year sucked. But it was also very eye opening for me and helped me get clarity.

Now I do 1:1 coaching for two types of people.

1. B2B Creators that want to make more money without working themselves back into a job that they hate. They are currently doing $5k mrr – $30k mrr.
2. Business Owners wanting to build a personal brand. They are currently doing $30k mrr – $100k mrr within their business.

I also just started a newsletter [the $30k /mo Blueprint] where I coach 3 entrepreneurs (for free) to $30k a month in real time and share the lessons along the way.

What sets me a part is that I’ve lived the creator life. I’ve either been where my clients are, or coached someone who has. So I know exactly what it takes to build a $30-$80k mmr creator business (or how to monetize a personal brand).

I’m most proud of being able to reinvent myself and to keep moving forward when things get really tough. I’ve been a creator (and been behind other creators) for my whole adult life. I’m really enjoying HOW I’m doing my work now.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

When I was just starting my agency and my personal brand was first taking off – I was invited to speak at VidCon. I was so excited, but I had no money to get there. A client of ours was behind on their invoice and we needed to be able to pay for two tickets (myself and my business partner).

We hosted an event two days before I was supposed to be there. It was a paid workshop. I stayed up all night planning it and sending out personalized 1:1 invites for people. We sold out of that event. Our client paid the invoice. And we made just enough money to get there and back. A friend picked us up in San Diego and drove us to Anaheim, CA. We ended up sleeping on another friends hotel floor and the that week I spoke at the event.

How did you build your audience on social media?

This is a part of what I do for a living now. So I’ll tell you what I did and then I’ll share what I would do now if I were starting again.

What I did:

– I created videos on just about every platform: Snapchat, YouTube, AskWhale (y’all don’t even know what that one is :P), Instagram, LinkedIn, etc.
– I created over 500 videos before anyone really noticed me. I talked aobut my life and what I was doing to build my business.
– Eventually I became the LinkedIn video guy but I hated being known for that, so I never really leaned into it as hard as I should have.
– I shared content around my life, personal branding, and community building. Sometimes around entrepreneurshiop.
– Eventually I started doing experiments like i mentioned before.
– A big driver for the success that I had was that I focused on building communities. We did in person events, but we also had a Facebook group.
– It got to the point where i was recognized all the time. People would stop me when I was out to lunch, at the airport, at events, etc.
– Most of my leads came from my content. My co-founder and I did do some cold outreach as well.
– It was great but it went to my head.

If I were to do it again:

– I would start with what I wanted to do. What did I want my life to look like? What did I want to create? Why? Who am I and why am I and what sets me apart? Who would that content be for? Etc. These are the most important questions. Because if something is not aligned then it can lead to unhappiness, burnout, or feeling like you’re constantly running on a treadmill. Being a creator is amazing but an issue that I see a lot of people run into is that there are so many ways to win. And because there are so many options people get stuck or they try to do too much.
– I’d build a niche audience (aligned with the above answers). And I’d figure out how I was going to sell to them. I only do B2B personally. This could be via a community, a webinar, email sequences, via dms, ads, etc. I’d keep optimizing my sales process. Then I’d scale that up as needed (if applicable). Niche is a lot easier to sell something to. There are people making millions off of communities / followings under 10,000 people.
– Once I felt I was clear and aligned and knew what I wanted to create: I would find a way to make money/generate leads that was aligned with those answers. I would keep it simple and go all in on my content and making money. Here’s what I currently do. I do 1:1 coaching and I have a newsletter that is for the people I coach (but at an earlier stage – it allows me to showcase what I can do as a coach). I create when I want to because I don’t want to HAVE to create content to make money. I have a simple cold sales strategy on LinkedIn that gets me leads. And then the content I create also gets me leads. I built a notion sales page (super simple because I am lazy). I take a sales call with those leads and close. And eventually I’ll open up sponsored slots for my newsletter. But that’s it. I have a sales system and I create content. You don’t have to do a bunch of stuff to make money. You just have to do 1 or 2 things really well. But make sure those things are aligned with your answers above. If I had to create daily on YouTube I don’t think I would be able to do it at this stage of my career. If I had to spend hours engaging with a community on a webinar or challenge, I wouldn’t be able to do it. But I can create around my coaching, send messages every day, and hop on sales calls.
– Give yourself as many shots on goal as you can. Meaning create a bunch of content and learn. The more you create, the more chances you have. Keep improving. But make sure you’re having fun with it too. :)
– Content wise there are a lot of clues out there in terms of what could work for you. So make a list of your favorite creators, or favorite pieces of content, and ask yourself what you like about them. If you don’t have a “style” yet then I would start there. Remix all of those things that you like and just keep creating.
– If what you create is needed, then you will have an easier time growing. I’m also a big fan of using concepts to speed up growth. Things like “Can I make $1million in a year?” Or “can I reach X rank in a video game?”

Contact Info:

• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tagjustq/
• Other: LinkedIn is NOW the only platform I use. But I still have old accounts. TikTok being the main one.