Building Better Developers: An interview with Amy Harrop

Welcome to Building Better Developers, the developer podcast where we work on getting better step by step professionally and personally. Let's get started. Well, hello and welcome back. We are starting a new interview this episode and we're speaking with Amy Harrop. We're going to talk about side hustles a little bit more. We're going to get into some opportunities, some specific ways that you can take some of your content and even take, we'll say hobbies and things like that and find ways to turn those into a nice little side hustle. She has courses and some training that she does, but really we're going to spend this discussion talking about some of the ways that you can go out and utilize tools that already exist, templates that already exist, things like that and get going and get something started. It's sort of the beginning of a year and even if it wasn't, actually depending on whenever you're listening to this, I guess it could be any time of the year, but today is the best day for you to start something if you haven't already. And hopefully this will be an episode where it gets you motivated a little bit, get some of those juices flowing, get you thinking about how you can get a side hustle started, get going and utilize some of the things out there to improve your odds for success. I don't want to take too much away from her, so let's get started with our conversation with Amy Harrop. All right, so today we are here with Amy Harrop, who has a pretty much a career of dealing with digital books and publishing and has spent a good deal of time on the technology side of publishing and putting together content, marketing that, using online marketing and those sorts of tools that basically are par for the course for modern business and any, whether it's a side hustle or even a primary business, these are the kinds of things that just show up often enough that I think this will be an incredibly good conversation with Amy. I don't want to set the bar too high, but hey, she is exactly living in the kind of stuff that we talk about on a regular basis. And I think we'll see a lot of, be ready to take notes because I think we'll have a lot of great items that will come out of this conversation. So I'm sort of limited in what I can do, and I always find that it is best for someone to introduce themselves in their own words. So we also get a little bit of a feel for their personality and sort of their background. So I will throw this out to you and allow you, Amy, to tell us a little bit about yourself. Well, thanks, Rob. And thanks for having me here. I'm also looking forward to and excited about this conversation. Those are the types of things I do really enjoy sharing with people. So as Rob mentioned, my name is Amy Harrop and I actually live in North Idaho. I lived near Coeur d'Alene, which is a resort town. So sort of between Coeur d'Alene and Spokane, Washington. And I've lived up here for about 10 years with my husband and my two cats. So I have a pet family and we often say we have cats, not kids. But I've been, I guess you could say running my own business for quite a long time now. I do have a background both in sales and teaching. And a number of years ago, I left teaching because I just felt it was very limited, but I really did enjoy a lot of aspects of that. And I brought that into working on developing online businesses and, as you mentioned, focusing on content. One of the things I think is super exciting and that's part of the reason I got with this is I got really jumped in full time about 10 years ago with this, about 10, 12 years ago, because it was really at the time that Amazon released the Kindle and Amazon put this whole thing about anybody could self publish. And I just think that's just really exciting. And it was actually at the forefront of the trend because what ended up happening is that people could actually bypass all those gatekeepers. So you didn't have to send your manuscript and have it sit in what was called the slush pile to some agent where maybe nobody would even read it. You didn't have to go through a publishing house. Anybody could publish. Now, of course, we have this thing now where we have so much content needs to get curated and we have to wade through it, which is, you know, I think brings up other opportunities as well. But when I first got started, I saw the there were things there that normal people could actually use technology and bypass and get their content out there. First, it was books. And then I've started working with a lot of other content formats as well and probably will continue to do so as technology continues to develop. So that leads to just starting right off from that. So what are some of the other content platforms you use and are there? Maybe talk a little bit like the strengths or the and the weaknesses of those or maybe you have like a favorite. Sure, sure. So I really got started with Amazon and their KDP platform, which is, of course, is still huge and growing strong today. But the last about three years ago, I really pivoted to helping people explore and publish on what I like to call low and no content types of products. And a lot of those are things like printables, downloadable content, educational printables as well, things like actual what are called low content books on Amazon, things like puzzle books, journals, planners. And so one of the platforms I've pivoted more to recommending to my customers and the people that I work with has been Etsy, which has had huge growth. It's not as huge as Amazon, but you know what is. And but there is has been a lot of growth there because a lot of times I think people think, oh, Etsy, it's just like handmade items and things like that. But Etsy is actually this huge and growing marketplace where you can sell and create and publish a lot of digital downloads and also things that are also print on demand, too. So and one of the more exciting things now that I think is happening is also looking at some of the technology that allows people to do more with print on demand, looking at sites like even more art focused sites like Redbubble and Society6 where you don't have to be necessarily a fine artist, but you can actually create visual content that people want to purchase on products and things like that. Yeah, I would be one of those people that had no idea that you would put that Etsy would be a place to put content like that. That's that in itself is quite an eye opener for me because I'm the same way I always assumed it was really more like handmade items and crafts and things of sort of like an Internet craft fair as opposed to having things like digital downloads and that kind of content. That's an interesting area to go explore. Definitely the print on demand, like your Redbubble's and that I stumbled across that years ago as my daughter is on the artsy side of stuff. And it was something I think it was a teacher actually recommended at the end of a year. Students had done just as they typically do. They had a whole bunch of stuff that they did and they recommended it or something along those lines at the end of the year and said, hey, you can you can go out, you can publish the take whatever you like out of their artwork and as long as you can upload it to them, then they can put it on whatever it is you want to put it on. I actually ended up doing it not as a business, but more as just a it was a unique Christmas gift. I was able to take a picture that my daughter had done of her and some friends that was very cartoonized or whatever that she had put together and threw it on a couple of coffee cups and so that she has she now has a coffee cup with her own personal art on it. And those things are to me have been just incredibly simple to step into. The process seems like it's almost a no brainer. Not only is you refer to like a low content kind of thing, but it also seems like it's a typically a sort of low a very low barrier to entry. Is that where you're why you're you're pushing people that way is to really sort of say, hey, let's get it in front of people quickly. Yeah, I definitely think that having that low barrier to entry is helpful for people because it helps them build the confidence. Now, again, I think the downside to that can be that things can get oversaturated. And so that's where things like keyword research and niche research and putting together compelling listings in terms of putting that in front of the people who want to buy it. So matching in with the audience, that's where that more that more comes into play. But I really do firmly believe that with today's technology and tools, pretty much anybody, if they want to put forward a little bit of effort and consistency, can actually create a part time income. And I do think working on things that don't necessarily require a lot of writing or a lot of time and preparation, but can still be good quality or can be a really good way to get started, because not everybody is going to want to put together a business proposal or become a startup and get funding and do all that sort of stuff. So I think this is a great way for just the average person to get started with building an online income or a side hustle if they want to call it that. So is that where you have somebody comes to you and says, Hey, I love this idea. Where do I get started? You sort of start them on the research path to figure out what makes sense and where you can find your niche? Or is there a different approach that you take? Well, I specialize in offering courses for people that are in the lower price range. I really try to keep them under, you know, like under $50. Most of my courses are like 20 to $30. And I give them like a starter pack in many cases where I talk about a popular area or niche they can get started in. I share a lot of examples. I show how, you know, what specific sub niches they can go right away in. And then in many cases, depending on what other type of content it is, I'll actually give them templates. So it's an implementation. They do need to edit them and make them their own. But there are, of course, you know, tech speaking technology, there are tools that are easy to do with that. So it's, that's more what I focus on. Yeah. So people can get started because as we all know, it's easy to have information overload and just sort of flounder around and not do anything. So I focus on making it easier for people to get their first listing on Etsy or to get their first book up on Amazon without having to spend, you know, hundreds of hours just trying to put something together. Yeah. And that's, that is definitely a rabbit hole. I think you can go down and in my own self publishing experience, there's been, you know, times where it was, there was a lot of time spent walking through all of the, and this is the early, you know, create space, KDP days where there's, there's a lot you could put into it. You spend a lot of time, but also they've, they've streamlined a lot of that. And so I think that's a good way to do it. And I think that's a good way to do that now so that you can, you know, if you're particularly particularly use some of the templates and things like that, that are available, it seems like you can, you can turn that kind of stuff around fairly quickly and have sort of a, almost like a made to order kind of packaging so that you, you can focus on, spend the time to get your content together and then, you know, sort of run it through the system as it were, and get a pretty decent product out on the other end. Yeah. I think that's really true. And I think, you know, as if people want to grow, like you said, that's a good point. Systemization, I think is important, you know, having, having a system, having consistency. I mean, one of the things I see with people, and I don't do tons of individual coaching, but with some of the people I do, or just with the people I work with, you know, with my customer base is the being inconsistent, like, oh, okay, I'm going to spend, you know, a bunch of time on a weekend doing something, and then I'm not going to do anything for three months. I think it's much better to say, okay, I'm going to spend, you know, a half hour or two or three times a week and do something and get the system down, you know, and then you can start putting out work regularly, because a lot of those platforms too, they really reward people for being consistent. I mean, we know YouTube does, you know, like YouTube wants to see you release videos regularly, and like Etsy, you know, like a storefront, they want to see that you have new items in your store. And Amazon, of course, has like tools and author tools where you can, you know, have people see, like everything that you have, and it makes it easier to make sales and things like that. So yeah, I definitely think, I mean, I guess there's always a sort of teeter totter between quality and time, you know, because you know, it's about you want to put out good quality work, we don't want to be, I don't think like branding out stuff that nobody wants or that isn't very good. But I do think there's a sweet spot there where you can put out things that people want or in demand without having to spend hours and hours and hours. And of course, that can decrease over time because of those systems. Yeah, that's something that we push pretty regularly. We talk about a lot is having that consistency. Even if it is 15 minutes a day or something like that, that's an hour and a half a week, essentially, that you can add to whatever it is that you're working through. And if you've got something that's, you know, that's not overly burdensome on time, then you can steadily put out regular streams of content or update products and things of that nature. And I think it's almost a sort of a fallacy. I think people think that there's this passive income stream that people can generate is, you know, like you said, you sort of like you crank it out for an hour or two on a weekend, you spend some time, you go heads down, you knock it out, and then you never think about it again. And it just magically has, you know, generates income from there on out. And it's never that simple. There's always that level of, you know, you got to go back and you got to spend a little time and time and care and give it a little love from time to time to keep it up to date and to make sure that you're following up on potential leads and working with affiliates and all the kinds of things that you can do to keep it fresh and keep it in front of people instead of just like, Hey, here it is. And then, you know, they're going to forget about it a week later. You've got to have that be as close as possible to front of mind for people when they come around to saying, Hey, I want to get X, whatever it is that you're producing. Right. I think those are all really good points. And, you know, I was thinking too, and you said that it's like the 80-20 rule. Well, 20% of your products or whatever you're doing might be making most of your impact or your sales, but you're not going to really know that until you have a body of work and you start seeing what's actually people are responding to and what's actually selling. And it's difficult to do that if you only have like one or two things. So having that body of work grow, it's going to allow people to grow their income, even if it's only maybe 20% of what they have out there is really making more of the sales. That's true. That's very important. It's hard to figure out which part of the 80-20 you're in, if you've got one product, you know, it's like, is this the best I'm going to do or is this the worst I'm going to do? And of course everybody does it best the first time. So, you know, it's usually going to be better to give yourself a couple of attempts at it. So with your processes then, are you really pushing people more to find a steady stream of content and products that they can deliver or is it more getting them on that, getting them that first step, you know, that like, it's like the first book on KDP or the first thing on Amazon or the first thing on Etsy or is it more building to the point where they can get that first thing, but then also the second and third and the fourth? I would say a steady stream because I really do release products semi-regularly, you know, and I also have a membership that people can join where they can get like a new niche geared a bit more toward Etsy and templates each and every month. So I just, I do have a bit of a focus more, I suppose, for beginners to intermediate people. You know, the types of products I put together at that like under $50 level aren't really geared necessarily for highly advanced people unless they just want to get the templates, but it's just to help people sort of not have to be thinking so much about what I need to do next or what to sell. It gets rid of a lot of that indecision, you know, and it's not, you know, it's not magic, it's probably no, it's not like a crystal ball. I mean, I often look at trends and what's actually already selling and then looking at look at competition as well and see where there are pockets where people can be successful in and then gear, you know, the training and the templates I'm providing to people toward that. But I definitely don't have like, oh, it's the model I use is not a one and done or nor is it like a flagship program where people come in and spend a ton of money and that's all they need. I tend to do more like this is a good one. If you want to jump in, here's the information. Here's, you know, a couple months later, I might put something else out. Here's something else. That's also doing well if you want to do this. So that's what I tend to do more of. Oh, that's good to know. Yeah. And that seems to be more sustainable and also particularly, because as you mentioned, it's more for people to have like a side hustle or something like that, where you don't want it to take up. It's just, it's not possible to have it take up, you know, a 40 hour work week. It's something where you've got to be able to put a little time in it and then let it go as opposed to, you know, be, you know, 720, 24 by 7 working on it and turning it into something that is, you know, essentially a flagship product, because you're not going to get those, those just don't come easily. They don't come quick. You know, they've got bigger sales cycles just like you said, it's, if somebody's going to be sold on a $50 tutorial or a class versus a $5,000 class, that is a whole different approach and, you know, expectations and everything else are very different to them. And, you know, sometimes you just, I think you just don't want to bite off that, you know, that bigger piece, particularly for something that's just, you know, something that's more, you know, like a hobbyist or a side hustle kind of an approach. Right. Exactly. And, you know, I've, as I know you have too, I've been in this business a long time and I do get, it kind of cracks me up sometime when you do see people and they're often high end coaches sort of pushing the high ticket model. I mean, I think it's a good model, but it is just one of the many models out there. It's not the only model that people need to do or be in. So, you know, sometimes I think that's funny. Yeah, I agree. I mean, I, I have often gone sort of pushed back on that to somebody, I wish I could remember where I stumbled across this a couple of years ago. It was a lady that did sewing patterns. She loved to sew and all she did was cranked out. I think she did like once a month, she would have a new sewing pattern that she would put out. And it wasn't, you know, it's not some business that's going to generate six or seven figures, but it was, you know, I think a couple of grand a month or something like that. And that was, yeah, there was no, she didn't worry about advertising or anything like that really, other than just very basic low end stuff. And, you know, you're for advertising, you're not going to spend the same amount for knitting patterns as you are if you're selling cars or food or something like that. You know, it's, so it worked out really well that it was a, it was a perfect hobbyist kind of site. And it was something she did anyways. Yeah. That's like, I think in a lot of cases, that's the best thing is if you can find something that you're, you're more or less doing it anyways, or it's fun to you, and you happen to make some money out of it, then, you know, who isn't going to like that? I mean, I don't know how you can turn that away. I agree. I think that's a great thing to keep in mind. And I think that also does lend itself well to things like digital downloads or print on demand. You know, if you're, you know, if you're a dog owner and you love labs or whatever, you know, you could do all kinds of merchandise and printables that are related to people who have labs. I mean, you know, it's just, and that could be like what you get started with. So that enthusiasm and that interest can carry into the beginning stages. And then if you want to branch out, you could do other types of dogs or, you know, whatever. So yeah, I think, I think that's a really good point. Yeah. And so that actually leads into how did you, since you obviously have this, this sort of focus that, hey, you know, we can keep it simple. It can be something that you enjoy and it's something that you want, you know, you need to maintain. So obviously it's going to be easier to continue to do it if you enjoy it. So how did you get into this area? Basically, you start out teaching and sort of developed along the way. So how did you, you know, what was there some, maybe a turning point, or is it just over time you realize what, you know, what you really want to do and where you're, you know, we'll call it your calling was. Well, it's actually, I suppose, a bit convoluted. I have a degree in actually film. I went to San Francisco state, and I have a bachelor's in film production. And I moved down to Los Angeles after I graduated and I worked in the film industry for a while. And while I enjoy movies and love movies, I didn't really like working in the film industry. I mean, you know, there's a, I mean, it's not the only thing, but you know, like there's a reason why me too became so popular. I think particularly the lower level people in the film industry, it's just a tough place to be, you know, so I didn't particularly enjoy that, although I love movies. And so I got out of that and I just sort of started bouncing around doing different things. I liked, I did enjoy a lot of sales. I did a lot of sales work, particularly phone sales. I liked being able to sell people without having a hard sell and also, you know, being able to connect people with things that can benefit them. And that's, I think really what sales sales is. So that was great because that just brought with me sort of this, using a fear of being judged, you know, or diminishing that and feeling comfortable being in a sales space, you know, like asking for a sale, like offering something and asking for money. And I know that sounds basic, but I do think sometimes people get hung up on that. They don't feel comfortable with that. So I did that different things. And then I got into teaching cause I was getting to be my, probably hit my early thirties. And I thought, well, I kind of need to maybe think about more of a career. And I thought, well, maybe that would be good. And I worked at a really great district. I actually taught upper level, like AP level high school English and things like that, but I just really felt that the pay wasn't there and it was a lot of work. And I thought, well, you know, I like doing some of this stuff, but what can I leverage my skillset in? And I will tell you that one of the sort of the bridge things I did was in terms of jumping into completely working for myself was when I lived in Southern California, I actually got involved in selling used books on Amazon. And that was a lot of fun. Southern California is a great place to pick up used books because there was lots of estate sales and there's lots of libraries and there's lots of wealthy people where you can, you know, find books that are signed by like celebrities and collectible books and things like that. There's universities, you can go to universities. So I love reading and I love books. And that's probably also one of my sort of backgrounds with that. So that got me into working on Amazon and doing the used books. And that was fun, but I also still very much felt like it was trading time for money because you still had to go out and get the books, you know, and do that. And I wanted to find something where I didn't have to do that as much. And also I wanted to not be so location dependent because my husband and I wanted to move out of California. I know you live in California, it's just getting expensive and it's not super friendly to business owners, I don't think, with taxes, especially small business owners. So we wanted to move and that's again, sort of circling back to what I was talking about at the beginning. That's when Amazon released the Kindle. And I started delving into that and seeing what was happening with that space and just thinking, you know, I bet a lot of people want to publish to the Kindle, but they're just kind of lost or they publish something and this still of course happens today and then nobody knows about it or finds it or reads it. So I put together a very low cost course on free sort of promotional methods that people could use to promote their books and mentioning some of the tools that Amazon had available to do that. And that really just started that. I got a lot of great feedback and people were buying it and it just, that just kicked me off into wanting to develop more courses and just really grow what doing that as a business. Yeah, that is a, you say it's convoluted, but I'd say it sort of makes sense too. It was one of those that it's, there's definitely, you can see the sort of the logic is that that progresses, although it is, you know, it's interesting to start with film and then get progress from there. Cause like, wow, that, I think most people have a very different assumption when you start there and especially out in California, you're like, okay, it's basically Hollywood and all of that. And people have this view of the film industry and then to say, oh yeah, here's where I went. But it does make, it makes a lot of sense. And of course, along the way you touched on what I've started to think more. It's almost like Amazon's almost like a gateway drug for side hustles and entrepreneurs. It seems like everywhere I turn, somebody will say, well, hey, I did this thing and found out that I can go, you know, basically either, you know, salvage or get something secondhand or do a little research and find something at a better deal, sell it on Amazon. And then suddenly, you know, you've, you're basically, you're, you're making money. You've got a little business business running that's, you know, that's been enabled as you know, you're especially when you go to the some of the backend stuff and the services that Amazon provides, there's, there's a lot of stuff there where you can, you know, you used to have to be, it's just like self publishing, I guess it used to have to have like, you know, get through all these gatekeepers. You had to do all of these things to get to a point where you had somebody that offered you the platform for products and, you know, or your books or whatever it was. And now it's, it's really, it's just there because of the, the size of Amazon and how they've approached it. You don't have to, you don't have to be that person. You know, you can be, yeah, I don't know how many people are, how many Stephen Kings and people of that nature are going to have that have come through self publishing, but I know there are some, and there are several that are, you know, maybe not New York times, you know, best sellers, but they started that way. And then eventually got to the point where somebody said, Hey, you know, we're, we need to be publishing person. We don't need to have them do it on their own. Yeah. And it's, yeah, it's, it's becoming a pretty common story. And that seems like a really good place for us to pause. We will come back next episode and we will continue our discussion with Amy. We're going to continue looking at what's out there and talk a little bit about how the Amazon's almost like some sort of a drug dealer that like gets you in. It's like a gateway drug that gets you going. And next thing you know, you're seeing a lot of opportunities and it's a, as they call a target rich environment for you to start some sort of business, to have some business idea, get going. And it's not the only site. We just sort of pick on that a little bit, but there are many ways for you to go out there and utilize the, some of the tools are out there to write your own books, to do eBooks, to do audio stuff, to go do some sort of product, whether it's a craft kind of thing that you do by hand or whether it's something where you're buying and, you know, it's working as a reseller. There's a lot of opportunities out there. We're going to continue our discussion, talk about what's out there, what you can do and how you can maybe get started. And, you know, if you don't have an idea, get moving forward on that, or at least go find an area, you know, some places that you can, you know, maybe soak for a little bit and have some ideas come to you. That being said, we will wrap this one up. So go out there and have yourself a great day, a great week, and we will talk to you next time. We are there. And remember, just a little bit of effort every day ends up adding into great momentum and great success. Hi, this is Rob from Building Better Developers, the Develop-a-Noor podcast. We're excited to be on Alexa now. You can enable us by simply saying, Alexa, enable Building Better Developers. And we will be there ready for you every time you want to listen to your now favorite podcast. Whether we are your favorite podcast or not, we would love to hear from you. So please leave a review on Amazon.