Bootstrapping a niche newsletter in 2022

Hi Everyone,

So I recently started working full-time in crypto and got really into it.

Previously I worked in the music industry for about 10 years. I wrote songs professionally initially then worked corporate at a major music company (with artists like bieber, taylor swift etc.).

Anyways, in the pandemic I learned to code and the music company I was at sponsored me to become the internal blockchain expert. Basically paying for me to learn how to code apps on Ethereum so I could project manage music NFT projects for our writers.

Long story short the company went public in the fall and they stopped all web3/crypto projects. I decided to leave music and try to get into crypto.

I always loved to be creative. Whether it's music or art or more recently coding.

While I was working I built 3 profitable side businesses in the music space. They are essentially all passive income. One I exited during the pandemic (sold it), one I still hold and profits as much as a full-time job, and another I closed as it honestly wasn't a very good business.

When I left music to join the crypto industry I didn't have any connections or know anyone in the industry. I just started applying to 1 job a day regardless of what the company was. Subscribed to job boards and basically just kept applying and let that create momentum.

I interviewed at most of the major crypto companies; Crypto.com, Blockfi, Avalanche, Opensea etc.

I paid someone to rework my resume.

I learned so much going through the process. Now I work at a crypto VC. We invest in early stage crypto native projects; wallets, exchanges, scaling solutions etc. We invest pretty heavily in the space.

Through this I now see both sides. Working with founders that we invest in I hear about their hiring problems. There are a lot of companies hiring, they just don't feel many of the interviewees are properly educated. Crypto educated, not college educated. So they tend to rely on web3 focused recruiters to do the initial scouting process.

They want prospective employees to know how crypto works and have their own perspectives to bring to the table.

Through this experience I built close relationships with web3 focused recruiters, executives and investors.

I decided to team up with a buddy who also works in the space and we created goremotecrypto.com.

1. Starting the project

It was originally called WorkWebThree.com. The concept was to start as a job board. To get the initial proof of concept we created a landing page with subscription sign up through GoDaddy. Ran about $47 in Google ads to it and got some sign ups. Nothing too impressive, about 8. We noticed a lot of people were clicking the ad on Google, not many were entering their email.

So we built a site, the thesis was maybe they want to see the website first before subscribing.

2. Pivoting

We went on Themeforest and bought a job board theme for wordpress. Spent about 2 weeks reworking the theme to fit the brand and sourced listings from the Careerjet and Indeed API.

We ran another $25 in google ads and got 0 sign ups. The site was obviously not converting very well. We also added an exit intent. Got 2 signups.

Some people say you gotta give the algorithm time but this is bootstrapped and when I built other bootstrapped businesses in the past you can tell almost immediately that they're working. Call it instant gratification, call it what you want. I like internet businesses that move.

We tried reworking the site over the next week. Adding the subscriber input in the banner, changing text and landing page layout, still nothing. We had about a 70% bounce rate as well. This was not good.

3. Pivoting again

We've identified interest in the Google Ad. A lot of people are clicking it. It's apparent the website is not converting. We decided to pivot again.

Did some keyword research and saw Remote Crypto Jobs is relatively untapped and untargeted. Since crypto is in a bear market, if we can build by targeting that keyword and can get some subscribers that are interested in that niche, we can most likely get a lot of momentum when/if the market comes back at some point (even if in a few years). We just need momentum right now with the crypto die hards.

We are changing the value prop to reflect what we can uniquely bring to the table.

An exclusive free community called Go Remote Crypto. Basically it’s starting as a newsletter where we will handpick high paying remote crypto jobs from great companies and circulate them via email. We’ll be bringing on executives and recruiters to do interviews talking about how to get hired in web3. We will also be providing tips on how to best get a job in crypto, from our experience. It’s designed for crypto power users that are serious about working in crypto and are qualified.

We're looking to build this out to create a free community where people can connect and lean on us for resources; recruiters, introductions, education etc.

This project is now seeking to teach you how to get a job in crypto, for free. We'll show you what worked for us vs. didn't work for us in our newsletter. How your resume should look etc. We'll interview employees from major crypto companies to hear about how they got their remote crypto jobs too.

4. Testing it: GoRemoteCrypto.com

We posted it on Twitter and got some subscribers.

We then ran Twitter ads to see if they would work (most of crypto lives on twitter). Nothing. People liked the post but noone signed up through the link.

We're now testing Google Ads. Should know in the next 24 hours if they are working.

We're looking as a backup to engage NFT communities and projects directly to open up exclusively for them for a short period to allow them to apply.

Maybe that will work.

Curious to hear everyones thoughts if you have any! Tips, tricks etc.

Excited to see how it all plays out. Fun times!

Ryan