AI Summary
5 min readTiago Forte, author of Building a Second Brain, built a massive online audience around productivity and personal knowledge management. But when a financial advisor ran the numbers on his entire life, the result was sobering: excluding his business, his net worth was essentially zero. Everything he had was tied up in one internet-based company. That vulnerability is driving him to explore a new set of strategic moves—acquiring physical businesses, entering Hollywood, and licensing his intellectual property to the corporate world—that most online creators never consider.
The Creator's Hedge: Acquiring a Boring Business
Forte is drawn to the idea of buying a small, cash-flowing business that is completely uncorrelated with the internet. He sees it as a hedge against a world where online platforms become less dependable. "It's dangerous to live that way," he says of having all his eggs in one digital basket. The key insight is that his audience—hundreds of thousands of people who trust him—is a multi-purpose asset. It is not just for selling courses. It can be "plugged into an established business that already has operations that just needs more clients."
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What you'll learn
- 1 (00:00) **Lead Magnet Strategy in Books** - Tiago explains why he included a lead magnet in *Building a Second Brain* to grow his audience and sell courses.
- 2 (02:57) **Acquiring a Small Business to Diversify** - Tiago shares his interest in buying a small business as a hedge against his internet-based income.
- 3 (05:55) **Using Audience as an Unfair Advantage** - The host suggests Tiago leverage his half-million follower ecosystem to supercharge a boring business.
- 4 (07:58) **The "Brick" Device as a Business Idea** - The host pitches Tiago on buying 30-50% of the Brick, a physical device that turns smartphones into focus mode.
- 5 (13:28) **Creator Equity Deal Structure** - The host outlines how Tiago could negotiate a partnership with Brick's founders, raising money from his network instead of using his own capital.
- 6 (18:20) **Underutilizing a Large Email List** - Tiago realizes he has 140,000 email subscribers with 50% open rates but few products to offer them.
- 7 (24:20) **Exploring TV as a Medium for Ideas** - Tiago discusses how a Hollywood agency reached out to adapt his books into a TV show, exciting him as a new creative frontier.
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Show Notes
I'm joined by Tiago Forte, Founder at Forte Labs and bestselling author of ‘Building a Second Brain’ and The ‘PARA Method’. We talk about the necessity of building credibility online, the role of gatekeepers in information sharing, and why the B2B market could be a goldmine for online course creators.
We cover the benefits (and drawbacks) of being an independent creator, how to leverage the media platforms of the world to your advantage, and why you need lead magnets.
00:00 Why Creators NEED to diversify.
08:09 Cool non-Internet business ideas.
11:41 Using a dumb phone - the ultimate productivity hack.
22:30 The future of tech in 2024.
25:15 Is Tiago Forte really creating a TV show?
34:37 Multi-million dollar opportunities in B2B markets.
38:00 Free B2B business ideas.
44:02 Why you should stop building businesses in competitive spaces.
51:15 Book recommendation: "Signs: Secret Language of the Universe" by Laura Lynn Jackson.
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