Twitter University
Online Learning doesn't talk about this enough
Those that undervalue the internet forget about this -
The Age of Online learning has finally hit its stride.
Lambda School has cracked the code on developing the next tech generation and has innovated ways of getting them jobs as soon as they graduate.
Better than Linkedin.
Better than your university career center.
Better than a recruiter.
Online courses are becoming more saturated and what makes the good ones different from the ones that transform you into the next CEO is those that take what is learned "from the field" and translates it into a process that you can use.
I've taken many of those courses. I've 'dropped out' of many of them as well because I wasn't at that stage. I've learned how to sequence these skills in order to maximize your return on each of them.
You need a portfolio before you can sell your experience. You need experience before you can build a portfolio.
The perpetual Catch-22
I've cracked the code on how to pierce through the veil of content creation and encourage you to follow the progression.
Here's how to navigate Twitter University to become the next Erik Torenberg, Nat Eliason, or Jack Butcher
A Big Note on how to accelerate your development
The first thing that you need to agree to before you start this journey is to Publish Everything. This makes it easy for your eventual audience to see the progression and connect with you at a very deep level.
If you aren't broadcasting your progress you are not giving others to help you on your journey. People love helping. Give them permission to do so.
Step 1: Speak with the confidence of Harvey Specter
Speaking is the lowest hanging fruit that most people tend to not have experience or comfort with. By speaking and recording yourself, there is synergy with #2.
For this I would recommend Performative Speaking by Robbie Crabtree. He has had skin in the game developing his speaking skills as a trial lawyer and is invested in all his students becoming better speakers.
You'll have in field experience by recording yourself and observing and learning from others. If you've learned any skill before this is key in accelerating your progress.
Key Tools
- your voice
- video camera/phone
- willingness to hear your own voice
2. Use your speaking skills to become the next Casey Neistat (in less than 40 hours a week)
Learning the basics of video editing allows you to build an audience on a video platform like YT.
For help on doing this, I recommend a few courses at different price points.
Ali Abdall's Part Time Youtuber allows you to go at your own pace or have Ali as your coach to provide feedback and develop your YT profile. It's worth the investment to have him and others review your videos. Ali has quite a following and developed it from scratch. Learn from those with skin in the game.
If you're interested in learning how to edit your own videos, I also recommend his Final Cut Pro course on Skillshare
Cam Houser's Minimum Viable Video is an alternative that is for all around application. Cam is invested in using video for everything - thank yous, cold outreach, networking, newsletters - and wants to get more people comfortable on camera. Much like performative speaking, it will get you a backlog of content once finished with the course.
Key Tools:
- Phone
- 3 Point Lighting
- lapel mic
- Video Editing - free or paid
3. Keep your audience's attention like Gary Vee by transferring your video/speaking to audio
Transferring the audio version to a podcast allows you to reach even further with little effort. You don't need a course, just a few key pieces of software and an internet connection.
Audio is underrated because it's the only long form content that is consistently listened to from beginning to end. The average blog post reading time is 4 min. The average podcast listening time is around 8-10 times that!
Your YT and speaking will help you gain a following. Your podcast will help them become your 1000 true fans.
Podcasts like the Inforium have great information on what they use and how to get started. Don't overthink it.
Talk. Edit. Publish.
Key Tools
- Mic
- Audacity
- Anchor/Podbean/Podcasting service
4. Become as cool as Nat Eliason by supercharging your written content creation
The outlines of writing can be done by using transcripts of your already recorded videos/podcasts. Then you can clean them up and produce blog posts and tweets. Additionally you can tweet at the beginning as a way of collecting your thoughts.
To figure out how to use these ideas in long and short form content Write of Passage is a great course. David leads you through building your home on the internet as well as collecting your ideas into a deliverable - posts, newsletters, and tweets.
Key Tools
- Personal Website
- Otter.ai
- Twitter/Tweetdeck
- Threadhelper
The other key part of having a transcribed video/audio ready is you can incorporate it into a note taking system that you can reference later or use to thread another idea. That's where BASB and Roam Course come in
BASB helps organize your thoughts into categories that you can reference later. At a high level you are able to see what you already know rather than trying to remember. With a backlog of things you've said and recorded already and with much of it transcribed, you can sort it by project, area, resource, or just archive it for later.
Roam is a great tool for throwing your thoughts into digital. Nat goes through a process and project that you can model yours after.
The key here is to have a backlog of content you've made. You already have an idea of what goes where and what you want to work on at this point. There is synergy of starting with content first and organizing and synthesizing later.
Key Tools
- Roam/Evernote/Notion
5. Productize yourself like Jack Butcher through stunning visual design
To learn how to present information visually, you need ideas to draw from first. Using ideas from the audio, video, writing, notes you have a backlog of snippets that you can make designs from. Visualize Value shows you how.
You can go through the course at your own pace and jump to where Jack walks through how he visualizes quotes from others. It's a very quick and dirty process that you can refine as you go.
Key Tools
- Canva
- Figma
6. Become the Wolf of Wall Street for sales (with your own products!)
By this point you have a repository of video, audio, blog posts, tweets, designs, that you can collect into a product and share with your audience. It may take a while to consolidate and make pretty, but the hardest part - creating the content - is done. If all else fails you can get someone hungry to help to do it (sometimes for the experience of just doing so).
You can productize yourself by making:
- Books of Tweets - thread templates, visualized tweets, etc
- Video Courses on your knowledge
- Create a book on a certain topic as email capture
- Collaborate with others on products
- Bundle products together
- Affiliate with existing products that you use
Once you have something to sell, you have your sandbox to learn how to sell. This is where Pitch Masters (name still in the works) from Cameron Holmes and Robbie Crabtree will help immensely.
From the moment Cam started posting his secrets to building his sales in the tens of millions, you can tell he has the in the trenches experience that you can use for your own products. Looking forward to the final product of this. In the meantime, dive through is tweet threads and reach out to him when you have questions.
Get in on the ground floor and ride the wave.
Key Tools
- gumroad
- teachable
- podia
- patreon
- stripe
Bottom Line - How much does all of this cost?
The cost of these courses can range from $500-$2500, so to simplify I will say that the average course cost is $2k. There are about 5-6 courses that you will be investing in, with personal coaching in 80% of them.
Compare that to the usual cost of an in state university of about $5k per semester and you are paying half the price while
- creating a personal brand
- developing a portfolio to share with the world
- learning the soft skills needed for ANY job
If you want the piece of paper, go and get it. I'll be writing on how to develop your portfolio in college soon.
In the meantime
I do recommend reaching out to each of the course creators mentioned to see if their course is right for you. Make the connection. Dig the well before you are thirsty.