Excited to announce that we have hit 1,100 subscribers of The Community.

This is more than a 100% increase in growth week over week when we announced hitting 500 last week.

The first 500 of you, I reached out to personally on social. After that, I added in email for scalability. It worked (and I’ll share specifics in an upcoming issue).

You all were asked to be here for a reason. 

You are some of the most forward-thinking founders and GTM leaders in the game. 

This newsletter has been created to challenge the status quo and provide playbooks, gameplans, strategies, tactics, and thought-provoking ideas to help you build communities that grow brands.

I also encourage you to directly reply and share your feedback and experiences, so we can grow together.

Update: Influenced by today’s big idea ‘The Rise of the Solopreneur’, I decided to recalibrate the ‘3 tech tools’ section to be a feature of ‘3 solopreneurs’ in The Community that companies should work with.

The goal is to build community through this newsletter and make both our readers and the companies they will be working with money (by hiring the best talent)!

Excited for today’s chapter, let’s dive in!

The Big Idea

The Rise of the Solopreneur & Impact on GTM

Since launching RevGenius (coinciding with the start of COVID-19), I’ve watched the role of the company employee shift tremendously.

Where there once was a sole focus on growing the company and maximizing earnings, they were increasingly becoming disenfranchised and looking for other ways to earn income.

Along with the rise of creators and influencers, building of personal brands, and monetizing expertise, there was now more opportunity for a lot of people to do just that - replace their income.

People in B2B capitalized. 

Now instead of wanting to learn how to sell better or manage better, these folks wanted to learn how to run a business, get more clients & brand deals, launch courses, and maximize their earnings away from their core job.

Some kept their solopreneurship as a side hustle, while others went full-time.

Regardless, this is a major shift in the community.

And one, that I frankly don’t think has been integrated well enough (if at all) into a company’s GTM.

The rise of the solopreneur and their new place in the b2b go-to-market landscape intrigues me and should be watched & harnessed.

Here are some stats:

• 41.6% of solopreneurs have been running their businesses for less than one year. [Leapmesh]

• 80% of the 24 million small businesses in the United States are run by one-person businesses or solopreneurs. [Small Business Administration]

• 14.8% of solopreneurs are between the ages of 18 and 24. [Leapmesh]

• The number of solopreneurs is on the rise and is contributing over $1.3 trillion to the United States economy. [Fundz]

• The solopreneurship trend is expected to continue growing, with a projected 42 million self-employed individuals in the U.S. by 2026 [Statista]

How can companies leverage Solopreneurs for growth? 

“I used to have to make a choice of top-line growth or bottom-line net. 

In other words, do I pay a big salary or agency bill and spur top-line growth, or do I try to cobble together something so that I can de-risk my bank account?

 It was a tough balancing act. 

Now I don’t have to make that choice - I can get the insights and skills I need to grow without the bank account risk with solopreneurs/fractionals.”

Jenn Steele, founder of Sound GTM.

Why is this part of building community?

You now have an opportunity to work with people in the community you serve and create a mutually beneficial (and flexible for both parties) program that rewards results.

More companies should integrate this strategy into their GTM vs the equivalent hiring of dozens of full-time employees.

As you go into 2024 planning, how many of you are actually planning for the rise of the solopreneur?

2 Resources

I. Solopreneur Statistics for 2023:

John Cirelly explores solopreneur statistics for 2023. Pulled the statistics from my big idea from here (read here)

II. What the Latest Solopreneur Statistics Reveal About Going Solo:

Cheefo, Director at Connectbit, studied the solopreneurs in the United States, the average annual revenue they generate, the demographics that are characteristic of this business model, and what motivates individuals to pursue it.  (read here)

3 Solopreneurs

I. Melissa McCready

Melissa McCready is a 20+ year veteran in Go-To-Market, Customer Relationship Management, Marketing Automation, and Customer Success, today known as “Revenue/Go-To-Market/Growth Operations.” She’s worked with some incredible brands like Diffbot, Sendoso, LeanData, and others. (view her profile).

II. Karen Steele

Karen Steele is a passionate, Enterprise Cloud Marketing Executive who scales fast-growth companies and has worked with several iconic brands including VP & C-level roles at Sendoso, Near, LeanData, Marketo, VMWare and others. (view her profile)

III. Adam Jay

Adam Jay is the founder’s best friend working with early-stage founders to help them scale their sales. He’s a 7x VP of Sales with 2 successful exits under his belt. (view his profile)

Thanks for reading!

If you want to send this to friends or you received this from somebody you trust and want to subscribe, click below:

Reply to this email and let us know what you’d like to see more. And a big thank you to all who made it to this point.

Until next week,

Jared

p.s. What is one important problem you would like community to solve for you?

4 ways I can help you scale your business with Community:

1. Join RevGenius (free).

2. Community consulting for your startup or scaleup (reply for rates).

3. Be introduced to one of the solopreneurs listed here (reply).

4. Promote yourself in this newsletter + to my 40k personal following on LinkedIn (reply for rates).