2018 Review: A Year of Realization

It’s that time again! Every year I dedicate a couple days to reviewing my entire year, personally and professionally, so I can reflect on the health of my business, what I’m thankful for, goals I’ve accomplished, where I’ve succeeded, where I’ve experienced failure, and how I plan to move forward in the coming year.

The purpose of publishing this annual review is primarily for my own sake, but it provides the added benefit of holding myself accountable to my goals, being transparent with my students & readers, and perhaps it will provide inspiration for you to perform your own annual review!

The Theme for 2018: Realization

As I look back on 2018, I realize the theme was “realization”. In both my business and my personal life, I’ve made profound realizations and experienced deeper understandings about things I’d previously not been aware of, or had ignored. Some of the realizations I’d made deeply affected my life, my thoughts, and my actions. Some realizations were discouraging, others; very encouraging.

I’ve realized…A true sense of purpose in my life and in my business.Success doesn’t create value Success is the result of creating value.

What I’ve been doing wrong. Where my focus must be. A deeper understanding of my faith. What needs to change.

Here is a top-level summary of what you can expect in this blog post, and then we’ll jump right in!

My Body of Work

When you run your own business, it’s easy to forget what you actually created throughout the year; things get busy and you’re thinking about now and the future. So when you take some time to truly reflect on your body of work, it’s surprising to see how much you can actually do in a single year. Here are the things I created:

Products

Freelancing Freedom: Essentials Edition

This was a brand new online course I created at the beginning of 2018. It’s a short foundational course with the purpose of helping brand new freelancers launch their business and book their first paying client. It was created to fill a gap in my Freelancing Freedom offerings — an introductory low-priced course that could be purchased any time, which served those who wanted to start freelancing, but had no idea how.

I quickly created the course at the beginning of the year in just a few weeks, and launched the course every 2 weeks via a live webinar. The purpose of live launching this frequently was to test and validate the course — would anyone buy it? Is the value communicated clearly? Does it solve my students’ problem? Does it work?

After about 2 months of launching every 2 weeks, the course was validated enough for me convert it into an “evergreen” product that can be joined any time via an “on-demand webinar” (this simply means you can participate in the webinar at convenient times, as the video is pre-recorded).

Looking back, this course was a success both financially and in terms of the value it added to the students, however, I realized this course is a temporary product (we’ll jump into what I mean later on in this post).

Freelancing Freedom Masterclass

To help differentiate from the new Essentials course, my original “Freelancing Freedom Course” was rebranded to Freelancing Freedom Masterclass.

The core content remained unchanged, but the overall branding, messaging and additional value was re-vamped.

We launched the Masterclass twice in 2018. The first launch in June was simple and successful with 86 new students enrolled.

For the second launch in November, myself and my team (we’ll talk about my “team” shortly), pulled out all the stops and created the largest launch campaign I had ever done for Freelancing Freedom.

For 8 weeks prior to launch week, we published weekly blog posts, regular livestreams, arranged partnerships with other influencers in complementary niches, an expensive Facebook Ad campaign, multiple scheduled live webinars, huge goals and insane effort…

The result? 86 new students enrolled.

Granted, even though we had the same number of enrollments, our second launch invoiced 28% more sales due to increasing the “average cart value” per student. I pushed my team really hard, and by the end of the launch, we were all completely exhausted. In fact, I found myself in a “mental funk” immediately after launch… again, we’ll get into that shortly.

Web Wednesday Livestream

For a few weeks, I’d committed to doing a livestream every Wednesday to my audience on Facebook. I’d answer common web design and web development questions, do live code-along sessions, and provide advice and inspiration for new designers and developers. It was a fun experiment, and helped boost attention and signups to my website, CodeCollege.ca. The livestream recordings are still available, but I stopped doing them once my focus was called to prepare for the November Freelancing Freedom launch.

Blog Posts

I’m satisfied with how many blog posts I published in 2018, although, my publishing consistency was poor, at best… I kind of just wrote “when I felt the inspiration”, which is a lame strategy.

Although I don’t consider myself a “writer”… I write a lot. If I combine my journaling, note taking, writing scripts for courses, blogging… I write tens of thousands of words a month. The amount I write tends to have a significant effect on what I produce in my business. So, although I don’t identify as “a writer”, I write for a living… So I must step up to the plate, and do my job.

Seth Godin, one of my favourite authors, said it best on his blog and in his new book, This is Marketing:

“Writer’s block is a myth. Talkers don’t get talker’s block, they just talk. Plumbers don’t get plumber’s block, they just show up and do the work. As a writer, you must show up and write. Write like you talk. Often.”

— Seth Godin (paraphrased in my own words)

• 2017 Annual Review
• The 80/20 of Getting Started as a Freelancer
• How do I craft the perfect freelance product or service?
• The BBQ Method to building a business
• The inconvenient truth about success
• I have a Deaf student. This is about him.
• The compound effect of a small decision.
• Selfless service
• 3 reasons you shouldn’t start freelancing
• 6-figure freelancing: is it possible?
• The truth about Brad Hussey. My reaction to being called“poison” by an Internet Troll.
• 3 small tweaks to improve your life in a big way
• You’ll never be successful tomorrow(if you fail to notice you are today)

YouTube Videos

YouTube has been a wildly successful traffic source for my business. Since 2012, I’ve gone from less than 50 subscribers to more than 52,000! I publish free coding tutorials, business and life advice for aspiring entrepreneurs and freelancers. I enjoy publishing video content, and some of my audience has even mentioned wanting to “see more of [my] face”.

Serving my YouTube audience will continue to be important going forward. In 2019, I plan to focus creating more content on business and life advice for freelancers and entrepreneurs. What’s held me back from creating regular video content in the past is the time & effort required to film, edit and publish videos.

At the end of 2018, I experimented with “batching”. I spent one single afternoon filming three “uncut” videos on separate topics, uploaded them straight to YouTube, and scheduled them to publish once per week. By filming 3 or 4 videos in a single afternoon each week, and eliminating the “editing” process (which requires the most time), I can easily schedule a full year of weekly video content in one month. Challenge accepted.

Here are the videos I published in 2018:

• The 80/20 of getting started as a freelancer
• Van Halen guitar solo
• The compound effect of a small decision
• Code College free trial promotional video
• Is it possible to earn 6-figures as a freelancer?
• My reaction to being called Poison by a fellow coding instructor
• Why you should expect more of yourself
• Should your business have a blog(and why)?

Instagram

I hesitate to even put this here, as I don’t consider this my “body of work”… It’s really just me dinking around and being silly.

Some might see it as a “strategy” to expand my personal brand identity…

But really, I was just being weird.

You’ll find my #TopTipsWithBrad complete with Tap Dancing tutorials, guitar solos, random impersonations, bad accents, wood working and more.

Don’t spend too much time here. Also, don’t judge me. But enjoy.

How did I spend my time in 2018?

I use a service called RescueTime, which constantly runs in the background of my computer and tracks all of my activity on my computer. Not only does it tell me which software, websites and activities I’m using — it also organizes all of my activity into categories like “Business”, “Design”, “Learning”, “Communication”, and allows me to see how “productive” I  have been throughout the year.

It’s a really useful (and free) tool if you want to know where you’re wasting time, when you’re most productive and how to optimize your workday (get RescueTime here: https://bradhussey.ca/rescuetime).

29% of my time was spent in Design & Composition

• 50 Hours writing in Dropbox Paper
• 29 Hours editing video in ScreenFlow
• 20 Hours creating & managing course content on FreelancingFreedom.com
• 18 Hours creating course content in Keynote
• 15 Hours publishing & editing content on my blog

28% of my time in Business Activities

• 50 Hours writing, scheduling and automating email in ConvertKit
• 24 Hours planning and organizing in Trello
• 14 Hours doing Webinars in Crowdcast
• 12 Hours writing in Evernote
• 11 Hours creating dynamic forms & analyzing data in Typeform

12% of my time in Communication & Scheduling

• 21 Hours communicating with my team & students in Slack
• 20 Hours reading, writing and deleting email in Gmail
• 9 Hours in team meetings on Skype and Zoom
• 4 Hours texting family & friends on my computer in Messages (maybe I could have spent that time elsewhere?)

Productivity Pulse

• 81% of time spent on productive or very productive activities (+10% from last year, woohoo!)
• 19% of time spent on neutral, distracting or very distracting activities (-10% from last year, oooh yeah!)

Important metrics in my business

Freelancing Freedom Essentials Edition

• 104 new students

Freelancing Freedom Masterclass

• 2 launches
• 172 new students

Code College Paid Membership

• 65 new members added
• 181 total members

CodeCollege.ca

• 92,161 sessions (-4% from 2017)
• Top 3 viewed courses:
  • CSS3 in 30 Days
  • Code College Membership
  • Bootstrap 4 Quickstart
• 3,540 new students
• 306 paying customers

BradHussey.ca (Blog)

• 200,719 sessions (+4.4% from 2017)
• Top 3 pages (excl. Home):
  • Resources
  • What’s standing between you and [that thing]?
  • Am I good enough?

Email List

• 10,962 new subscribers
• 29,297 total subscribers

YouTube

• +8,340 new subscribers
• 52,167 total subscribers

Revenue Snapshot

• -26% decrease in total revenue (compared to 2017)
• 78% profit margin

Professional Highlights
A quick overview of important highlights in my business

Created & launched Freelancing Freedom Essentials Edition

This was a good product that filled a need. That said, we will likely be sunsetting the course and replacing it with a series of new courses at FreelancingFreedom.com. Those who are enrolled in the course will still get to keep it, but moving forward we will eventually stop offering it.

This may come as a surprise to some, but many of the students have said the “Freelancing Freedom Masterclass” live webinar alone is superior to the “Essentials” course. It’s not that it’s a bad course (students clearly want it), it’s just that my live webinar for the larger course really brings the heat. This realization, coupled with the realization that the “Masterclass” is in desperate need of an overhaul (more on that next), has myself and my team working on Freelancing Freedom 2.0 (working title), which will bring the very best of what I have to offer new and experienced freelancers.

Went “all in” with my team

In previous years, I’ve dabbled with hiring virtual assistants and delegation, but in 2018 I truly “let go of the reigns” and allowed others to help me, specifically:

Aleia, my assistant & online business manager.

She started out as a “General Virtual Assistant” on paper, and—in the span of working with me for over a year now—has secured a valuable spot as a trusted colleague. Aleia, I appreciate your hard work and value you bring to the table!

Robert, my student support assistant.

With countless technical coding and development questions submitted by the students of my coding courses on Code College and Udemy, Robert ensures everyone gets an answer. Thank you, Robert!

Bao, Facebook Ads manager.

A special shoutout goes to Bao, one of my students at Freelancing Freedom! He was a tremendous help during the last launch of Freelancing Freedom with his growing expertise in the Facebook Ads department. Cheers, buddy!

Personal Highlights
A quick overview of important highlights in my life

My family.

At the very heart of everything I do is my family. Nothing on this earth matters more to me than my wife & children. The very reason I started my own business back in 2012 was so that my life could be spent in the presence of my family.

Laura, my wife & greatest blessing, has stood beside me every step of the way — supporting me, guiding me, inspiring me, loving me. A woman of tremendous talent; she’s a mother, a role model, a creator, a gift to all that know her, and the love of my life.

People make great sacrifices for their families, and for me, that sacrifice was to surrender to the unknown and take a great risk; to set out on my own and start a business without truly knowing what would happen.

That risk has paid off, and I’m grateful for every day I get to be with my family while simultaneously building a business I’m passionate about.

Now, more than ever, I believe it’s my duty as a husband and a father to step up, show up, work hard, be true and add value — both to my family and my students & followers.

Travel

Hawaii

Early in 2018, we made our way out to one of my favourite places in the world, Oahu, Hawaii! We spent a few days as a family in Waikiki soaking up the sun and riding the waves, and then we made our way up to the North Shore in a town called Punalu’u to vacation with our close friends. As you can imagine, it was beautiful!

Montana & Idaho Roadtrip

In June, we drove down to Boise, Idaho for the annual Craft+Commerce conference by ConvertKit), but along the way we stopped in a Montana for little while to enjoy nature, fishing, outdoor cooking and the simple life.

Boise was a blast, as usual. I met new friends, reconnected with old friends, met some cool people (one of them a Freelancing Freedom student of mine!), had deep conversations, and experienced a pleasant, but awkward fanboy exchange with Pat Flynn, you know… the usual.

During the finale of the conference, ConvertKit announced they were rebranding to “Seva”, which at the time people seemed super jived about, until someone got upset, citing cultural appropriation. Awkwardness ensued. Long story short, ConvertKit is now ConvertKit, but with a red logo. Fun times. You can Google it.

Vancouver Island

In August, there were some incredibly unfortunate wildfires happening all around interior, and coastal British Columbia. Much of the smoke was blowing West toward Southern Alberta, and amidst the 40ºC heat (104ºF) we were breathing in smoke. Of course, this is nothing in comparison to what the people directly affected by the fires were experiencing.

That said we wanted to escape the smoke and get in one last road trip before the end of the summer, so we packed up the family van, and headed west, all the way to Vancouver Island. Thankfully, there wasn’t much smoke on the island, and we not only enjoyed ourselves, but we completely fell in love with the island. Laura and I have since went back together on a little getaway, and we even plan to go back again soon!

Skiing at Sunshine

In December, my parents watched the kids while Laura and I went skiing at the world famous Sunshine Village Ski Resort in Banff — which is not very far from us! Believe it or not, it was my second time on skis, and despite some really gnarly weather, we had an amazing time on the mountain.

Some Key Realizations
A quick overview of important realizations in my life and business

Why “financial success” is a byproduct — not a focal point

At the beginning of 2018, and for much of the year, my primary focus was not of creating true value, building the best products, or dramatically improving what I’ve already built.

It was money.

My focus was a financial goal—a monetary target—and I honed in on it like a rabid dog.

It’s clear looking back it was the wrong decision. Not only did my business generate 25% less revenue as compared to the previous year, my behaviour was desperate and unfocused, with my attention easy swayed into trying to new tactics, software and secrets that would boost my revenue more and more.

The learning lesson here is: lead with value. Create something that matters. Build something you’re proud of. Solve actual problems for the audience you care about.

The goal needs to be one of service. How well can you serve? How well can you solve the problem for your students?

Success (financially or otherwise) is the byproduct of how well you add value.

My “Mental Funk” after a successful launch

After my huge, exhausting launch of Freelancing Freedom Masterclass in November 2018, I was exhausted. Even though the launch was successful, and we brought in 86 new, excited students…I didn’t hit my goals (because I was focused on money first, rather than value first).

After we closed the launch, as usual, I went into “reflection” mode, where I unplug from work for a little while and reflect on what went well in my launch, and what I could do differently next time.

But this time, instead of celebrating a successful launch, more students and an influx of revenue, I just felt… off. Lost. Confused.

“What am I doing?”

“Does my work even matter?”

“I don’t even know where my focus is anymore.”

“What’s my purpose?”

With some serious reflection, downtime, and the guidance and support of my wife, I spent about 2 weeks focusing on one thing:

Discovering my vision, mission & principles.

I realized I’d never spent any time whatsoever developing and uncovering my mission and vision for my life and business.

Over the years, my business just grew organically, as the result of a few good decisions, some consistency and luck.

And when you’re in a fortunate position, you kind of just want to keep that boat afloat. Keep doing what you’re doing, right?

While I believe it’s a good idea to set financial goals for yourself and your business, making it the primary focus is what really knocked me down.

It took me chasing money and financial success to realize… it’s time to figure out what I am made for and what I am meant to do.

After much serious reflection, I came out with a draft of my vision & mission statement. And although it’ll probably always be a “work in progress”, it stands to provide me with a compass to ensure I am on the right track, and doing the right thing (both in life and business).

Here’s what I have:

The Problem I See

People have lost their purpose, lack faith, and long for a meaningful life. They are sick of trading their time and leaving their families behind for a job that doesn’t afford much more than paying the bills — let alone serve their soul, or provide freedom & flexibility. They dream of starting their own business and forging their own path to freedom, but don’t believe in themselves, or their ability. They believe, people like them don’t achieve freedom like that.

This false and atrocious belief system plagues far too many, extinguishes the flame within their hearts, and prevents them from offering the world what it is they were created for.

This must change. I believe we are created for a purpose, we all have a unique and valuable gift to offer this world, and it is our responsibility to cultivate and pursue this gift. I believe that if someone is willing to open their eyes, dare to dream, and to push themselves beyond the edge of what they used to believe was their limit… they will ignite that flame and finally see what they are capable of, and how they, too, can not only build a business that matters and provides freedom and flexibility, but realize a life full of passion, meaning and purpose.

My Vision

To empower the dreamers and aspiring entrepreneurs of the world with the results-focused education, un-compromised guidance and support they require to discover their purpose and start a meaningful business that provides freedom & abundance for themselves and the ones they love.

My Mission

To teach aspiring entrepreneurs how to provide for their families by starting a business they are passionate about.

To inspire dreamers to discover their purpose and take action toward it.

To lift skeptics beyond what they believe are their limits in life, business and faith.

To ignite the flame within the hearts of those who need it most.

Principles

• Family first
• Be a gentleman
• Do your best work, or don’t do it at all
• Believe in what you create
• Focus like an Eagle
• Expect more of yourself and those who seek your guidance
• Add unapologetic value
• Stand up for your beliefs
• Be accessible
• Honesty & integrity
• Be different & stand out
• Be a leader
• Trends are for those who follow. Don’t follow.
• Set boundaries & say no
• Less is better than more
• Don’t compromise
• Results matter most
• Value begets success
• Abundance is to be shared
• Have passion for what you do
• Lead with love
• You are not an accident; you were expertly designed
• Allow God to work through you

Stop compromising & hiding my faith

Nowadays, it’s cool not to believe in God. It seems that faith and the belief in a supernatural creator is something best kept to yourself.

Unfortunately, this is the nonsense I’ve subscribed to in the recent past, and as a result, I’ve hidden my faith, I’ve not acknowledged my blessings, I’ve tucked it away, and I’ve continually compromised my guiding principles and beliefs for the sake of looking un-cool.

This is stupid. I no longer subscribe to this.

I’m grateful for what I have, I’m truly blessed, and I certainly don’t believe I’m a random mass of nothingness simply here by chance.

My life, my purpose and the meaning of my existence has only dramatically improved since deepening my faith, becoming Catholic in 2017, studying apologetics, and following great faith-based thinkers, such as Bishop Robert Barron among many others (seriously, if you’re skeptical about God, Christianity, the Catholic faith, or have some really hard questions… check out Bishop Robert Barron on YouTube.)

The learning lesson here is: if you believe in something, have guiding principles, and hold something deeply true to your soul… stop hiding it for the sake of others. Be who you were created to be. Don’t compromise.

Last Year’s Goals
What I did and did not achieve

GOAL: 2X total business revenue

No. Although business has been doing very well, and I’m not complaining, we generated about 25% less revenue than the previous year.

The problem here is that I lacked focus on a meaningful goal, and I was scattered in my desperate attempt to focus exclusively on a financial goal, rather than focusing on service, and building the best business that truly adds value to my students.

GOAL: 40,000 email subscribers

No. Although, 29,000+ is nothing to balk at. That said, I did prune more than 10,000 subscribers from my email list in 2018 — so, if we count those numbers, I came pretty close.

Learning lesson: It’s not the size of the subscriber count that determines a successful business, it’s who actually cares about what you offer and how you affect them that matters.

GOAL: 80,000 YouTube Subscribers

No. Currently at 52,000+. I think I was just throwing numbers out there with no real reason why. Oh well. 

GOAL: 500 students in the Code College Membership

No. At it’s highest in 2018, we were at about 280 members, I believe. At our best effort, the strategies we used to boost member numbers was working, however, we realized how much time, effort and money is required to “sell a membership”.

Learning lesson: selling a membership is hard & expensive, as people aren’t looking for a “membership” as the solution to their problem. The benefits, perks and value included in the membership is what you should sell… not the membership itself. That said, moving forward, I will take some focus off of promoting the membership and its wide library of content and put it toward creating a great course on a single topic and promote only that.

2019 Goals

You might look at the fact that I didn’t achieve any of my “public goals” for 2018, and think… wow, Brad must really be discouraged. Poor guy!

Nay! You can’t always hit home runs, especially when your focus is scattered and in the wrong place. Failure is only true failure when you give up because you tripped up. The key is to learn from your mistakes, and use them to come out the other side even stronger than ever before. I’m actually more excited for 2019 than any other year.

Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.

Henry Ford

I like to set far-reaching goals because they challenge me to be creative, force me to take risks, and inspire me to achieve greatness—even if that means I come up short!

In previous years, I’ve made it a habit to list the kitchen sink of my personal and professional goals, and while I do have a handful of personal and professional goals for 2019, this time I’m going to do something different. I’m not going to list a whole bunch of goals. I’m just going to give you a statement on where my focus will be for 2019. It will act as my guiding light throughout the year, rather than just chasing arbitrary numbers and lofty goals that don’t add value to anyone.

A year is a long time, and I don’t want to create a rigid structure within my business that doesn’t allow for spontaneity, new discovery, or deep focus. So this year, here’s my goal (or rather, my guiding light):

Focus on Value, Live My Mission & Serve Abundantly

Remember my vision, mission & principles I told you about earlier? Here it is, as a reminder:

My Vision

To empower the dreamers and aspiring entrepreneurs of the world with the results-focused education, un-compromised guidance and support they need to discover their purpose and start a meaningful business that provides freedom & abundance for themselves and the ones they love.

My Mission

To teach aspiring entrepreneurs how to provide for their families by starting a business they are passionate about.

To inspire dreamers to discover their purpose and take action toward it.

To lift skeptics beyond what they believe are their limits in life, business and faith.

To ignite the flame within the hearts of those who need it most.

This is my guiding light for 2019.

It’s not a subscriber count.

It’s not a revenue number.

It’s not a fancy new course idea. Or a cutting edge strategy.

It’s not “hustle & grind” or any other buzzword you may hear this year.

It’s just the truth.

The reason I am in business, and the reason I have been successful and very blessed in my business is not because of luck, crazy strategies, or buzzwords.

It’s because I have something valuable to offer, and I dared to be true to myself. I care about what I do, and I care about the people I get to serve.

The moment I took my focus off of serving, adding value and being true to myself… I fell down.

I want to feel good about the work I create.

And if my efforts to focus on what matters results in higher numbers & growing revenue? Great. But those will come only as a byproduct of the value I add in 2019.

To leave you with one specific item though, what I can tell you is that Freelancing Freedom is going to be where much of my focus lies this year. This will be my primary vehicle for serving, living my mission and creating life changing value for the people I care about — the people who need it most.

Wrap Up

If you’ve read this far, I appreciate you taking time out of your day for me. As I mentioned at the beginning of this review, the primary reason I write these reviews are for my own purposes, but I publish them publicly so that my readers & students can learn more about me and my business. Perhaps it will inspire you to make write your own annual review, make a big change, start something new, or grow your own business in 2019.

Do you have any outlandish goals or big plans this year? Don’t be afraid to share some of your goals in the comment section, I would love to hear from you!

God Bless You,
Brad