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GE 310: How Sam Parr Went From Owning Hot Dog Stands to Becoming the CEO of an 8-Figure Company (podcast)

Eric
Sam Parr The Hustle
Hey, Everyone! Today, I share the mic with Sam Parr, the CEO of The Hustle, a daily email newsletter with tech and business news.
Tune in to hear Sam discuss how he went from owning a hot dog stand chain to becoming the CEO of an 8-figure company, how The Hustle newsletter got to ~1.5 million subscribers, and how his successful conference, Hustle Con, has never lost money.

Time-Stamped Show Notes:

  • [00:41] Before we jump into today’s interview, please rate, review, and subscribe to the Growth Everywhere Podcast!
  • [01:32] The Hustle is three years old.
  • [01:45] In college, Sam had a chain of hot dog stands in Nashville.
  • [02:00] He left that and opened an internet company before starting The Hustle.
  • [03:10] The Hustle is an eight-figure business that started with a friends and family seed round.
  • [03:30] They are close to 1.5 million subscribers.
  • [03:40] They currently have 30 employees.
  • [05:50] When they started, their newsletter was going to small startups, but now it is going to employees of national and multinational companies.
  • [07:00] The Hustle has a sales team that reaches out to people, but they get a lot of inbound traffic.
  • [08:08] They make sure to cull their list, so they aren’t emailing people who don’t engage.
  • [10:25] Sam and his partner eventually built their own system in order to move away from Mailchimp. They needed something more specific to their needs.
  • [11:45] Hustle Con is a big event that the company hosts and upwards of 8000 people attend.
  • [12:08] They consider this business marketing development.
  • [13:55] Live events can be a risk, because a lot of people lose money on them.
  • [14:35] When throwing your first live event, beware that you may lose money.
  • [14:55] Hustle Con has never lost money, but that is because Sam refuses to spend on unnecessary costs (like name badges).
  • [15:36] Hustle Con also doesn’t pay its speakers.
  • [17:15] When providing beverages, they went with red solo cups instead of something nicer.
  • [17:30] Amazing talks and attendees is more important than nice cups.
  • [18:00] It’s hard to build a business with just advertising.
  • [18:10] They have a team that scours the web, looking for trends
  • [19:55] The Hustle also has online groups where you can chat with other entrepreneurs.
  • [20:38] Blogging got Sam his first 100,000 subscribers.
  • [23:10] Sam loves the tool Web Archive (they have the Wayback Machine).
  • [23:50] Sam recommends the books Titan and The Patriarch.

Resources From The Interview:

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