🧠 Wondering why my kids aren't at $10k/mth yet ・
🔮Uncommon insights on sharing your unique perspective in my newsletter・
✍🏻10 yrs exp in Strategic Comms
"I have no idea what that is"
👆🏻I get this quite often when I mention my 9-5.
Strategic Communications = I figure out how to put information together for a specific audience to digest easily.
Be it investor relations, internal comms or PR, I think about the who, what, why,
I collected 40+ lead magnets in 7 weeks.
👉🏼email mini-courses
👉🏼e-books and
👉🏼Notion templates
Analysed why they went viral or flopped.
I give you the best tips to supercharge YOUR lead magnet
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Picture this:
You’re at a party.
Lots of people.
You don’t know anyone.
You’ll get $100,000 (tax-free) if you make friends with 5 people who own cats.
But if the bouncers hear the words “cat” or "meow" they’ll throw you out.
What do you do?
I loved working for a big corporate.
Sports, team bonding, karaoke, long-service awards, craft workshops, lunchtime yoga... you name it, we had it.
Prestige too.
At family gatherings, I wasn't "Ruth". I was "the one who works at big corporate".
The requisite oohs and aahs
Not trying to flex...
But The Queen of Strategies
@therightvibes_
followed me!
I might have done a ballet pirouette and almost ripped my pants 😆😁
Gosh, I love her.
Here's the ridiculous thing my client said,
"Oh no worries, we'll wait. Feb next year?"
My schedule is packed til the end of the year.
My client doesn't mind.
She's 100% willing to wait for me.
Instead of picking someone else.
🥹I don't feel like I deserve this
1 underrated, powerful habit that could change your life.
Always fulfil your promises.
Especially the promises you make to yourself.
Train your brain to default to "I always deliver" instead of
- "if I feel like it"
- "if the time is right"
🚀🚀🚀
9 years 🥰
No marriage is easy
But doing it with someone who champions you, who supports you despite the nonsense they don't understand & believes you're capable of more... Makes it a ton easier 🥰
"I'm a mom first"
The first time I said this in an interview, I felt like crap.
But it was 100% authentic to
- who I was
- where my priorities lie
Now, my job is
- 100% wfh
- flexi-hour
& they think I'm awesome.
I'm driven to perform because they respect my priorities.
I took huge risks with my first giveaway.
Kinda went viral.
Here are the numbers:
305 → ~500 followers (67% increase)
34 new subscribers to newsletter
5 potential clients, 1 paid in full
The step-by-step breakdown 👇🏻
Let’s be honest. The temptation to use money as a reflection of your value is irresistible on Money Twitter.
After all, who doesn’t want to show that screenshot of a $2,000 transfer and shouting from the mountaintop? This is where I am! This is what I’ve achieved! Praise me for
I could tell you that
- I have 10 years of experience
- I’ve run workshops and seminars
- I’m the Strategic Communications lead at an edtech
But how much does that make you trust me? Maybe 10%.
It's just words...
Don't let words hold you back.
I made a careless comment the other day about being traumatised by parenting so much that it fueled my career and ooh I didn’t expect what went down in my dms.
Anyone who says parenting is all fun and rainbows is a liar.
Kids are developing little monsters.
& in the process of
Don't write tweets like a naggy old man.
Do you respond positively when someone tells you what to do?
"Don't do this. Do that."
"Stop doing this."
Now, like the rebellious, independent kids we all are on X, we don't like it.
So why do you write your tweets like that?
People enjoy being entertained. They LOVE it!
That’s why they invest their time in social media.
Their ROI is entertainment.
If you don't entertain and just preach... You're making it hard for people to enjoy you.
P.S. No one can compete with you when you're having fun 💜
I wish I could say that this is more accurate to how I look in real life, but facts: Oppo has a portrait mode. I used it.
Also: My 8yo unicorn princess loves the polka dots. Not up for discussion😂
We decided to take her hustle to $10k/mth seriously. After all, if other kids
A small selection of the poptarts we got 😍
We gonna be so fat trying every flavour hahaha.
Not featured: strawberry, blueberry, cinnamon sugar, s'mores 🤭🤭🤭
As a mom I know that TELLING my kids a 1,000 times that eating too much of anything is a bad idea won't convince them.
I've got to show them.
P.S. Go on a carrot diet and this is what happens. You turn orange.
P.P.S. Works with mangoes too.
Show, not tell.
My face changed?!?!?!
Nah, I'm kidding.
I was just suddenly filled with an urgent need to lose my blue tick (and some colour).
And I put a lot of sunblock for this new photo.
Tell me, fellow friends on X... will the almighty algorithm crush my heart because I've lost the
I accomplished the impossible.
I got a ghostwriter to ghost me. 👻
👻: Hi Ruth, I want to write for you. At the end of two weeks I am sure I will increase your followers, engagement and leads. blah blah blah...
Me: Okay. Can you describe my brand voice?
👻👻👻💨💨
"I'm invested in this; it's serious now."
... is what you say to your audience when you pay $8/mth for a blue tick.
Then you ask for $2,500/mth for your services on the same day.
So I guess now you're super duper super super serious?
🙃
I'm gonna be a little bit dirty with this one 🤭
Some people are great at foreplay
💥 Great marketing
💥 Compelling ads
💥 Hypnotic landing pages
But they don't check in on their customers after
😬 Was it good?
😬 Did it satisfy you?
Believe me, when the experience is
My cheat hack for choosing my brand colours for The Solopreneur's Comms Hub
1. I went to
2. Hopped straight to "Trending Colour Palettes"
3. Chose the one with the highest likes.
Majority wins, right? 🤣
Perfect for colour-dumb people like me.
🌟LAUNCHED 🌟
The Notion template I've been teasing...
The Solopreneur's Communications Hub
Real case studies, real creators, breaking down their strategies and the why, so you can easily understand key concepts and use it for yourself.
FREE, with a premium option.
My version of work life balance
Work = therapy from my annoying kids
Kids = therapy from brain numbing work
Half-excited, half-regretting my decision to start figuring out my website on my own lol.
Exciting, but there's so much I don't know! 😱 I shall hustle until the kids
Loved this massive gem from
@ItsKieranDrew
's newsletter.
People suck at feedback.
They absolutely do.
That's why rather than ask an open, blanket question, it's better to have prompts.
Here's a tip:
If you suck at receiving feedback (hey there's no shame, people talking about
I get paid well for my 9-5. So why do I bother building my side hustles?
Ans: It's 100% mine.
The emotions one feels about something you own will always be more precious.
It's like how I glare at other kids stomping around but gaze at my own with love. 😅
Conversations with my parents...
Me: How is Canada?
Parents: Nice food.
Happy Thanksgiving to all my Canadian friends! 🫰may your tummies be filled and hearts be full of joy!
It was do or die.
Two pairs of eyes looked expectantly at me as we stood two stories above ground.
I’m terrified of heights.
I took a deep breath. My mind raced as I mentally flipped through my options.
Okay, okay. What was the goal?
That my children bravely take the
騎牛搵馬 - Ride an ox, then look for a horse
Make do with whatever resources you have, until you find the "best" solution.
It might be a bumpy ride, but it's better than waiting for the perfect steed to come along. 😊
Share an uncommon piece of wisdom with me 💜👇🏼
Your fear of success is an obstacle you need to unpack.
Have you ever started something but stopped just a few steps before completion?
Maybe it was a workout plan.
Or launching an offer.
Or a new habit.
You were 70%, 80% there.
So close, but suddenly stopped believing, trying
Since December 2009... I knew 𝕏 existed.
I then spent 13 years of my life living a watermelon-free, croc-free, pineapple pizza-free life, before I dedicated ~5 months to 𝕏 (the receipt says I purchased blue tick in July, so I probably started a month or two before deciding 280
Weekly recap!
🦄Big Idea
Timelessness.
I’ve been taking huge steps back to review my entire flywheel to gear towards timelessness, i.e. a model that won’t drastically be affected if I take a break or two.
🦄 Wins
Successfully ran my second workshop and secured a third!
Word choice can scare people. Questions like
- "Tell me"
- "Name one"
are authoritative, but can scare off someone who doesn't know you that well.
Instead, make them the key focus
- "Can you share with me..."
- "How would you like me to..."
Give people a warm welcome 😊
Likes will always matter.
Making your post easy to like isn't a cop-out. It's part of your strategy.
Being easy to like isn't a bad thing.
Balance quality with the right vibes 💕
Our taps ran dry.
I sent one text for help and 4 neighbours within the estate sent me dms offering drinking water and their homes to bathe 🥹
My network has never felt more priceless ❤️
Here's some common sense: People don't like bad news.
So when a guru tells you, "get personal! Tell your story!"
You MUST know that people have a certain threshold for trauma.
The best personal stories have perfected the emotional rollercoaster.
Too much, people will run 💨
Your lived experience is different.
The way you react and respond is different.
So there's absolutely NO reason why your content should be identical to someone else's.
Have more confidence in your voice! 🫰
Be your own unicorn! 🦄
In 2023, I made $22,428 outside of my 9-5 income.
Disclaimer:
Common sense, actionable, non-sexy methods.
The Biggest Earner:
Investments (69%)
I'm an unsophisticated, non-active investor - I rely on fund managers + robo advisors, instead of monitoring my funds closely from
Customers are always beautifully, wonderfully dissatisfied.
- Jeff Bezos, 2016
Note to self:
Don't give up thinking it's a saturated market. You just haven't figured out your special angle yet.
This made me laugh today.
P.S. Why can't AI get eyes right? My kids spent an hour yesterday trying to generate "the three little pigs walking happily in the forest" and none of them had their eyes on right 🤦🏼♀️
What you see: One happy guy and one weirdly contorted guy.
The Story: South Korean roller-skater Jung Cheol-won started celebrating his win before he reached the finish line, at the Hangzhou Asian Games.
His Taiwanese competitor Huang Yu-Lin persevered and stretched his leg
Gaps are the space where your customers engage.
They tease, they make people think, they spark interest.
If you’re too clear and just give everything away, people lose interest.
Be Clear, not Clever - advice that might not work for you 🤭
Having been on X for a grand total of I-don't-know-how-many-months (because I love keeping score, numbers = meaning of life), I can safely say that
I glaze over X-es that sound like ad copy
I love X-es that surprise me
I don't really enjoy X-es that talk AT me, even though I
Conversations with my asian Parents (X edition)
Me: I started exploring the Elon Musk platform, X
Mum: Oh, I know somebody there. You should go and make friends.
Me: oookay
I checked him out👇🏻🥹 Shocked is an understatement.
Can your parents flex better than mine?
I fell in love with
@_coleschafer
's essay on Dope Shit 👇🏼
I think the only way for anyone to stand out these days is to focus all of their time, attention and creativity on really doing dope shit and then sharing said dope shit with the world.
Dope shit isn’t a 17-part tweet
Parenting inspires so many ideas.
Take this bedtime story - the parable of the elephant and the blind men.
The elephant is your product.
The blind men are your customers.
What if they only see the 🐘bum? Or its ear?
Guide your customers.
More in next week's newsletter.
My DMs with
@Notion4Ts
helped me realise I knew cool stuff
So I created a Notion Guide so every side hustler and solopreneur could have a basic framework for
- branding
- marketing
- content strategy
- social media content
- product descriptions
- managing happy customers
👇👀
A 17 yo got his IG account from 500 to 277,000 followers in 15 days.
It's possible in a cruel, cruel world.
Chewy Thompson is smart.
He's on a mission to workout with John Cena.
💥His daily fitness challenge 💥
For every 1 follower, he walks 1 inch.
For every 1000 followers, 1
Here's how I found my zone of genius (and how you can do it too)
Your zone of genius=
What you like + what you're good at
1. Observe
Comparison is the thief of joy... but it can also help you recognise your strengths.
What can you do more effortlessly than others?
When you
Everyone talks about the most amazing mindset shifts and transformations.
What about the worst?
Tell me the worst ones that derailed you.
👇🏼
Here’s mine…
Saying goodbye to everything that didn’t spark joy 🙈
Very painful reason why many creators fail to replace their 9-5 income.
They do what they love, but they don't behave like professionals.
Put in the same amount of effort you put in your 9-5.
Otherwise, it's just a hobby.
(or a mini bet)
Part of personal branding is creating and owning your own narrative.
But here's the part that disturbs me.
It's curated.
Rightfully so, but the part where you condition yourself to omit all the "non-interesting" bits could be self-sabotage.
Remember yourself.
This has been disturbing me for awhile…
There’s a huge misconception about personal branding. It’s NOT about being liked.
We all have a universal desire to be liked. It’s hardwired into us, we’re fundamentally a species that thrives in community.
But it is a fact that most
Here's an epiphany I had today:
Flexibility is the secret to resilience.
Be the grass that sways in the wind but hold firm to the soil that grounds you.
Most people have a 9-5. They just don't shout it from the mountaintops.
So if you're disqualifying everyone who has a 9-5 upfront, that's a really huge slice of the pic you're giving up on.
Boys.
Date a girl who pays more attention to your hunger pangs than nailing that perfect flat-lay IG-worthy shot.
Yours sincerely,
One who just survived an awkward dinner with a very, VERY hangry man and his oblivious IG-influencer girlfriend.
She might be pretty, but your
The first time I did media training I nearly died from fright.
This was me:
- Introvert
- Never been on tv
I asked my boss, “Why me?”
My boss said, “You write pretty well and it’s not gonna be me, so…”
Dafuq. 🙃
It was the most unglamorous way to get the opportunity. So I
"All that matters is you show up"
👆🏼Great advice, but most people don't understand it.
When I show up as a friend,
I'm funny and slightly full of nonsense, but I actively listen and thoughtfully respond.
I don't show up as a warm body who is more interested in spouting trite
4 years ago the park had been teeeeeming with wild deer. 🦌
Wild deer who knocked my (then) 4 yo down in their frantic eagerness to grab senbei (deer crackers).
The taekwondo lessons we had paid for had obviously been useless (we promptly cancelled and invested in gymnastics
Self-care is more than just bubble baths and face masks.
It's when you embrace your unique self and make choices that are for you.
It might defy logic.
It might "waste time".
It might not be "correct"
Self-care champions you, for you.
You can have the BEST advice, but if you’re applying it in a way that doesn’t match your
▪️ product
▪️ brand or
▪️ voice...
It's going to fall flat.
Think, adjust, then apply.
Blindly being a copycat won't work.
Be your own unicorn 🦄🫰
Wrap up of the last 2 weeks
🦄Big Idea
Live life with a genuine heart.
I spoke about it this morning in the spaces hosted by
@ds_groundupbiz
It’s incredibly easy to fall into the trap of lip service. You say things you don’t mean and praise people just to “reciprocate”