Steal The Strategy Of a 7-Figure Writer

Beginner-friendly.

Photo by Antoni Shkraba, Pexels

This instalment of One-Person Business Success is free for everyone. I send this email twice every week. If you would also like to receive it, join a community of ambitious solopreneurs today. 

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Let me introduce you to Michael Simmons. 

The guy is a blockbuster creator and a writer for Forbes, Inc. Magazine and The Observer. 

Anytime I find someone new who’s as successful, I always look into his strategy and copy parts of it. 

Reverse-engineering the success of others is an excellent opportunity to learn and see what’s possible. I recommend you do it with every successful person in your category. 

In this e-mail, I will show you: 

• How I reverse-engineer the strategies of the best so you can, too. 

• What I learned from Michael Simmons and how you and I can take advantage of it. 

Secret to Success: Copy-Paste Success

We all have these moments: we find an online entrepreneur who’s ultra-successful, and we think, My God, if only I could achieve this, that would be amazing. 

Well, you can. 

Most strategies for online success can be reverse-engineered and re-applied to almost any situation—as long as you know how to do it. 

Here’s how to reverse engineer successful online strategies: 

In short, I do this: 

• Look at how & where my role model finds their audience

• Look at what my role model does (in detail)

• Look at how they make money (what they sell, how they monetize) & how much money they make (if you can find that information) 

Here’s how I applied this process to Michael Simmons. 

I found Michael Simmons by accident on Substack. Since I fit in his target audience, I subscribed. I was impressed with the quality of his e-mails so I wanted to learn more. 

1. First, I looked at how & where Michael finds his audience. I looked for him in multiple platforms and Google his name. Here’s what I found out: 

• He has 72K followers on Medium. He’s not very active—his last article was published on 23rd of Sept, but all of his pieces boast high engagement. No idea what he makes on Medium since he’s not showing up regularly, but my guess would be a few thousand dollars per year half-passive income.

• He has 142K subscribers (wow!) on Substack. He publishes every other day. The paid option of his newsletter is $10 per month, $100 per year. According to Substack stats, an average of 5-10% of subscribers choose the paid option across newsletters. Michael seems like a good marketer, but let’s assume he’s on the lower end at 5%. This means he has 7100 paid subscribers, earning the whooping $710K per year on Substack alone. 

• He has 19.3K followers on X, but his last post dates back to 19th of Sept

• He has 32K on LinkedIn, but his last post dates back to September, again. 

• A quick Google search brings up articles he’s written for the Observer and Inc. Magazine. It seems like he’s actively writing for big publications. He also has a website that I’m not impressed with.

1. I look at what Michael does to be as successful as he is.

• His main edge is that he synthesises lessons from successful people in great detail. Think Bill Gates, Warren Buffet and Elon Musk. 

• His content is very long when you compare it to that of most online writers (his Medium stories are 10+ minutes, which is around 3000 words. Some are as long as 20+ minutes). His Substack newsletters are also long.

• Even though his posts are long, they’re very interesting and well-written. He managed to get and hold my attention, and I’m a jaded reader of online business advice, so that speaks volumes. 

1. I looked at where he makes his money. Based on my research, I will assume he focuses on: 

• Writing for top media. Unknown income.  

• Writing his newsletter. $710K+ per year. 

• Selling his Blockbuster course. He mainly sells it through his newsletter. Unknown income. 

How to copy the strategies of the best: 

His edge is the fact that he’s featured in top publications. 

Unfortunately, I can’t copy that one easily (even though I keep pitching stories to Business Insider and Fast Company regularly, and so can you).

What I can copy is his writing style: long but super interesting and readable.

So, let’s zoom in on his writing. 

Here’s how Michael Simmons writes mesmerising long-form content: 

1. He starts with the results you’re about to achieve and either a personal story of how he’s gotten these results or the story of someone successful.  

2. He explains why the solution you’re about to read is the ultimate solution to this problem.

3. He uses a lot of popular names to sound credible. 

4. He uses a lot of scientific principles and research to sound credible. He links to resources. 

5. He includes visuals to help people understand the principles he’s referring to. 

6. He writes long articles but made of short paragraphs--no more than 3-4 lines.  

That, I can copy. 

Dan Koe also says writing long-form content is a great credibility booster. 

• It shows readers you have deep knowledge. 

• It’s a real test of your writing ability. 

• It makes people remember you. 

However, Michael goes further. He says that the longer you spend on an article, the more successful it is.

Screenshot from Michael Simmons’ newsletter “Blockbuster Blueprint”

I can’t afford to write one article per week right now and pour hours into it—it would tank my views. 

However, I will try a mixture of his and mine strategies: 

• I will write one or two long-form articles per week. I will load them up with research and examples of big names. 

• I will still write 3-4 short to mid-length articles per week, plus be consistent on other platforms. 

My first long-form post (7 minutes & 1600 words long) was published in The Startup yesterday. Let’s see how that goes. 

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Peek behind the curtain:

Latest success: 

Yesterday, I got an engagement bonus from Medium for October. It’s just $7 (not sure how they estimate it), but it’s still nice that they have this type of incentive and that I got it. 

Latest failure: 

I have one module left on my Branding course so I can get a Branding Certificate from the University of London. I keep postponing it. It’s a lot of work, and the tests after each module are rather difficult. You also have to submit short papers with every test. 

It’s important for me to keep learning. I just find myself a little overwhelmed lately. I’m not going to let it stop me, though. I just need to become better at managing my time & energy. 

Something new I’m trying: 

The only thing I can think of are the long-form posts we already discussed. I’ll let you know if they outperform the rest. 

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Sending you the energy you need to do everything you need to do,

Maya