{"id":234072,"date":"2023-06-19T15:09:46","date_gmt":"2023-06-19T19:09:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/coreywilkspsyd.com\/?p=234072"},"modified":"2024-01-27T22:14:51","modified_gmt":"2024-01-28T03:14:51","slug":"what-i-learned-from-a-hustler-named-cornbread-in-nyc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/coreywilkspsyd.com\/what-i-learned-from-a-hustler-named-cornbread-in-nyc\/","title":{"rendered":"What I Learned from a Street Hustler Named Cornbread in NYC"},"content":{"rendered":"
Don\u2019t trust a man named Cornbread.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n That was one of two painful lessons I learned on my first trip to NYC. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m not a touristy person, but when you go to NYC, there are a few things you just have <\/em>to do. Like walking through Central Park, taking the subway, and watching people play chess outside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As my friends and I walked by the chess players on their stone benches and tables, a well-dressed gentleman in his mid-50s beckoned us over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cDo you all want to play chess?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNo, I\u2019m not very good and would prefer to watch,\u201d I responded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNonsense. I\u2019ll give you a free lesson. Let\u2019s play!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He introduced himself as \u201cCornbread.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The first \u201clesson\u201d was just a regular game of chess where he beat me in like 4 moves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cRematch! Let\u2019s do one more game real quick!\u201d said Cornbread.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Again, he beat me in a few moves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I thanked him and got up to resume exploring NYC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat\u2019ll be $20,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat? You said it was free!\u201d I said, confused and betrayed by who I thought was my friend named Cornbread.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Refusing to pay for the \u201clesson\u201d he\u2019d just given me, I stormed off as he yelled at the nearby cops claiming I\u2019d stolen from him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cShut up, Cornbread,\u201d they said without looking at me and my friends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cornbread was a hustler.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n But he taught me a valuable lesson that applies to every creator today.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Here\u2019s what I mean\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n\n\n\n Remember when you played football and your coach would yell, \u201cHustle! Hustle!\u201d it meant to move your ass, to keep pushing forward instead of letting fatigue win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Side note: At least this is what they do in the movies. I played football in high school for like a day. After the first practice, I threw up and my ankles swelled because I was exceedingly unathletic, so I quit. So my only understanding of how sportsball teams work is from the movies.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s what it\u2019s supposed to mean to hustle<\/em>. To push forward instead of letting fatigue, uncertainty, or self-doubt stop you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But to most people nowadays, \u201chustle\u201d means to be a street hustler\u2014to bamboozle someone out of their money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When people complain about \u201chustle culture,\u201d this is the type of hustling they\u2019re talking about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is the hustler mentality: wring money out of people however you can, as often as you can, for as much as you can. You don\u2019t buy <\/em>get-rich-quick schemes, you sell <\/em>get-rich-quick schemes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Why is this hustler mentality so pervasive in the Creator Economy?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Simple: Because it works. You can make a shit-ton of money in a short amount of time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cornbread was a hustler. And like many hustlers, he did a bait-and-switch. He offered \u201cfree lessons,\u201d but then demanded payment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Think about it this way\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n\n\n\n I recently signed up for a free email course promising to teach me the foundations of a topic I was interested in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A few emails in, I hit a paywall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But it wasn\u2019t framed as a free trial or anything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Damnit, Cornbread\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I have no issue with paid newsletters. I\u2019ve subscribed to them. I even wrote <\/em>one for a year. But that\u2019s because they were framed as a paid newsletter, or at least a free trial for a paid newsletter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Don\u2019t offer a 100% free newsletter, then 3 emails in bamboozle me with a paywall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s all about setting expectations and consent.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I consented to signing up for a free thing, not a trial. If I\u2019d known there would be a paywall, I could\u2019ve made an informed decision to either subscribe anyway or move on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are businesses out there with a reputation for being an \u201cecosystem of upsells.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n You buy what\u2019s supposed to be their flagship product, but immediately get upsold to use their proprietary app, join their exclusive membership (and pay a premium subscription), grab a handful of a la cart workshops that are tangentially related to the flagship course you just bought, and so on\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tactics like this are becoming increasingly, painfully<\/em>, common in the Creator Economy.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n But don\u2019t confuse this tactic with building a value ladder\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n\n\n\n A value ladder allows you to help your audience by meeting them where they\u2019re at:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Each of these offers something distinct from the other rungs and meets your audience based on their ability to invest their time, money, and mental bandwidth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A value ladder is built on integrity and a genuine desire to help your audience.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n An ecosystem of upsells is different. <\/strong>You\u2019re not thinking about how to help your audience. You\u2019re thinking about how to always have something else to sell them and using scarcity mindset-inducing tactics to get them to buy buy buy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s no integrity in this approach. Because you\u2019re focusing on maximizing your profits over providing legitimate value to your audience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Without our audiences, we can\u2019t do the work we love.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n We owe it to our audiences to show up with integrity in everything we do\u2014free or paid\u2014and build a reputation that we can be trusted.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n When you create an ecosystem of upsells, you sacrifice building a long-term reputation of trust for short-term financial gain.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The only way to keep this ecosystem running is to overcome the churn from burning bridges with your audience. They buy your product, get some value out of it, feel pressured to buy your upsell, get less value out of it, get upsold again, then realize how one-directional the value exchange has been and leave your ecosystem forever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Which is why so many of these ecosystems of upsells target beginners, because there are always new people becoming interested in becoming creators and entrepreneurs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It works, but is it worth the cost?<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe Pervasiveness of the Hustler Mentality in the Creator Economy<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The Dangers of Building an Ecosystem of Upsells<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
An Ecosystem of Upsells Isn\u2019t the Same as a Value Ladder<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n
Final Thoughts<\/h2>\n\n\n\n