If you have been considering to join the Smart Passive Income Community of Pat Flynn then
In this post I’ll give you an overview of all my experiences with the community from the inside as an Accelerate member for 6 months exactly today. I’ll also tell you how I decided to join it and have a look at some alternatives, both from my own experience from the inside of some of those and some I just heard of from the outside.
3 Months to Financial Freedom turned to 5.5 Years and Counting
To understand why I decided to join the membership you first need to know a little about me.
I’ve been running this blog actively about 5.5 years since December 2019 and creating content in other forms even longer.
Which were separated as following more or less
1. 0.5 years army mandatory service
2. 2 years working on the content full-time
Running out of money
3. 2/5 years Working as a courier and simultaneously as a salesman the last half of those.
4. 0.5 year until Today I’m back at the full-time stage living in Spain.
All during this time I continuously worked on the content. There are very few days where I remember not making progress. I have been planning for it to be quick and easy. 3 Months they said. [Make money blogging book – No affiliation] but got somewhat bogged down.
When this dream of 3 months was planted in my mind I was thinking of the opportunities to travel the world and being financially free as I explained in this video, which used to be my trailer on YouTube
I Got To Spain Without Passive Income To Re-Focus On Passive Income
But, every time the dream kept appearing farther and farther away.
The first country I was planning to travel to or live in once I get passive income was Spain, where I actually live now, but back then as I didn’t generate the planned online income, it appeared that if I want to get a long-term visa I’ll have to go to university to get a “highly skilled” job, which I didn’t want to do because it would take a lot of time away from the content.
So, I found a loophole. It seemed there was a certain amount of money I’d be allowed to present and get a permission to live in Spain for a year [Residence] but I wouldn’t have a permit to work. Which is great because I now have the opportunity to refocus on creating content and get it to also pay the bills and maybe a little bit more, or a big bit more, but I support baby steps, so lets start with bills.
Which, FINALLY ^^, brings me to our subject.
I knew that I must get additional guidance so I’ve been thinking for a long while to join Pat’s membership (All-Access Pass) for this year and eventually I did (Who knows maybe it will be more or less than a year as I pay quarterly – more on that later.)
I Filled The Bulldog Mindset Void with SPI
During the 2-year period where I didn’t work before I ran out of money, I also tried the Bulldog mindset membership for 11 months, then at a later stage I had it for 10.5 months more. But It didn’t work out. In the last days of the second membership period I was feeling a bit like John was trying to get rid of me on the monthly coaching calls… So I left it for the second time, which created a void that I knew would have to be re-filled (The first was because I didn’t make income thanks to it so I didn’t want to keep paying).
So about 7 months later I joined the SPI All Access Pass Which is worth roughly double the amount of BDMM’s membership – 200$ quarterly or 66$ a month.
Tried Channel Jumpstart and Creatornow In Between
In between I also tried to see If I may find something that is more affordable, so I contacted the team of Channel Jumpstart which was started by the YouTuber and YouTube influencer Derral Eves and had a sales call where they told me the worth of the program was something like 5,000$
Not for my pocket.
But, I asked the salesman who else he would suggest, and he said that if I was looking for a budget option I may try YouTuber Airrack’s program Creatornow. I don’t remember how much it cost, but as I’m writing this post it is at 149$ a year and it was something similar before too, so it’s almost one sixth of 800$ which SPI is. I tried the program for a two week trial but didn’t manage to connect with anyone or feel a serious benefit, so I discontinued.
I Lost 240$ By Skipping The Promotion
About two weeks later, after having sat in front of a promotion Pat had put out of paying 560$ for the first year and just stared at the screen a few days, frozen with fear, I eventually let it pass.
Even though the regular, non-promotion prices were 660$ paid yearly or 800$ yearly if paid quarterly.
It didn’t make sense to me to pay for a full year before I even tried it and saw whether it was useful for me.
My previous experiences with Airrack’s community didn’t create an optimal environment as I felt, and Bulldog Mindset didn’t either, so I didn’t want to risk. For me it was, and still is a lot of money.
I also already anchored in my mind far in advance that this would cost 800$ so I was willing to pay even that price if it really is as beneficial as I thought it was, but I needed to try first.
Why I Keep Paying 800$ instead of 660$
After 1.5 months I wanted to switch to the yearly payments but I was told I’m not allowed to add 460$ , instead I’d have to have my remaining time returned – about a 100 dollars, and then I may buy a full year of 660$ with a discount of the returned 100$
It meant I’d end up paying 760$ for a year and 1.5 months instead of 800$ a year.
But, I didn’t need more time and I thought that the option to stop every quarter instead of every year may also be of use, so I wouldn’t have to pay for a year more once the year ends. So I decided to stay with the current payment plan.
Rebranding from All Access Pass and SPI Pro to Thrive/Accelerate/Start
That’s it for the payment which was and still is 200$ a quarter for me, but, FYI, if you join now it’s 297$ quarterly.
All access pass members now became accelerate members, locked in the old price, and there are two more community levels – Thrive and Start. Thrive, previously SPI PRO is application based, and they filter people who don’t have an income from their online presence, which is probably the reason I wasn’t accepted. [ It was 300$ quarterly back then ]
Start has all the courses too, but less accountability like mastermind group matching. A deeper comparison is available below.
Another Option - Ali Abdaal Membership for 995$ a Year
In any case I recently also ran into Ali Abdaal’s course/membership today priced at 995$ a year, from a few glances at the sales page it seemed attractive + Pat suggested his book Feel Good Productivity at one of his office hours, so you might consider it too. I don’t since I’m good with SPI for now. My mastermind team-mate Virginia possibly will write to you about her experiences from the inside of the course, but for now I’d like to link one of the videos of Ali Abdaal which I found useful and say that this membership might be a good option for you because of the above stated.
If You Are In Doubt Maybe Start With Pats 3 Books
One more thing that is important to say is that before I ended up signing up for Pat’s membership I read all 3 of his books, one is Let Go which is his biography. My top of mind key insight from it was some suggested diary writing format – 3 “positive” things and 1 “negative” written daily, no more no less.
Because if we write more positive ones we´ll be too euphoric, but if we´ll write less we’ll be beating ourselves up too much. Also the phrasing is important. 3 Things I did well and 1 Thing I could do better – which means it’s not actually bad, but just something that may be improved. Compassion to yourself is key. As they say, “To make mistakes is human but to forgive is godlike”. A quote I heard in The Little Book of Stoicism
The other book of his – Superfans I summarized on here and in the YouTube video and the third book – Will it Fly I´ve completed with all of its exercises and 1 thing that comes top of mind is that it prompted me to ask my co-workers what my superpower was. They said I was like a tank that i am very difficult to change my mind once I’m set onto something and will sort of “break walls”.
Office Hours and Mastermind Were of Help to Me
As I was on the fence, I was thinking “there’s something very trustworthy in the way Pat presents things” and there was the possibility that I will find a mastermind, and I was pretty sure I´ll get the office hours with Pat, which alone is already worth the fee, I mean… Imagine you´d be able to speak with a million subscriber’s YouTuber once a a week for a long period. (Pat recently passed 1m subs on Deep Pocket Monster)
It turns out I was right. There were weekly office hours, but recently the frequency changed to two monthly meetings with Pat which means it would cost 50$ a meeting if that was the only thing you got at the new price point. At the old price it means 33$ a meeting though. A bargain? Now don’t give yourself illusions. It’s not a 1 on 1 coaching here. You write a message and he answers. But, since I’ve been attending the office hours he seems to encourage people who ask more than one question, and I had an opportunity to ask him a few questions per stream too. People who were apologizing for asking “so many questions” got his response to the likes of “no need to apologize, that’s what we’re here for” or “ask as much as you need” or some paraphrasing of that. He also managed to watch my YouTube channel twice as he shared his screen doing it and give me tips.
He did say however that he will make sure to answer other people’s questions before he does that. So there’s no promise he will manage to do that for everyone on every stream, but he did twice for me, and that is extremely valuable.
That is if we do not count the mastermind which is of even more help because of the personal connections I created.
The Courses - My experience with YouTube from Scratch
I’m only going to comment on YouTube from Scratch, since that is the only one I’ve taken, and of which I’m at the last lesson now.
On the negative side, it had some things I already know
On the positive side, it was made from the perspective of two experienced YouTubers, Pat Flynn and Caleb Wojcik – His editor. So every piece of information even if basic is presented from that perspective. Things they find useful on their channels. And I also learned a few things I didn’t know.
So for example, one thing I knew but got new light on is to search for products on Amazon and make videos accordingly. It reminded me of the importance of making videos for an existing market, and not whatever I’m interested in.
How The Community Helps Me Replace Gaming
About 2.5 months ago, after about 3 years of being clean, I found myself playing videogames once more. Thankfully, I´ve since been clean for 75 days, but this was a red flag which indicated that I must change something.
The things I learned from the awesome brand Gamequitters and the book Respawn, both created by Cam Adair taught me that quitting video games requires us to replace gaming with other activities that will fulfill the basic human needs that gaming fulfilled for us.
There are generally four of those needs according to the book. Those are:
1. Social
2. Temporary escape
3. Constant measurable growth
and
4. Challenge
I knew long ago that my social part of life was neglected but I was trying to ignore it with willpower and it caught up with me for the second time.
There’s a thought on the subject that Benjamin Hardy conveyed in his book “Willpower Doesn’t Work” to the gist of: Willpower is a limited resource, we need to work on replacing our environment to contribute to our goals and not rely on willpower, at least not long-term.
Taking that into account and after some self-analysis I realized I was spending a lot of time alone working on the content just like last time I relapsed about 4 years ago.
I also remembered that the gaming pull was almost non-existent
when working as a courier and a salesman in between.
I guess it was because these jobs provided social approval in the form of grateful customers and salary.
That is besides the challenge and constant measurable growth.
So I made it a point to start both viewing SPI content as a consumer part of the time during which I eat, because I was barely making any progress while eating and working on the content anyway. This then works on fulfilling the temporary escape + allows me to learn and not just do the same again and again. And, many other parts like mastermind chat, office hours, events, accelerator, monthly quests work more on the social need part because they include my participation and engagement. All this, in fact, fuels my chances to succeed in content creation which is my source of challenges and potentially experiencing constant measurable growth.
What Are Accelerators?
Another thing which I recently joined in SPI is the YouTube course accelerator,. It is a concentrated effort to help us pass through the course, with networking events and a weekly meeting with someone who has some know-how regarding YouTube with Q&As
It’s important to note that those take place only at specific times and if you’re signing up for those, please make sure they are indeed taking place soon for the course you’re interested in.
My February Challenge Lessons
Then there was a 5-day February challenge. In it we were prompted to complete five small daily challenges which, when completed, caused me to make small actions of progress on 3 projects on which I was procrastinating. For two of them I kept taking action, and the third dropped along the way.
These projects were:
1. Adjusting the “system processes” in my content production to the new way I do things, meaning, to have them instruct how to produce multiple content pieces per book instead of 1 per book.
2. Getting a dishwasher
3. Hiring a video editor
On each of those I was prompted to identify the next small step that requires about 5-10 minutes and do it.
Then comment what this thing was. On the fifth day we were prompted to plan how to incorporate these projects into routines.
Insights Regarding Hiring My First Freelancer
I wrote messages to a few potential editors and have been wondering how to choose which to go with
then I remembered Pat recommended the book Buy back your time by Dan Martell on one of his streams.
I also ran into the book on Productivity Game´s channel which I´ve been watching for a while
The two of those encounters caused me to remember the importance of creating a system and not trusting some superstar employee to do an awesome job for you. This means not giving general guidelines, but very specific ones. And so I didn’t really need to test their skills, but find someone who will do my instructions in the best manner.
Once I have my video production process going predictably, I may work on outsourcing other parts of my process like making the voiceover to a self-employed hire from Fiverr too. One more book that illustrates what I’m talking about in an amazing fashion is the E-Myth Revisited.
It explains why it is important to have the business predictable including: For the audience to build an expectation, and for you to have the business operating more effectively and for the employees to have clarity.
But, I think we’ve deviated a bit from the subject here. Let’s go back to comparing the 3 membership levels.
The Smart Passive Income 3 Membership Tiers
Accelerate - 100$ or 83$ Monthly Paid Quarterly or Yearly
As you can see on the image there are 5 points differentiating Start from Accelerate.
Let’s discuss each from my perspective as an inside member
Exclusive office hours
Pat Does Not Take Us For Granted
I have to say that I felt a different vibe from Pat than from John, at least for now, what I mean is that he always says that he is there to answer our questions and that if there are none, we’ll finish early but he’s there to answer for the full hour.
He thanked me a few times for being a member and for considering the switch to his annual membership
which shows that he really does appreciate our trust in him, and is still working in order to justify that trust, which, at least for some time I didn’t feel with John. I felt silly since I felt he was doing it out of necessity, and was trying to brush me off and get to the next person.
I think that the text vs. video-based questions may be part of the reason. Because they allow Pat to focus on answering the question, allowing Pat to better manage the time and control the conversation without worrying how long the other person will talk.
Live cohort-based accelerators
Limited in Time
So again, make sure those are taking place in a time period close enough to your signup date if you sign up for those.
Networking Events
I attended two networking events, and those didn’t bare much fruit. Although there were some conversations that I’ve continued afterwards it didn’t develop to anything much mostly (I had a few meetings with one guy as a sort of 2 people mastermind, for which I’m grateful, but it didn’t last)
Weekly Accelerator Q&As
The weekly meetings are pretty fine, but I feel that sometimes the people who were there didn’t feel like enough of an authority to me. For example, although Caleb did co-create the course with Pat and is the CEO of SPI, and has a channel with a following of 50k, he had largely neglected his channel lately and is working on Pat’s community instead.
Then there was another lady which had about 1,000 soubscribers and barely any views on her videos.
I guess she was making an income, but YouTube woise- she didn’t seem to ebe in the place of an authority, at least from the numbers perspective.
Friday Mandatory Check-In
Next, you are obligated to reply to a check-in post with your status report which is posted every Friday. You have two days to do it if you want to stay in the accelerator space. The response might be “I didn’t complete the task but working on it” so long as you reply with something. This is a good form of accountability because you feel like someone cares about your progress and a part of the group which is passing the same process.
Monthly post-based quests
We have already discussed this before but my only experience with this was that on the end of february i had accomplished three small tasks on the way to my longer term goals in 3 different fields. Dishwashing Machine, System creatinon and Hiring a video editor, that is the only one I’ve participated until now, and actually until this very moment i didn’t even know it was a thing. Should start keeping more of an eye on that
Early access to new courses
As I was writing this post I found out that Accelerate members have 1 month early access to the courses. Which is nice to have, but not something I felt I was missing in particular either.
Member-led mastermind groups
It Was Hard But I Found One
I have been looking for this sort of setup for AGES, and I have been able to find two individuals through the SPI community with whom I had more than one – one-on one meeting, and finally, having myself added to a group of 4 more people.
This was not easy and I had to dig and contact a bunch of people. My constant posts weren’t enough, It took reaching out to a guy who’s a “Thrive” member, who told me I could write to one of the team members and that there are mastermind groups that I might be added to. This was Awesome. Of course I sent a message to the team member and – He connected me to a mastermind group!
Why I Believe Masterminds Are Awesome
Although it is just one weekly meeting and not 2 as Napoleon Hill suggested (the reason for which I’ve been looking for a mastermind) that is still again – Awesome. It allows me to share my long term goals as they are in the process, which I almost never do with anyone, but this is the appropriate setup for this. The constant reflection with other people on my “Passive income” and generally life goals, is allowing to have improvement ideas rise, and the accountability of having other people aware of your resolutions is a powerful propeller to acquire these goals.
I Got Results Through Accountability and Self Reflection
The last few weeks I can see a jump in my productivity, as since I started the mastermind, I had been putting detailed reports regarding how I was using my time during each Pomodoro , which helped me highlight my areas of less productivity a bit.
Input From People Who Get Me
Moreover, besides reflection, there is of course the input of other people, which they give you as they hear you speak about your problems. Mind you, these are not just some people on the street, they are people who:
1. Are paying hard earned dollars to develop themselves, and
2. Generally who are also on the journey of content creation for quite some time.
3. People who understand my struggles and are like-minded and worthy of sharing my goals with as I know they will not subconsciously try to undermine my efforts, as a majority of people very well might.
That is because the majority of people don’t look for growth or improvement arguably, and they’re uncomfortable when someone else does it around them because it makes them feel regret of sorts.
Today Finding a Mastermind Is Easier - Mastermind Directory
Today there’s a web-page where you may enter and choose a mastermind group in SPI. How easy is that?
As of writing, I see 4 groups there. There’s also some matching going on every quarter to create new groups. Although, to be transparent I must say I just now noticed that only two groups accept new members as of now.
Start - 50$ or 41$ Monthly Paid Quarterly or Yearly
A network of like-minded entrepreneurs through direct messaging and active community discussion channels
This is the channel through which I’ve been looking for a mastermind from the very start. I did that by posting an elaborated post about myself and an elaborated post regarding looking for a mastermind. After about a month or so I managed to find one person with whom I had a few 1 on 1 meetings, which is significant, no doubt. But it is not a rainbow of awesomeness kind of thing and required efforts on my part.
SPIs entire library of pre-recorded courses
Thinking Which Course to Take? Maybe ask Pat
It took me some time to decide which of these courses I want to attend. Clearly not all of those will be relevant to you most likely. And this was a great fear of mine that I might register, the main value will be in the courses but I won’t find relevant ones. For example, the YouTube from Scratch was said to be for very basic beginners, probably the only one of the courses I thought I’d do was Email Marketing Magic.
But, while consulting with Pat on his office hours, he helped me by suggesting a course – The YouTube from Scratch course. Maybe you could also sign up and ask Pat too.
YouTube from Scratch Course Experience Summary
And yes there are some concepts there that I knew, many of them, but still, hearing the basics from a perspective of well-based YouTubers (Caleb and Pat) gave me some insights.
Two Things I Learned
For example, the fact that I got to analyzing products in demand on Amazon and getting video ideas because of it, got me to re-focus on which videos are the most demanded and not the ones I’m most excited to produce – Which does the market want and not I. Then, there was the lesson of doing thumbnails and headlines first, among other things.
It Might Seem Too General But It Inspired Me
Even though most courses are not something I need from A to Z, they may give
general ideas about things I don’t know I don’t know or serve as a reminder. That’s what happened with YouTube from Scratch. Whether they do or not remains to be seen of course.
Live recorderd workshops
The only one I’ve attended thus far if I remember correctly is “Building a Storymine” or some similar name. It was on the subject of storytelling. I do not yet feel I have applied the insights from it, maybe I just didn’t find the connection of how to apply it.
Actually there was another workshop that I remember now of new year resolutions of sorts or habit building workshop of which I definitely remember now that one of the things I wrote in the workbook, I went on to apply. It is to start searching for garages as I go out to get vitamin d downstairs in the sun.
Mini Courses
Haven’t touched those yet
Thrive - 150$ or 125$ Monthly Paid Quarterly or Yearly
The `Elite` - I wasn`t accepted, so I`ve got little to tell
Thrive is the “Elite” part of Pat’s community who are already making some sort of income from their online presence, which is probably why I wasn’t accepted so all I know is from the outside almost like you. I assume there are the least of those members relatively to other tiers.
In fact, I’ve counted 224 thrive members in the members directory while the complete community has 4,119 including the SPI team and the 3 tiers.
You may see the image with the benefits it includes in the image above.
You May Sign Up Through My Affiliate Link Or Directly
For now, I’m going give you my affiliate link for the community in case you found value in this post and would like to join. Feel free to use it and by doing so giving me a reward for writing this post at no additional cost to you. Also feel free not to, and just sign up through the website if that feels better to you. Whether you do or don’t, if this post helps you decide in either way, I did my job here.
Best wishes.
If you have any questions , feel free to reach out to me on yan@improvementor.blog or Yan Raychuk in the community if you decide to join and I’m still there and generally alive 🙂
Stay awesome and see you in the next posts. Working on 7 Steps To Freedom Chapter 6 Now.
P.S. This Post Was Inspired By YouTube From Scratch
P.S. For your information, the inspiration for this post came from YouTube from Scratch Module 5 Lesson 3 on monetization, in particular from one of the linked resources – The affiliate marketing guide. Feel free to check it out too.
That said, as much as I will be grateful to have some sort of income from this post (being my first from this content creation ordeal[if we don’t count a video-editing gig]) it is completely fine if I just end up helping you out, and you choose not to sign up or not sign up thorough me. Nonetheless, I am currently enrolled in SPI and these are my experiences. Do whatever you believe will help you most in your content efforts 🙂