One Year In, The Journey
A year ago, I had just graduated from university in the UK. Then Covid hit, couldn't find a job in the UK so I came back to Malaysia but I couldn't find a job in Malaysia either. I was lost.
Somehow, since then, I've landed a job in a reputable company (though still not my passion). Over the past 365 days, I've:
- Personally written and sent 52 issues (132 issues overall)
- Researched on 11 side hustle ideas
- Onboarded 2 writers
- Grown from 0 subscribers to 127 subscribers and counting!
Though not very impressive, I'm still proud of what we managed to accomplish
How It All Got Started
- Like I mentioned above, I've just graduated from university and couldn't get a job. I was feeling incredibly stuck and a little hopeless
- Then I fell into the Twitterverse and stumbled upon creators like Sam Parr (the Hustle), Austin Rief (Morning Brew), Janel (Brain Pint)
- My thinking was instead of feeling sorry for myself, why not build a side project and starting a newsletter looked like the lowest barrier to entry
- So I reserved microdigest.co and begged 200+ Twitter followers to sign up
- A day later, I had 13 subscribers, sent out my first issue and we were off to the races
Who Are We
- I found that a lot of newsletters out there stack a lot of stuff in one email and it can get a bit overwhelmed
- So my idea was to share just ONE THING I learned over the week in a shorter and simpler form, hence the name
- My interests were in business, crypto, investments so I would spend a few hours each weekend curating links to articles, podcasts and videos with a dash of commentary
- I told this to my friend, Lee Way. He liked the idea and was interested to join. He told his friend, Adrian and he joined too and that's how we got What's Up Wednesday and Pub Convos
- They write stuff from films and music to societal issues which brings diversity to the newsletter
The Future of Micro Digest
- So what's next for MD? The answer is, just like a year ago, I have no idea
- But unlike a year ago, I have 365 days of figuring it out under my belt and I can't wait to see where serendipity leads us over the next 365 days
- What I do know is that I want Micro Digest to be big, I'll probably build some stuff under the Micro Digest brand
- Mostly, though, I'm just going to keep writing, iterating and following this thing wherever it takes me
If you want to bring some like-minded friends for year two, share them this link
Thanks for an amazing year 😀
|