12 Comments
User's avatar
Mohamed F. Ahmed's avatar

The part people skip is the tax and cash flow mess that comes right after this milestone. Once creator income passes salary, you're suddenly dealing with quarterly estimated taxes, no automatic withholding, and lumpy sponsor payments instead of biweekly deposits. Did you set up a separate business account before or after you hit that number?

Avishi's avatar

Thank you for writing this. I want to start my personal brand with Substack, one of the major hurdles for me is how to come up with content?

I keep notes in my phone for content ideas, but a lot of times, the articles don't pan out - either I feel there's not a lot of content there, or the content doesn't align with my personal brand. I'm curious how you tackle this problem?

Hannah Zhang's avatar

Turned how I approach this into a little guide! https://stan.store/hannahzhang

Madeline Lam's avatar

Such an insightful article! My friends and I keep referencing you in our conversations whenever we discuss building our 5-to-9 business. Thank you for sharing, Hannah!

Hannah Zhang's avatar

WOW what an honour!!

Ruxandra's avatar

thank you for the insight!

Sarah's avatar

This is a great article to cheer us on and hear some details of how someone else grows. Thank you for sharing Hannah.

Melissa | The Good Yield's avatar

Cool! Thanks for breaking this down Hannah, especially with the brand partnerships. Curious to hear more about that – is it mainly sponsored content or placements? That’s an arena I’m interested in!

Hannah Zhang's avatar

Yep! Including this newsletter 😄

Lula's avatar

Also curious about the process of hiring assistants: how did you find them, how did you make it so they could be helpful without you holding their hand etc

Hannah Zhang's avatar

Girl, what a great question, because I could write a whole post on this, and I might! For now, Fiverr Pro has treated me well, they’ll help you find someone. If you want even less lift, I also have an affiliate link at the bottom of my posts on the agency that I use. They can definitely help you: https://go.nexuspt.io/hannahz

Lula's avatar

Curious if you could expand on influencer channel vs creator business!