Jay Clouse

Learn the strategies I used to:

• earn $2.8 million+ as a creator since 2017
• build a 138,000 subscriber YouTube channel
• achieve 2.25 million podcast downloads
• attract 58,000 followers on LinkedIn

If you're struggling to find traction as a creator—or if you're struggling monetize the attention you ARE receiving, I can help.

🧪 CLIENT WINS FROM THE LAB

"One month after joining the lab, I pulled in $21,000. So I know that sounds too good to be true. That's probably not what I'm going to do next month, because I did do something a little special. But I can say from my one month alone joining The Lab, it has been absolutely be worth it."
— Claire Bartholic, The Planted Runner

"I'm building out a little SaaS project, and Jay had some great additions for the design and also for how to how to sell it. So I implemented one of or both of those both of those additions. One of them brought me $3,000 in about a week, which was awesome."
— Jake Thomas, Creator Hooks

"So I have been in The Lan for about 45 days at this point, and while it did take me seven months to make the decision to join, I can honestly say that at this point of me being there, I have already made my money back."
— Gannon Meyer, ManyChat expert

________


👋 Hey, I’m Jay!

Eight years ago, I left the startup world to build something of my own. I didn’t believe I was creative, so I started writing a newsletter just to prove myself wrong.

Fast forward to today, and that newsletter has become Creator Science, a multi-million dollar business and one of the most trusted voices in the creator economy. 

Creator Science teaches creators a reliable path to growth through observation, experimentation, and iteration. My work spans a newsletter, podcast, membership, and YouTube channel, helping thousands of creators build sustainable businesses.

In 2023, I was named “Content Entrepreneur of the Year” by The Tilt, and the Creator Science podcast earned a 2022 Signal Award.

I’ve personally invested in 10+ startups—including Kit, RightMessage, Maven, Carry, Kick, Gumroad, and Beast Industries. Through the Creator Science Syndicate, I invite my audience to invest alongside me, supporting platforms that help creators succeed (and giving them a share in the upside).

Before Creator Science, I built and sold a community, Unreal Collective, to Pat Flynn and Smart Passive Income, where I designed their membership and community programs.

🚀 Growing your creator business? I can help.

creatorscience.com
creatorscience.com/podcast
creatorscience.com/youtube
creatorscience.com/lab

Founder

The more I've studied creators, the more I've come to one major realization:

Today's top creators aren't just artists. They're scientists.

The creators you look up to don't leave growth to chance. They are constantly forming new hypotheses, testing things, and changing direction based on the results. Not only that, but they share their results with their creator friends!

Creator Science is your new creator friend.

We do the work of compiling shared knowledge here as well as acquiring NEW knowledge. That may be through interviews, first-hand experience running this business, or off-the-record conversations.

Creator Science's content, courses, and membership community are built to help you shorten the learning curve to becoming a professional creator.

Learn more and join 17,000+ readers at creatorscience.com or click the link below 👇

I've gotta be honest with you, and you're probably not gonna like it:

The idea that you'll get this creator thing figured out in year one is a pipe dream.

I'm in year eight. I'm constantly realizing where I've been ignorant, overconfident, and lucky. It just takes time.

YouTube (and other discovery platforms) can provide glimpses of success quickly—and that's good! But a successful video doesn't give you a sustainable creator business. It's a signal of progress.

Like Samir Chaudry shares here, you're better off ASSUMING it will take 3-5 years so that you don't set yourself up for disappointment. If you get there sooner (wherever "there" is in your mind) that's amazing! But for most of us, it took years.

It probably will take years for you too.

—
👋 I'm Jay, and I help creators attract more attention, develop deeper trust, and make more money from their content.

📬 Want my help? Join 65k+ other creators learning from my newsletter → creatorscience.com

Founder of Creator Science: I help you earn more from attention | Creator of The Lab: Invite-only membership for 6-and-7-figure creators | Investor: Kit, Carry, Kick, Maven, Gumroad, Beast Industries

Freelance Cake

Freelancers want to grow, but with so many things competing for your attention, focusing is a struggle.

Marketing? Messaging? Offers? Pricing? Systems?

Once you pick the next thing to fix or build, you have to find the time to actually do it. (Client projects have a way of monopolizing our attention.)

The Freelance Cake Community helps advanced freelancers stay focused and prioritize their own biz dev in 3 specific ways:

1. Access to high-caliber people, ideas, and advice—behind a paywall

This barrier to entry ensures that you get solid advice quickly when you have issues, as well as encouragement and good ideas from a cross-disciplinary gathering of folks at your level.

2. Smaller group with narrow focus

We talk a lot about the Big Three: marketing, sales, and systems. Why? We need the first two to grow our businesses, and we need the third to enjoy our lives outside of work.

3. Emphasis on honesty and psychological safety

Working remotely and solo can be isolating and lonely. Our 9-to-5 friends don’t understand the challenges we face building our businesses. We want freelance friends who do.

The Freelance Cake Community connects you with like-minded people and provides the structure and tools you need to execute.

It’s for you if you want to keep growing without burning out.

Each week, we do coworking sessions. Each month, we also do Office Hours for questions and Hot Seat Sessions for live coaching around more acute problems and opportunities.

We also have a theme each month. For example, January 2025’s focus was a Rejection Challenge, which helped members reach out to 100 new prospects without worrying about rejection because rejection was the goal. It. Was. Amazing. 

There’s other really valuable stuff that members get, including access to the Resource Library and Business Redesign playbooks.

So you make measurable progress on your top priorities and build the business you really want for $79 per month.

Visit freelancecake.com/community to apply.

Freelance Cake Community

You know how freelance income can be unpredictable? You’re either in a feast or a famine. You’re either too busy and stressed, or you don’t have enough work and money coming in. 

Many freelancers resign themselves to riding the rollercoaster. “That’s just the way this business is,” they say with a sigh. 

If that answer isn’t good enough for you, then you’re my kind of people. 

I don’t mind the occasional roller coaster, but we don’t catch what we don’t pursue. 

I show ambitious freelancers how to become smooth operators. The right levers, habits, and beliefs help you accomplish the following with less time and effort wasted:

✅  Zeroing in on what makes you special
✅  Doubling-down in the work that brings you joy
✅  Charging more, more confidently

Really, making great money as a freelancer comes down to CLARITY, CONSISTENCY, and FOCUS. 

How consistent are you with your marketing and follow-up?

We can’t outperform our habits, and I have helped dozens of freelancers log their first-biggest-best evers by teaching them what six-figure freelancers already know and do. 

The first time I cracked six figures I did it the WRONG WAY—by feeding more and more hours into the machine. 

After recovering from burnout, I did it again the RIGHT WAY—by collecting what I call “repeatable, transferable advantages” and using them. 

With the right levers a little effort produces outsized results. 

A Nice Niche is one such lever. A positioning cheat code and juicy offers are two mores. 

You can make the freelance game easier on yourself. But you have to first believe the roller coaster isn’t the only option. 

📞 Schedule a 20-minute call with me today. Let’s chat about what you want. 

Email me at hello@freelancecake.com with the subject line “advantages” or DM me here on LinkedIn. ⬆

1-on-1 Business Coaching for Advanced Freelancers

Outfit

Fractional CMO

Balernum

What is your brand and brand strategy?

We all have brands we love and loathe, ones we find irresistible and irritating.

Yet, when it comes time to create our own, most DTC and e-commerce founders struggle to straighten out the many tangles of problem and solution, values and culture, where you’ve come from and where you’re going.

It’s no surprise that an Olympic champion turned consultant once confided to me: “I have my MBA, and I still don't know how to build my brand."

Good news: The branding process can be fun and deeply moving.

I watched one founder teary-eyed and excited as he reconnected with their company’s deeper purpose. 

And another client told me later he had closed over $1m in new business because he could finally communicate his team’s full value.

In practical terms, here’s what we do together:

✅  Define your brand’s 7 essential parts 
✅  Pinpoint the small commitments you must make to grow it
✅  Decide in advance how you’ll protect your brand’s integrity

Then, we put all that clarity into a handy guide. 

You’ll use the guide to steer your design, messaging, and hiring.

You’ll show it to potential hires and ask, “Is this something you want to be a part of?”

You’ll use it to get everyone on the same page and stay consistent. 

Brands derive their power from simplicity and consistency, and you build your brand the same way you build your reputation: by showing up in the same way.

Do you want help with that? 

📞 Schedule a 20-minute call with me today. Let’s chat about what you want. 

Email me at austin@balernum.com with the subject line “brand development” or DM me here on LinkedIn. ⬆

Fractional CMO & Brand Strategist

Moxie

Canvas / ShopCanvas.co

Wunderbar LLC

Wunderbar LLC helps businesses grow and make problems go away. To that end, we help clients gain clarity, set direction, and identify next steps. We then use blogging and content marketing to get our clients more customers. Right now, we work primarily with SaaS companies, tech firms, and consultants.

http://wunderbarworks.com/

Founder & Lead Consultant

Closeup.fm

Closeup.fm helps artists, influencers, and brands reward their most loyal fans and make more money in the process. Think MailChimp meets text messaging meets Taylor Swift baking cookies for her superfans.

Co-Founder & COO

Bright Newt

Ridiculous photo apps. Addictive games. High-quality source codes. Fun.

Morris Creative Group

· Copywriting and editing
· Account support and management
· Social Media (Facebook, Twitter, Delicious, Digg, Technorati, et al)  
· Publication relations

Writer | Social Media

University of Tennessee

• Taught two First-Year Composition 101 courses in the Fall and two First-Year Composition 102 courses in the Spring that explored rhetoric, the writing process, and research 
• Managed a variety of responsibilities from choosing curriculum and generating syllabi to developing assignment sequences and submitting grades

Graduate Teaching Associate

Every advanced freelancer I talk to wants the same thing…

Growth.

They want to keep growing their income without more stress, long hours, or burnout.

Of course, growth is never just about more money. What’s the point of the surplus if you’re too busy to enjoy it?

It’s really about creating more freedom and options.

These seasoned, focused pros want to build a strategic, future-proof business where they’re highly sought after and delivering maximum value to clients at a premium price.

They want to systematize everything to minimize work time and maximize personal time. 

The trouble is, the more driven you are, the more susceptible you are to maxing out the hours you can work.

Talented solopreneurs run into roadblocks:

- Being overcommitted and unfocused
- Overthinking & second-guessing
- Overwhelm

Eventually, you’re just over, over, over it, you know?

Symptoms like unpredictable income, complexity, and burnout have the same root cause:

**Weak or nonexistent systems and processes.**

Therein lies your opportunity:

1. Get clear on the life you want and the business that can get you there.
2. Position yourself as the obvious choice for dream clients.
3. Create juicy offers tied to their desired outcomes.
4. Build a system for getting predictable leads.
5. Give clients what they want and need.

Once you get all the pieces working together, you start earning more while working less. You’re on your way to having a $300K Flywheel. You 

That’s what happened to me. After I taking a more methodical and process-oriented approach to growth, I cracked $300,000 for the first time.

But again, it’s not about the money. It’s about the freedom and options.

Because I had time to focus on my own passion projects, I finished and published my book, Free Money. I improved my health.

My wife and I started traveling more with our kids.

What I’ve learned over 15+ years of freelancing is that advanced freelancers don’t have unique problems. But they do have unique situations.

Do you want help building the lifestyle you really want and the strategic, future-proof business that supports it?

Apply to join the private Freelance Cake community: https://bit.ly/FreelanceCakeCommunityLI.

It’s for advanced freelancers focused on strategic growth through strong systems and processes.

Austin L. Church

Serious question: If the LinkedIn algorithm were a real person, who would it be?

During yesterday’s group coaching session, I said Ben Affleck. Has done some good work but has made some mistakes recently. 

I was told Ben (may I call you Ben?) wasn’t irritating enough. 

Lauren McGill said her eleventh grade Biology teacher. Weird and nerdy. Mixed feelings about him but you need him to like you if you want an A. 

I need answers please. 

Bonus points if you tell me what you’d say or do to this real person right away.

Founder of Freelance Cake — Coaching, coworking, and community for advanced freelancers who want the growth without the burnout | Details in About ↓

By the time I reach mid-November each year, I feel pulled in two directions: Should I unplug in December or hustle to tie up loose ends?

That predictable tension eventually led to “December Zero,” a simple practice that seems obvious now:

- Identify all open projects, loose ends, and sources of heartburn.
- Ask, “What must be true in order for me to end the year with a quiet mind?”
- Do a focused two-week sprint in the first half of December.

Instead of ignoring the low-grade stress humming in the background, I use this exercise to turn it into a magnifying lens.

Stress, show me what to focus on. Show me what to do, delete, or defer.

It’s imperfect because, let’s be honest, there’s always more work to be done.

However, the intentional acts of mental decluttering and making conscious decisions about each task do give me more of the space, lightness, and quietude I want as the year comes to a close. 

While I’m with my family, my mind isn’t jerked back to what’s unfinished because I've cut loose the sandbags.

And when January rolls around it feels like a clean slate, not Month 13.

I’m doing my December Zero practice on Thursday, Nov. 20 at 11:00am ET. It takes about 45 minutes.

Want to join me?

This is part of a two-workshop sprint I’m doing in partnership with Lettuce Financial. The second workshop is on December 4 (2026 Year in Preview).

Use code Lettuce to drop the price from $79 to $33.

Here’s the sign-up link: https://luma.com/s1h2vf01.

…

Will you be doing any year-end strategic planning, and if so, what’s your favorite question to ask?

Gaining momentum feels easier around the right people. Consistency is easier, too. Why is that?

One reason is that some of us are hesitant to try something until we see it working for someone else. 

Maybe you had that one crazy friend who always volunteered to try this could-be-stupid thing first: skipping class, going blond, cliff jumping. 

When you see her head break the surface of the lake, you exhale in relief and then you throw yourself off. 

When we're younger, it's easier to find the mix of pre-validated courage, inspiration, camaraderie, and good mischief because it's part of the groups we find ourselves in, like schools, teams, and camps.

When we're older, we have to seek it out. We have to deliberately surround ourselves with people who remind us to take risks.

Another reason is simply knowledge and ideas. 

The right people know how to remove our roadblocks:

- I'm a member of Jay Clouse's Creator Science Lab community. 
- I'm a member of a mastermind group.
- I'm a member of the Freelance Cake Community.

If you want to give yourself another advantage, join a paid, private community.

Check out the most recent episode of the Freelance Cake podcast where I go in-depth on this. 

Have a listen, and if you're game, tell me what risk you need to take next.

A new Freelance Cake podcast episode just dropped. In it, I make a case for community as an advantage for advanced freelancers. Research backs it up —

Open article: the splash zone effect by Austin L. Church • 3 min read

January used to feel like Month 13 to me. I'd try to remember where I'd left off before Christmas and then tie up loose ends as quickly as possible.

That meant the implementation of any strategic planning I'd done in December got pushed to late in the month. I didn't like that. 

A couple of years ago, I decided to try something new: a simple year-end business decluttering exercise. It worked!

By "worked" I mean that I had less rattling around in my gourd during the second half of December and I felt more momentum going into January.

Check out this week's LinkedIn newsletter. 

In it, I share the step-by-step process I follow and my GSheet template, which you can copy.

Perhaps my weird brain can help yours this year. I hope so.

As much as I love my work, I don’t like how it can bleed into the rest of my life, especially during the holidays. Those of us who are self-employed d

Open article: year-end business decluttering by Austin L. Church • 2 min read

taplio

The Battle

Jay Clouse

Austin L. Church

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance ScoreJay Clouse's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreAustin L. Church's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

The Battle

Jay Clouse

Austin L. Church

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Jay Clouse's LinkedIn Performance

Performance ScoreAustin L. Church's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreJay Clouse's LinkedIn Performance