How to drastically increase your earning potential

I just got back from a 10-day vacation in Singapore and Thailand, and Zen Dev is in full effect. The vibes are good and momentum is high. Here’s what I’ve been cookin’ up like Chef Curry:

1. ICYMI: I announced that my show and podcast Reed Between The Lines is dropping on March 20th 👀
   

2. Speaking of pod life, my good friend Mark Huber just launched his show, The Proof Point. I joined him, Anthony Kennada (CEO Audience Plus), and Morgan J. Ingram for the launch episode. Mark invited me to open with the hottest of hot takes and I delivered like DoorDash. You can listen to the episode here.
   

3. Be sure to check out the new section at the bottom of this newsletter for tools I use to manage and grow my brand and business.

B2B influencer marketing is hot hot hot 🔥

As Head of Content, influencer marketing is (by far) my biggest spend and will play a huge part in growing Clari's audience and pipeline this year.

I also earned $50k last year as an influencer… and two months into 2024 I’ve already made more than that.

Playing both sides of the table, I’ve learned a lot about:

- how to structure deals
- what really drives results
- major mistakes to avoid
- how to get CMO approval for big spends

There’s LOTS growth to be had and money to be made, so this Thursday I’m hosting a live webinar with Market Better titled How to Hire and Activate B2B Influencers in Your Marketing Campaigns.

Join us if you want to create a defensible influencer strategy and get funding from your execs — or if you want to start monetizing your personal brand.

Last week I said I would share a breakdown of my B2B content strategy deck today.

But as I was writing it this week I realized that I wasn’t going to finish it in time. I don’t like breaking my word, but I respect you too much to ship you something that isn’t my best work. If I’m not 100% confident it will make an impact for you, I don’t hit publish.

So instead, this week I’m going to share a concept that has been on my mind a lot the past few weeks: how to increase your earning power.

Put simply, earning power is a person’s or company’s ability to make money.

Today I want to focus on the person. That’s you.

Until recently majority of people in the corporate workforce relied exclusively on their annual salary to make a living.

For most my career, that was me too.

But content creation — both as a B2B marketer and a creator — has changed how and how much money I make.

Five years ago I left my high-paying sales job at Gong, where I was consistently top three on the leaderboard and making the most money in my career, for a content marketing role.

As expected, I took a significant pay cut.

But fast forward to today and I make more than 2x what I made my best year as a sales rep.

Part of that is due to growing my B2B marketing career, but most of it is from what I did outside my day job.

My hope is today’s post will change how you think about your worth and how to leverage your experience to earn more cash.

That said, what follows is completely optional. You’re not wrong or ‘behind’ by sticking to your current career strategy. My advice today is certainly the harder path, but also the more rewarding one, both personally and financially.

But if you follow my advice, you WILL make more money this year, and very likely every year after.

Ready? Let’s ride.

How to grow your earning power

Let’s start with the easiest one:

You can grow your salary by excelling in your full time job

Commanding a larger salary depends on:

1. Your experience: how much time you’ve spent in a specific role or function

2. Your results: the size of your impact and how much value you create for your company.

Sure, some play the political game to get ahead. We’ve all seen it. And for some people, it works. But that’s the cheap, short-sighted way to build a career. And I’d argue it’s how you build your title, not real value.

If relying only on your 9 to 5, you have options to make more money but they’re limited. You can:

• Stay at your company for years and get small annual increases. This is isn’t “wrong,” but it is the slowest way to grow your income.

• You can move companies every two years. There’s data (that I’ve heard referenced often but never actually seen) that this is the best way to negotiate larger salaries. But that constant jumping around has it’s own risks to your reputation.

• Another option is to go into leadership. But not everyone wants to become a CMO one day or the hours and stress that go with it.

Luckily, I just outlined the “old way.”

The “new way” is catching serious momentum and is easier than ever to take advantage of.

It’s the path I’ve taken and highly recommend you consider.

The best way to grow your earning power is to build your digital reputation and audience.

Your reputation is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.

The digital aspect allows you to use the internet to access millions of people instantly and build trust at scale.

When you build your digital reputation, you increase your credibility. People, specifically executives and hiring managers, don’t just know you exist — they actively pursue you to come work for them. You can use your leverage to command a higher salary.

And I am convinced that publishing content that share your experiences, perspectives, and guidance is the #1 way to build your digital reputation. 

I believe in this so much that I’ve created multiple guides, templates, and courses teaching you these skills.

The beauty is publishing content leads to building an online audience, which gives you undeniable credibility because:

1. It’s hard to obtain. You can’t buy an audience, it has to be earned.

2. It shows that you have influence and people care what you have to say.

It takes time and energy to grow an audience, but it’s an investment that continues to compound and pay dividends the more you put into it.

I experienced this first-hand when moving from Gong to Clari. Years of working in the sales tech niche (experience and results), plus having a substantial audience helped me negotiate a healthy salary that would have been impossible otherwise.

But keep in mind, this is just how to affect your corporate salary.

Once you have a strong digital reputation and a growing audience (even if small), you can monetize in multiple ways. This is how you create new revenue streams and increase your earning potential.

This idea might be new or even intimidating. I get that. It was for me too. But it’s been truly life changing, both for my family and the people I’ve been able to help through my content. If you’re interested in going deeper, I wrote a post about how I scaled to 7 income streams.

If you remember one thing from today, let it be this:

When you have a stronger (trust) and larger (audience) reputation, your earning power increases dramatically.

But to be clear: Life is not all about making as much money possible.

At least not to me.

It’s worthwhile to do things simply for joy, for the experience, and to operate in a way that you enjoy even if that means not making every dollar possible.

But I am “a capitalist with a soul” as my friend Chris Merrill says. I enjoy doing everything I just outlined, and I take pride in getting compensated for it. It’s how I support my family, enjoy my desired lifestyle in the Bay Area, and invest money in our future.

I hope this post inspired you to consider ways to increase your earning potential. And if you have any questions as you get started, give me a shout.

Holler at you next Saturday,
Devin

PS: If you found this post insightful, you can help me grow my newsletter by forwarding it to one person with a quick “You’ll love this newsletter. Check it out.”

Three ways I can help you scale your content and business

1. Want to partner with me? If you’d like to promote your business to my newsletter, LinkedIn, and podcast audiences, have me speak at your event, or create branded content, let’s chat. Hit reply to talk details.
   

2. Content That Converts Ebook: This 154-page ebook reveals over 30 plays for creating content that grows your reach, audience, and pipeline.
   

3. Content Strategy for LinkedIn: This ~1 hour video course shows you how to build your personal brand, create highly engaging content, and accelerate your career. Use code “CSR” at check out for the steepest discount available.

🛠️ Tools I use, love, and highly recommend 

If you’re looking for ways to better manage and grow your business, here’s a look at my tech stack. (Note: these are affiliate links but I would recommend without the commission)

1. I use Beehiiv to write and grow my newsletter for two reasons: it’s easy to use and the growth features are incredible. Launch or grow your newsletter with beehiiv here.
   

2. I use ClickUp as my project management system to manage my entire business. I’m saving time and money through automations and their AI feature, ClickUp Brain. Start your free trial.
   

3. SuperHuman has been my email productivity tool for 2+ year and recommend it to everyone who’s looking to own their email and actually reach inbox zero. Start using SuperHuman and get your 1st month free.
   

4. I recently started using Webflow for web hosting, and now I’m moving all WordPress sites here because I like the functionality and flexibility. You can check Webflow out here.