Featured Solopreneur Patrick Curtis: “My Goal Is to Hit 5 Million Page Views In a Month”

This is “Featured Solopreneur,” an ongoing series that gives all of us a glimpse at how other solopreneurs operate their small businesses. Click Here to read more Solopreneur Success Stories.

Name of solopreneur:
Patrick Curtis

Name of business and city:
Wall Street Oasis, Boston (I’m currently in Buenos Aires, Argentina)

Web site address:
www.WallStreetOasis.com

Type of business:
Online community for finance professionals

When did you officially go into business?
May 2006

What was the best thing you did when you were starting up your business?
I made sure that I focused on a niche I knew well AND I made sure that it was fun. That niche was investment banking and the fun was making monkeys the overarching theme of the community (it’s what people in the industry call the junior analysts). Sometimes being a little quirky and bringing some “flavor” to a serious industry makes you more memorable.

What is a mistake that you made that you have learned from?
I underestimated the importance of site performance and took too long getting the site on a more powerful server and themed properly. As soon as the site performance improved, traffic jumped and we’ve never looked back.

What is your biggest current challenge in the business and what are doing to try to solve it?
We always struggle to have the right balance of experienced professionals vs. students trying to break into the industry. As more and more students learn about the resource, it is important that we reward our most knowledgeable users so that they also get value from helping others. This doesn’t have to be money, but it should be status and respect (which many people appreciate).

In order to make sure we keep a lot of knowledgeable (but busy) professionals posting, we give them certification and we establish a peer-review system where the best users jump up in rank even faster (for good comments, users can award a silver banana to another user, which is worth three banana points. For bad comments, users can throw monkey shit at that user, which hurts the author of that comment and drops their status). This peer-ranking system has caused some controversy but has also worked as a great way for new users to immediately know who they should be listening to and who they should be ignoring. We are always looking at new ways to get more helpful professionals active to help out the new chimps.

What are your goals for the next 12 months?
My goal is to hit 5 million page views in 1 month (we are at 2.5 million now) and continue to form partnerships with good affiliates that will offer great services to my community (at a discount!)

Where do you want to be with the business in five years?
I would like to create several other niche communities and form a portfolio under the Oasis brand. My next project is jdOasis.com (for the legal profession) and based on what I learned with Wall Street Oasis, with the proper planning and execution I am confident we can create another active and helpful community.

What are your main software programs?
Drupal, Unfuddle

What lifestyle choices have you had to make to stay in business?
None, the community has always funded itself and I worked full time until business school two years ago. While getting my MBA I focused most of my energy on building the community and finally monetizing the traffic I had built up.

What are your strategies for staying competitive?
Keep a strong community feel, deliver great content and great services (resume reviews, mock interviews, financial modeling training, etc.).

Do you need a second household income to support your lifestyle?
No, this is my only source of income.

If your business should fail, what is your fall back position?
I could always go back into finance (private equity or investment banking), but more likely I would join a startup because I love the thought of being part of a small team and outworking the competition.

If you could start your career all over again, what would you do differently? Why?
Nothing. Working 100-hour weeks in investment banking and then getting fired after six months in private equity is exactly what inspired me to create Wall Street Oasis. I was young, overworked, and naïve–a common problem for aspiring “financiers.” Sometimes getting your butt kicked can teach you a lot. Coming out of college, the earlier you realize life really is not fair the better off you’ll be accepting the challenges ahead.

What’s your advice for aspiring solopreneurs?
My advice is to become an expert in a very narrow niche and serve that niche better than anyone else. Whether that is a blog and/or community, don’t worry the form it takes, but do add value before trying to sell anything. It has taken me four years to get the business where it is today. If you are looking to make money without work, don’t bother. If you are looking to make money on your own terms, be excited to wake up every morning and you are passionate about your business–then go for it!

Also, stop waiting and just start something today (anything you are passionate about). It can be related to a hobby, work, anything. The worst that can happen is you fail; with the cost of starting something online so low nowadays, the only real risk is hurting your ego and learning a lot about yourself so you can execute better on your next venture.

Are you glad you became a solopreneur? Why or why not?
Absolutely 100%. I just moved down to Buenos Aires. Why? Because I felt like getting my Spanish back and traveling. Working for someone else would not have given me this freedom. I can work when I want to work. If I am focused on something and I put in a 15-hour day, great. If I am tired and only want to do a 1 hour day or travel for a week, that also works.