How I Made 10k in 3 Weeks as a Broke College Student

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When I was a college student, I was very unsure about my career path. I changed my major a couple of times and was pretty lost.

I knew I wanted to make money and had a number of different side hustles but still didn’t know what direction to go in after college.

In my research, I was lucky enough to stumble upon @WallStPlayboys and learned about the importance of learning sales.

This advice transferred to other areas of my life and certainly did not let me down.

My job was to walk business to business on campus, get past the gatekeeper and set a meeting with the decision-maker, and then close him on digital advertising with our company.

The gatekeeper was usually the manager on duty and the owner was almost always the decision-maker.

My summer was fucking dope.

Many of my friends were all wearing suits in hot weather going to corporate internships that they hated.

I’d go out prospecting for leads rocking shorts, boat shoes, and a polo strolling business to business with a smile on my face.

I’d set up meetings with business owners who I got to network with and then after I got off work I’d start pregaming.

Summer was still fun on campus so I was able to hit the bars with my boys and then wake up and do it all over the next morning.

I had a 3-week span where I closed a few deals with a college merchandising company, several big chain restaurants, and an event planning company.

From this alone, I was able to net 10k in pay + commissions, and that funded my entire summer's shenanigans.

While I had an amazing summer, I was able to learn some incredible lessons from doing this job.

Door-to-door sales will humble you. I got verbally shit on in-person every single day but every time I closed a deal it only made me hungrier.

Here are a few of the lessons learned:

1. Rejection is nothing, once you're repeatedly exposed to it you really stop giving a fuck about it.

If you're scared of getting rejected on the phone or via email you are soft.

Getting rejected in person is a different ballgame but it too gets easier with exposure.

2. Use your age to your advantage.

These business owners were 50+ and were wasting money on newspaper ads.

I sold them on the fact that I was their target demographic and that I knew where our demo's attention was going and how to convert it.

It certainly wasn't newspapers.

3. Many businesses waste marketing dollars and barely even track ROI.

I was shocked when I asked "how much did that investment in X generate you?" because they NEVER knew the answer to my question.

There’s a lot of money to be made here if you can position yourself correctly.

4. Position yourself as an authority figure.

I was able to gain the business owner’s trust by surfacing their pain points, revealing the flaws in their marketing efforts, and providing a solution that I was an authority on.

Case studies and displays of success helped too.

At the time, I was a college kid selling social media ads to boomer business owners on campus.

They were trying to sell to college kids but knew nothing about social media.

Growing up in the social media generation was a HUGE advantage for me and I let them know that.

Postgrad I was able to leverage this internship into a B2B enterprise software sales job.

I then used my sales skills to start selling products online which was a seamless transition.

You can never go wrong learning how to sell, it has opened so many doors for me.

If this thread helped at all or you’re interested in learning more about sales, eCom, or my journey in general then follow me for more stories and insights like this.