Zach Evans is an entrepreneur, specializing in marketing an online piano business. His business, Piano University, has made over $1M in revenue.
He’s grown his following to an impressive 10M YouTube views and 100,000 Instagram Followers.
Q: What would you like to see your team accomplish in 2020?
In 2020 we’re going to be pushing joint ventures hard. We realize how much time and energy it’s taken us to grow our customer list, and others in the industry have done the same. By cross-promoting with others in the industry, we can create some significant spikes in revenue by having another company pitch our product to their audience in exchange for a share in the profits. In addition to this, we’re going to be testing new strategies like using text-message autoresponders, media attention for social proof, and leveraging customer testimonials into ads. We hope to hit $100,000 a month by the end of 2020.
Q: What were the most challenging areas in the early stages of the company’s growth?
The biggest challenge was simply lack of money. Because of this, I was learning and doing everything from setting up the website to video editing to running ads. There’s a learning curve on everything you do, so it takes a long time to get off the ground. The mental side of pushing through and doing a ton of work, and not knowing if after your efforts you’re even going to make any money off it was challenging.
Q: Who is your role model or hero?
Elon Musk.
Q: What is your favorite book?
The E-Myth Revisited – Michael Gerber.
Q: Do you use any specific method or system to run daily operations?
I use a combination of many different strategies I’ve gleaned throughout the years into a custom strategy that works for me. Some of the highlights include: 1. No email until afternoon 2. Before any task, ask if it’s truly important, or if you can delegate it 3. Weekly meetings with my team 4. Writing out the specific goal for the next 45 minutes and timing myself to set a deadline.
Q: Why did you choose your present industry at this time?
To be honest, I fell into it by accident. I’d played piano in college, and had been building up a YouTube channel. Once I realized I was getting a couple of thousand views a day, I figured I should start trying to monetize it. When I was learning, I was obsessed with finding strategies to learn faster and more efficiently, and I found a niche within the piano niche of people who wanted to optimize their practice and learning curve.
Q: What is the best/worst moment you can remember in your career?
Getting invited to do a TEDx Talk. I’d always watched the TED Talk videos ever since I was a kid, and it was a surreal moment getting to go up on stage.
Q: Looking back – if you could advise a younger version of yourself to do something different – what would it be?
Calm down and be patient. It’s all going to work out. I’m a type-A personality. When I was building the business, I spent a lot of unnecessary energy wondering, “is this even going to work?” instead of just trusting the process.
Follow Zach Evans on Instagram: @zachevansmusic
