They quit their day jobs: 8 creators and the income mix that made it work

What makes this useful: A sourced EarnThread field guide written for creators turning attention into an owned business.

Eight creators who quit their day jobs, and what paid the bills afterwards. The short answer: for almost all of them, most of the money came from things they sold themselves, such as courses, paid newsletters, coaching and templates. Platform ad money and brand deals were extras. Below you'll find each person's previous job, when they left, how their income was made up, and the figures they've shared publicly, each linked to its source.

One caution applies to every number here. These figures are self-reported revenue, not profit. Each creator shared them in an interview, a newsletter or their own marketing, and none have been independently audited. They also cover different years, so they show how each income was built rather than what anyone earns today.

Key takeaways

• In most of these eight stories, the creator's own products, such as courses, paid newsletters and templates, earned far more than platform pay.
• Platforms like TikTok, YouTube, LinkedIn and Instagram brought the audience; the income came from offers sold to that audience.
• Several had a buffer before quitting: Louise Cooney saved six months' living costs and Tori Dunlap had $100,000 saved.
• All figures are self-reported revenue, not profit, and cover different years.
• Kajabi reports its average six-figure earner had 1,000 to 10,000 followers and 309 paying customers, so a big following isn't the starting point.

The eight creators who quit their day jobs, at a glance

Course and product sellers: Norton, Welsh and Abdaal

Three of the eight built their income on courses and digital products, with the platform acting as the shop window.

Kat Norton (Miss Excel): courses made up about 95% of income

Kat Norton spent four years at a consulting firm teaching Microsoft Excel. She started posting Excel tips on TikTok in June 2020 and sold her first course that November. Her last day "in corporate America" was 1 February 2021, she wrote in a CNBC Make It piece republished by NBC Boston (opens in a new tab) in February 2022.

Income mix: courses accounted for 95% of her income, with individual courses priced from $44 to $397 and bundles from $397 to $997. The rest came from corporate Excel training and motivational speaking.

Reported figures (sales, not profit): more than $1 million in sales after leaving her job, and $100,000 in sales in a single day in October 2021. Around January 2021 she was making about $15,000 a month from sales. The article doesn't give her costs or profit.

What stands out: her audience came from short-form video, but almost none of her income did. TikTok was where people found her. The courses were what they paid for.

Justin Welsh: $5 million in revenue from products, no ads

Justin Welsh was chief revenue officer at a venture-backed company, according to his own About page (opens in a new tab). He says he helped build two companies past $1 billion in valuation. He started his solo business on 1 August 2019.

Income mix: courses and digital products, including LinkedIn OS (building a personal brand on LinkedIn), Content OS (a weekly content system) and the Creator MBA. His Kajabi creator story (opens in a new tab) says one one-click upsell grew into a product bringing in $22,000 a month in recurring revenue.

Reported figures: over $5 million in revenue in 1,548 days, a reported 92% margin and "zero ads", according to the Kajabi page. His About page invites visitors to "join 200,000+ readers" of his weekly email.

What stands out: he built a following on LinkedIn and then sold products to it, with no paid advertising. His email list is the asset he controls.

Ali Abdaal: a course earned three times his Skillshare income

Ali Abdaal worked as a doctor while building his YouTube channel. In 2021 he worked only two shifts, for about $600 in total. In December 2021 he left medicine to create full-time, saying the business was "sufficiently profitable that continuing to work as a doctor didn't make financial sense," according to The Publish Press (January 2022) (opens in a new tab). The newsletter is drawing on figures he published in his own videos.

Income mix in 2021: Part-Time YouTuber Academy (his course) brought in $2.5 million. Skillshare brought in $800,000, and brand deals and sponsorships $430,000. YouTube AdSense also contributed, but no figure was given.

Reported figures: total business revenue of over $4.1 million in 2021.

What stands out: YouTube is his best-known platform, yet his own course brought in more than his Skillshare income and brand deals put together.

Paid newsletter writers: Gannon and Rachitsky

Two replaced a salary with readers paying them directly every month.

Emma Gannon (UK): a paid newsletter that replaced a podcast

Emma Gannon started her career at Condé Nast and the online magazine The Debrief. She left magazines in 2016, when budgets were being cut and print titles were closing, according to Press Gazette (August 2023) (opens in a new tab).

Income mix: her newsletter, The Hyphen, moved to Substack in March 2022. It had more than 27,000 subscribers, of whom more than 1,000 were paying £6.99 a month or £65 a year. She also writes books. Her podcast, Ctrl Alt Delete, ran for six years and reached 12 million downloads, but she ended it in June 2023. She said Substack brought in about the same money or more.

Reported figures: Press Gazette names her among Substack's "six-figure earners" but doesn't give an exact figure.

What stands out: about 1,000 paying readers was enough to replace a long-running, popular podcast as a source of income. Her subscribers pay her directly, in pounds, every month.

Lenny Rachitsky: about $65,000 a year from roughly 250 paying readers

Lenny Rachitsky spent seven years as a product manager at Airbnb. After leaving, he wrote a free newsletter for about 10 months, then added a paid tier at $15 a month. He described the launch in a Substack post (August 2020) (opens in a new tab).

Income mix: a paid newsletter. A few months into the free newsletter he had about 9,000 subscribers; when he went paid, he got about 200 paid sign-ups in the first couple of days, rising to around 250 after a reminder.

Reported figures: "about $65K a year before fees" a few months after the paid launch.

What stands out: a few hundred paying readers were enough for a meaningful income at a $15 monthly price. He spent the first ten months building trust for free.

Multi-stream builders: Dunlap and Jimenez

Two spread their income across several streams so that no single one had to carry the business.

Tori Dunlap: savings first, then several income streams

Tori Dunlap worked as a digital marketing manager in Seattle after college. She set herself a goal of saving $100,000 by 25 and reached it in 2019. Her Wikipedia entry (opens in a new tab) cites CNBC reporting that she quit her marketing job by 25.

Income mix: webinars and programmes sold through Her First $100K, financial coaching, speaking, the Financial Feminist podcast (launched May 2021), corporate sponsorships and a book, also called _Financial Feminist_.

Reported figures: citing _The New York Times_ (April 2022), Wikipedia says her business grossed more than $3.4 million in 2021 and that her sponsored videos earned $15,000 each that year. The company had 12 employees in 2021, so gross revenue here is a long way from personal income.

What stands out: the number of streams. No one stream had to carry the business.

Rachel Jimenez: seven streams, including an Etsy store

Rachel Jimenez quit her job as a higher education administrator about five years before a June 2025 CNBC Make It piece republished by NBC San Diego (opens in a new tab), so around 2020.

Income mix: she says she has seven income streams and names four: an Etsy store, a blog, real estate investments and stock appreciation. Her Etsy store was bringing in thousands of dollars a month about nine months after it launched.

Reported figures: an average of $14,000 a month in what she calls passive income. The article doesn't say whether that's revenue or profit. Part of it comes from investments, not creator work.

What stands out: her Etsy store took about nine months to reach thousands of dollars a month. It wasn't an overnight replacement for a salary.

Brand-led and blog-led: Louise Cooney in Ireland

One built on a blog, Instagram and brand campaigns, with a savings buffer in place before she left.

Louise Cooney (Ireland): six months of living costs saved first

Louise Cooney is from Limerick and studied communications at DCU. She gave up her job in 2017, at 24, to blog full-time. The Irish Examiner (March 2021) (opens in a new tab) doesn't name the job. Before quitting she saved six months' worth of living expenses, which she called a "calculated risk."

Income mix: her blog, Instagram (214,000 followers at the time), video content and brand campaigns.

Reported figures: the article says she has been cited as one of Ireland's highest-earning content creators, but it gives no income figures. We haven't added any.

What stands out: of the eight, she's the only one whose source mentions a savings buffer measured in months. Her income mix also leans more on brand work than most of the others here.

The pattern: their own products paid, platforms brought the audience

Put the eight side by side and the same shape keeps appearing:

1. 01
   Their own products made most of the money

   Norton's courses made up 95% of her income. Abdaal's course outsold his brand deals almost six to one. Welsh sells only his own products. Gannon and Rachitsky are paid directly by readers.

2. 02
   The platform was where people found them

   TikTok for Norton, YouTube for Abdaal, LinkedIn for Welsh, Instagram for Cooney. In each case the platform's own payout plays little or no part in the story.

3. 03
   More than one stream

   Dunlap, Jimenez and Abdaal each had several. That matches wider survey data. Kajabi reported that 75% of its six-figure creators run multiple revenue streams, five on average, and that the average six-figure earner had about 4,000 email contacts and 309 paying customers, according to Net Influencer (August 2025) (opens in a new tab). The same report put the average six-figure earner's following at between 1,000 and 10,000.

4. 04
   A buffer before the jump

   Cooney saved six months' living costs. Dunlap had $100,000 saved. Norton was making about $15,000 a month in sales before her last day.

These are survivors' stories, though. For every creator who quit and made it work there are many who didn't, and their stories rarely get written up. Kajabi's State of Creators 2024 report (opens in a new tab), reported by Net Influencer, found that two-thirds of creators rely on a single revenue source.

If you're still in your day job, start with the first point: sell one thing of your own. Our guides to choosing your first digital product, building an email list with a lead magnet and combining income streams cover the groundwork.

EarnThread gives you a storefront for your bio link, with downloads, coaching bookings, memberships and lead magnets. Payments go into your own Stripe account, and you can see which post drove each sale. The Launch plan is $0 a month with a 5% fee per sale, so you can test an offer while you're still employed. Start free.

Frequently asked questions

How much do you need to earn before quitting your job to be a creator?

There's no single figure, and this isn't financial advice. The creators here had either steady sales before leaving, like Kat Norton's roughly $15,000 a month, or savings, like Louise Cooney's six months of living costs. Compare your monthly costs with the income you already earn from your own offers before deciding.

What do full-time creators earn most of their money from?

For most of the eight creators profiled here, their own products: courses, paid newsletters, coaching or templates. Ali Abdaal's 2021 course revenue of $2.5 million was nearly six times his $430,000 from brand deals, and Kat Norton said courses were 95% of her income. Platform payouts played a small part.

Are creator income figures revenue or profit?

Almost always revenue. Every figure in this article was reported by the creators themselves, as sales or gross revenue, and none were independently audited. Tori Dunlap's business grossed over $3.4 million in 2021 but had 12 employees, so personal income would be far lower than the headline number.

Can you become a full-time creator with a small audience?

It's possible with paying customers rather than a big following. Lenny Rachitsky reported about $65,000 a year from roughly 250 paying newsletter readers. Kajabi says its average six-figure earner had between 1,000 and 10,000 followers and 309 paying customers. Most surveyed creators still earn far less.