The Flywheel Behind Tim Ferriss’s $100M Net Worth

Read time: 3 minutes

Good morning! It's Friday, July 28th - Today we’re exploring Tim Ferriss’s career and how he was able to combine investing, book sales, and podcasting into a $100M net worth!

THE FEATURE

The Flywheel Behind Tim Ferriss’s $100M Net Worth

Tim Ferriss’ is a modern jack of all trades, finding success as an entrepreneur, investor, author, podcaster, and lifestyle guru.

But what’s really fueled his $100M net worth is how he’s tied together all these seemingly disparate careers into a single business flywheel that promotes growth across all ventures– let’s dig in.

Tim Ferriss’s Business Ventures

After graduating from Princeton in 2000, Ferriss landed a job in tech sales but was frustrated with the monotony of his 12-hour workdays. During one of those long workdays, he researched the viability of starting a sports nutrition company and estimated it would only cost $5,000 if he outsourced everything from product to ad design.

That was how Ferriss’ first company BrainQuicken was born. Within two years, he was making $40K a month by selling a dietary supplement that enhanced neural health and athletic performance. In 2009, Ferriss sold BrainQuicken for an undisclosed amount estimated to be in the 8-figure range.

After the sale of his company, Ferriss had an open schedule and a sizeable amount of capital to start new ventures.

Angel Investor

With the business acumen gained from founding BrainQuicken, Ferriss had an eye for companies and products that appealed to market demand. He was one of the first investors in companies like Facebook, Twitter, Uber, Alibaba, and more. His stock value in those companies net him ~$10M per year.

Author

Before selling BrainQuicken, Ferriss was only working a few hours a week due to his mastery of defusing responsibility throughout the company. He tells entrepreneurs how to find similar success in his five best-selling books, such as The 4-Hour Workweek which has sold over 2M copies.  

Blogger

With fame from successful investing and book sales, Ferriss created the “Tim Blog” to bring more traffic to his online brand. His blog provides entrepreneurs with the latest advice to tackle current market trends and generates 366K in monthly traffic. Today, this blog mostly serves to promote his extremely lucrative podcast.

Podcaster

The reputation Ferriss built through investing and book sales basically guaranteed the success of his podcast since it provided him access to pick the minds of Mark Zuckerberg, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and other celebrities and business tycoons. There are 5 sponsor slots per podcast and each slot can cost up to $50K per advertiser– meaning that Ferriss can make up to $250K per episode.

The Flywheel

The “flywheel” concept was created by Jim Collins in his classic business book “Good to Great” and describes how the most successful companies have interlocking components that each feed into one another to generate momentum.

If we look at Ferriss’ various business ventures, the flywheel effect is clear. He built his initial reputation by founding BrainQuicken and investing in lucrative tech startups. With newfound credibility, he could release books, blogs, and podcasts. In turn, the constant cash flow from royalties and ad revenue allows him to invest in new startups and repeat his virtuous cycle of success.