Welcome to The Hustle Stack, your weekly hit of smart marketing plays, simple side hustles to grow your income without eating your time, founder hacks, and much more.
No fluff, no filler, just valuable, actionable insights you can skim, save, or stack into wins.
Let’s dive in. 🚀
This Week’s Hustle Stack:
Marketing Play of the Week: Steal the Scroll Strategy
The $2K+ PM Simple Side Hustle Hack: The Local Lead Machine
This Week’s Hustle News: AI Gets Personal + TikTok Goes Local
Tool of the Week: Notion Sites
Time-Saving Hack: The Two-Tab Rule
Founder Success Story: Saravana Kumar of Kovai.co (Bootstrapped SaaS to $10M+ ARR)
🎯 Marketing Play of the Week
“Steal the Scroll” Strategy
Ever notice how your thumb has commitment issues? It scrolls faster than your brain can process. So here’s the play: make your content impossible to scroll past—literally.
The Move
Run short-form videos or static posts that pause the scroll in the first 1.5 seconds by using pattern disruption—something unexpected, funny, or visually weird. Think:
A plumber yelling “DON’T HIRE ME” (then explaining why good plumbers are always booked)
A SaaS founder duct-taping their laptop shut (“We built AI so good… we’re scared of it”)
A fitness brand opening with “This pre-workout ruined my marriage”
Why It Works
The brain can’t ignore contrast. A pattern interrupt forces attention, and attention = the hardest currency in marketing. After that, it’s your job to pivot to value fast—usually within 3 seconds.
Pro Tip
Use the “Shock–Hook–Pivot” formula:
Shock – Unexpected opener (gets attention)
Hook – “Here’s what’s actually going on”
Pivot – Drop the value, CTA, or brand moment
Example
“I just deleted my company’s website. On purpose. Here’s why landing pages are dead and what’s working now…”
Congrats, you just bought yourself 10 more seconds of someone’s life and in marketing, that’s basically eternal love.
💵 The $2K+ PM Simple Side Hustle Hack
The “Local Lead Machine”
💡 Concept
Build a local business directory or review site in your area (e.g. Best Plumbers in Austin, Top Wedding Venues in Gold Coast). Rank it on Google for local searches, then sell monthly feature spots or lead referrals to small businesses who want exposure.
Think of it as your mini Yelp, except you actually make money.
🧱 The Build
Time Needed: 1 weekend to build, 2–4 weeks to rank locally.
Startup Cost: ~$100 total
Domain + hosting: $30
Website builder or WordPress theme: $40
Local SEO tool or Google Ads test: $30
Skills Required:
Basic WordPress or website builder knowledge
Copywriting (to make local listings sound good)
Minimal SEO (you can learn the basics in an hour on YouTube)
Steps:
Pick a niche with high-intent local searches (e.g. “wedding photographers,” “roof repair,” “dog groomers”).
Build a clean one-page site with short profiles for 10 local businesses.
Add SEO juice: keyword in title, meta, H1, and a few blog posts like “Top 5 [niche] in [city].”
Contact businesses to offer:
$100/month for a “Featured Listing”
or $10–$20 per lead you send them.
Once it ranks, it’s mostly passive income—update once a month, collect payments.
🔢 The Math
10 local businesses × $200/month = $2,000/month
If you charge per lead instead: 100 leads at $20 = $2,000/month
Costs after setup? Practically $0.
Profit margin: 95%+
🧠 Real Talk
Small local businesses suck at marketing—but they love paying for visibility that gets them calls. Build one site like this, and you’ll realize: it’s easier to sell exposure than to sell expertise.
📰 This Week’s Hustle News
AI Gets Personal + TikTok Goes Local
🤖 1. OpenAI’s “Custom GPTs” Are Exploding
Everyone and their dog is now building mini AI tools with ChatGPT’s “Custom GPT” feature—turning side hustlers into software founders overnight. You can create a GPT that writes ad copy, analyzes data, or helps users plan content in under 30 minutes—no coding needed.
What This Means for You:
You no longer need a developer to launch a “software business.” Make a niche GPT (like “Wedding Caption Generator” or “Landscaper Quote Assistant”) and promote it on TikTok or Gumroad. You’re now in the AI game—for free.
📍 2. TikTok Tests “Nearby” Feed
TikTok’s latest experiment, the “Nearby” tab, is about to flip local discovery on its head. Users in select regions can now browse trending videos within their area. That means more visibility for local businesses, events, and creators.
What This Means for You:
If you sell any local product or service, this is gold. Start adding your city name or location hashtags in every video. TikTok is quietly becoming the new local SEO—and early adopters are already seeing spikes in foot traffic and DMs.
⚡Tool of the Week
Notion Sites
💡 Highlight
Notion just went full send on website creation. With Notion Sites, you can now turn any Notion page into a slick, public-facing website—no coding, no setup, no extra tools. Think portfolio, product page, digital resume, or mini landing page—all built in minutes.
🧠 Mini Case
Let’s say you’ve got a side hustle helping local businesses with social media. You spin up a Notion Site in an hour:
One page for your services and prices
One for client testimonials
One for a contact form (via Typeform embed)
Now you’ve got a professional site that looks intentional—not “DIY broke founder.”
Total time: 45 minutes
Total cost: $0
Total vibe: startup that means business.
Why It’s a Win:
Speed is leverage. Most hustlers stall at “I need a website.” Now you don’t. You need a Notion page, an idea, and a caffeine buzz.
⏳ Time-Saving Hack
The “Two-Tab Rule”
here’s the move, never let your browser turn into a digital landfill. You only get two active tabs when you’re working:
The thing you’re doing.
The thing you’re researching.
Everything else? Bookmark it or dump it in a Notion “Later” list.
Sounds dumb. Works insanely well. You’ll go from distracted squirrel to laser-focused assassin in 10 minutes flat.
Bonus: pair it with a 10-minute focus timer (like Pomofocus) and watch your daily output double without feeling like you worked harder.
Try it today—close those 27 “just-in-case” tabs and see how quiet your brain gets.
🚀 Founder Success Story
Saravana Kumar of Kovai.co (Bootstrapped SaaS to $10M+ ARR)
The backstory:
Saravana Kumar was a tech consultant working with enterprise systems (especially Microsoft BizTalk) when he spotted a gap: tools for monitoring, analytics, and operations around BizTalk were clunky, scattered, or non-existent. He built BizTalk360 in 2011 to fill that gap.
He launched it essentially solo, from a tier-2 city (Coimbatore, India) instead of chasing the “startup capitals.”
Over time, he added more products (Document360, Serverless360, etc.), scaled the team, and stayed entirely bootstrapped—no VC money. Kovai.co
By 2020–2021, Kovai.co crossed $10 million annual recurring revenue and had multiple enterprise customers (Virgin, Mc…, etc.)
In 2025, the company did something bold: it distributed ~$1.62 million (INR ~14.5 crore) across 140 employees as loyalty bonuses (for those who’d stayed 3+ years).
🔑 Lessons You Can Steal
Build in your niche first — then expand
Saravana didn’t start with “generic SaaS.” He started with a domain he understood deeply (BizTalk). That gave him expertise, credibility, and a product that solved real pain.
Once BizTalk360 gained traction, he leveraged that to branch into adjacent tools (cloud monitoring, documentation platforms).
Takeaway: Don’t try to be everything at once. Plant your flag where you know the terrain — then widen your territory.
Stay bootstrapped to preserve control & discipline
No external funding meant he couldn’t hide behind “we’ll scale later.” He had to make every dollar count.
It forced prioritization, customer focus, revenue-centric thinking, and smart hiring.
Takeaway: If you can skip VC early, you’ll learn to build with profitability in mind — and retain the decision power to do things your way.
Leverage your location & community — not ignore them
Coimbatore wasn’t “Silicon Valley”—it had fewer distractions, lower costs, and staff who were deeply loyal.
He built a talent pipeline locally (colleges, networks) rather than fighting the war for talent in expensive metros.
Takeaway: Don’t assume you need to relocate. The edges (tier-2 cities, under-built ecosystems) are where value can be created affordably.
Think long game with people incentives
That multi-million loyalty bonus in 2025 wasn’t just generosity — it’s a signal. It binds culture, retention, and trust into the company’s DNA.
In startups, the people are often the only reliable asset. Rewarding loyalty (not just performance) builds a moat of team culture.
Takeaway: As you scale, bake in loyalty incentives early. Money is more motivating when it’s real, meaningful, and shared.
👋 That’s a wrap for this week’s Hustle Stack. 👋
Thanks for reading, your time’s valuable, and we aim to make every issue worth it.
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See you next week with more sharp plays, side hustles, and founder wins. 🚀
Stay sharp,
The Hustle Stack Team