Thomas Frank - A Case Study
Thomas Frank is a productivity guru.
As a YouTuber, author, musician, and entrepreneur who has been helping students and professionals be more productive since 2010, Frank has carved a niche for himself in the productivity space helping millions of people across topics ranging from effective studying and learning, productivity, personal finance, and fitness.
His main YouTube channel has over 2.85 million subscribers and more than 160 million views.
His second channel, Thomas Frank Explains, is the largest Notion education channel with more than 127k subscribers.
Thomas is also a co-founder of Nebula, a creator-owned streaming service with over 600,000 active users.
On top of that, he also runs the College Info Geek blog, which covers topics in self-improvement ranging from effective studying & learning, productivity, personal finance, and fitness.
Beyond the productivity, optimization, and the Notion wizardry, in his free time, Thomas is a guitarist, singer, and avid Magic: The Gathering player. Whereas his music is public, I can’t comment on his Magic: The Gathering collection, but needless to say, he’s got interests outside of the productive work space.
Today, we’re going to talk about how Thomas Frank has created a space in the productivity world. He certainly has the professional accolades to consider that accomplished but the interesting and impressive thing about it from my perspective is his ability to implement that same intentionality in his personal life.
So we’re going to do a deep dive on what it means to be a productivity guru, what makes Thomas Frank such a unique case, and how you can implement what he talks about into your life - ultimately, what are the takeaways worth spending time to implement or learn….in my humble opinion.
Productivity.
The man seems to eat and breathe productivity.
It is pervasive in pretty much every non-artistic/creative endeavour that he seems to do. I’m generalizing though because Thomas Frank Music content doesn’t speak too much on “optimizing music”
Whether that is optimizing his strategy for the online game Among Us, or optimizing his actionable list for his video projects for business, he appears to apply the same attitude towards efficient organization and actionable planning.
And we can see that as Thomas Frank has grown as an individual he has pointed this proficiency to efficiency and optimization at different things.
First, optimizing for studying and school.
Then, optimizing for business and video production for his YouTube channel.
Applying that further towards more general life skills like personal finance, productive iOS tips, productive Windows tips, and optimizing your fitness and well-being, the theme of productive and thoughtful consideration across the board becomes apparent.
YouTube.
Split up into a main, secondary, tertiary, and quaternary channels, Thomas Frank generated content in the optimal medium for contemporary consumption.
Whether that’s long-form discussions about bad habits, generating new habits, adapting to contemporary issues with productivity (work from home, phone addictions), specific tutorials about Notion, or the accompaniment videos footage for podcast content, there’s a ton to unpack.
College Info Geek.
Now by the time I stumbled upon Thomas Frank, I had graduated so less relevant to me. But as always, the material was focused on productivity and optimizing of time. Whether this was reviewing effective methods of focusing, studying, and retaining information to more adulting responsibilities like doing your taxes in college, enrolling in summer school, or picking a school study major, the site seems like a catch-all for the college life experience.
Podcast - College Info Geek & The Inforium.
Now on hold indefinitely, the podcast started as an accompaniment to the College Info Geek site. First being a college info geek podcast, then transitioning to the inforium, a stand-alone co-hosted podcast, the podcast library boasts an archive of 325 episodes in total.
Book - 10 Steps to Earning Awesome Grades.
Again, not something relevant to my life because I found Thomas Frank after my student career ended. But it makes sense as a book-form version of the same material to meet views/listeners/readers where they prefer.
Notion.
Last but not least, you can’t talk about Thomas Frank without speaking about Notion.
Thomas Frank has carved out for himself a niche in the world of Notion because of his proficiency with the program and the organizational benefits he derives from using it as a second brain. The literal name of one of his templates is “Ultimate Brain for Notion”.
It keeps him accountable, creates deadlines, is a hub for his business team, and automates a significant portion of the standard logistical needs.
It essentially allows him to offload the cognitive minutiae in order to buy him time to focus on the larger picture aspects of steering his business.
Because he is a walking example of the benefits of notion and his productivity-forward reputation, he has carved for himself a niche content interest - productivity with Notion. He is synonymous with the brand and applies it to both his professional and personal life.
And whether it is Notion or any other program, the notion is that he successfully distinguished himself as a productivity guru in his capacity to optimize his life around a platform. It could be any platform, but he had the prowess to learn Notion and apply it to meet his productivity needs.
So Here’s The General Blueprint.
Be Helpful.
Regardless of whether Thomas Frank generates content about college, about finances, about picking courses, or video games, the overarching theme seems to be a tendency to communicate efficiency and ease. He wants to help answer questions and be a resource for others.
Be Productive
Provide an efficient and effective source of help. It isn’t helpful if the information you provide isn’t better, clear, or helpful. So being productive is the follow-up to being helpful. It’s just optimizing that process.
Build a niche. Broaden afterwards.
It started off as productivity for college students. Then it grew into productivity for his YouTube business. Then it generalized to productivity in broader terms. The broadening afterwards was a direct consequence of his audience growing and broadening beyond school. Again, his voice grew as he grew. He no longer was a student in college and so his subject matter shifted. This was echoed by his own statement transitioning from the College Info Geek podcast - “We'll still be focusing on several of the same areas as before, but we've moved out from under the college label to add a bit more flexibility to what we can talk about.”
Be Present and Accessible.
There is content in audio form, video form, and written form. I think that’s worth acknowledging because there is a ubiquitousness to it. There’s an intentional effort in creating content where his audience is.
For me, this is a case study of what needs to happen for me to become helpful. I feel like I have good ideas and whether they are my own ideas, regurgitated ideas or modified ideas with my own personal spin or take, I think I owe it to myself to create content on the material.
Whether it turns into something is a different thing but it’s worth me trying.
And if you feel like I missed something or perhaps that you have a better summary or masterclass on Thomas Frank’s productivity genius, let me know! I’d love to hear it!