I made $1 million in revenue last year selling project-management templates. Here's how I built up this new income stream in just 2 years.

• Thomas Frank used Notion to plan YouTube videos and later started playing around with the platform.
• Last year, selling his two Notion templates generated $1 million in revenue.
• He describes becoming the "go-to person" in his niche through starting with free resources.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Thomas Frank, who is from Denver, about selling templates for the note-taking software Notion. Insider verified his revenue with documentation. The following has been edited for length and clarity. 

I've been making content online since 2010. In 2012, when I was a freshman in college, I started studying management-information systems.