Every six months, I spend 3-5 days with solo founders making $3-25k every month.
It’s THE sea of knowledge I consider lucky to get access to in close circles.
Today I am sharing three marketing basics that changed how I look at marketing.
1. Make Marketing Predictable
The end goal of all marketers is to either build a framework or an equation.
Framework: AIDA, PAS, etc. Something you could use as a template repeatedly.
Equation: Methods + Numbers gives you an equation. Example: “If I make videos with handmade sketches in them, they get me at least 30% more views than any other video format.”
I even went on to believe this:
I love creativity. It’s important. You may disagree with my statement.
But you can’t discard the fact why we do multiple experiments is to understand what channels, strategies, and resources work so we can double down on that.
That’s what I mean by making marketing predictable.
It’s finding an answer to “If you spend x resources for y amount of time on z channel, what can you expect?”
Some places I made marketing predictable for myself:
30 posts a week on X/Twitter gives me 10 new followers
Our community needs at least 8 active members to hit 100 total messages every week
With Meta ads, CPA is $0.16 for Indians in my niche, coffee newsletter
This is not a new concept. Marketers and founders are familiar with ROAS, ROI on channels like SEO, Meta ads, Google Ads, etc.
But if you look closely, you can form these equations for organic channels like socials, lead magnets, tools, etc.
Measuring every little detail, from traffic to conversions, has helped me form my equations. I highly recommend you do the same.
2. Learn from new users and also from the users who leave
This might sound obvious to you, but it was an eye-opener for me.
As a newsletter specialist, I have always focused on where subscribers came from and what they engage with. Which I should.
But it was a game-changer when I realised I can learn from readers who unsubscribe as well.
I have set up an unsubscription form, an optional checklist for readers to share feedback after they unsubscribe.
This includes options like poor content, too many ads, found better alternatives, don’t have time, etc.
So if a reader chooses “too many ads”, I know I should increase value in the value:ads ratio or decrease the number of ads.
3. Don’t die making a dead-end work. Instead, double down on what’s living.
Okay that is a terrible heading, but this was my huge mistake:
Our community has ~30 marketers. 10-15 members are active consistently, but not everyone else.
For months, I chased inactive members and asked them, “What can I do to make this community valuable for you, so you start engaging more?”
This sounds like a f*cking great question to ask. Maybe it is. But we shouldn’t bet on it for community engagement and growth.
Instead, I’d make a list of all the active members, what kind of questions they ask and what they react most to. Then bring in more similar marketers into the community and have more similar conversations.
I work(ed) with some top newsletters and I see some of them make the same mistake with email lists.
They intend to increase engagement by setting up reengagement campaigns to inactive emails.
It’s great for a 1-3% increase in engagement, but if you want a 10% increase or higher, you need to identify your most engaged readers and make more people like them subscribe to your newsletter.
Double down. Double down. Double down. Always!
(Is it weird I said “double” down “three” times???)
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Marketing resources shared in our community
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Personal Notes
I haven’t watched Odyssey yet, and I am worried I will miss Spiderman’s release day. That’s my biggest fear now.
Until next week 👋