Welcome! Follow these steps or perish!
This book is a step-by-step guide. You start from the beginning (here!) and move on section by section.
Each section builds on the previous and I will be referencing information I used near the beginning, all the way to the end.
That means you REALLY shouldn't skip ahead to a section that might interest you. I know, you might be ready and willing to jump head first into SEO or something else, but I implore you:
DO NOT DO IT.
Here is my side of the deal: I'll try to keep it entertaining as you read, as well as incredibly useful.
I know some of the early sections might sound boring. Who cares about analytics? It's just a bunch of numbers, help me write the perfect blog post, dang nabbit!
So the entertainment will be my attempt to keep you from doing that. I think that is a fair deal.
Oh, and if you follow these directions, your startup will be set up for incredible amounts of growth.
This is a step-by-step guide - not an exhaustive resource. I do not go into great detail on each thing you should do, as there is tons of writing out there on the specifics.
For example, I might tell you that you need to set up an A/B testing tool, but will not go over the pros and cons of each tool. You can find that information elsewhere.
Instead, I will give you the steps you need to take, the order to take them and the importance of each step. Consider this book your jumping off point and navigator.
I will also include useful information that comes from my 15 years of experience. Basically giving you the advice I wish I had gotten when I first started.
To keep you interested, here are some truths that I will flesh out in this book:
- Growth hacking is bullshit.
- You probably don't need a blog.
- You should market to FEWER people.
Some of those might be controversial, but as you read this book, it will make way more sense why these are all true.
Some other important notes about this book:
I will try to be technology-agnostic, it shouldn't matter if you use WordPress or Squarespace or anything else.
I will keep this book up to date (a strong point of it being a web book)
It doesn't matter too much where you are on the digital marketing journey, some stuff might seem obvious to you, but it's best to get it all in one package rather than me assume you have some knowledge you may not
You do NOT have to be super technical to get value out of this book.
There are a few assumptions I made about you, the reader:
You have already done research around product/market fit
You already know who your perfect customer is
Grab a drink of choice, sit back and enjoy!