I brought over 60,000 users to my blog in 4 weeks without spending a single penny.
I did this by breaking almost all the traditional marketing “rules”.
Instead of focusing on SEO, networking or hard promotions, I did the following:
I made really, really good content
I put it in front of the right audience
This allowed me to do very well on the following platforms:
. Quora: Nearly a million views on answers in
the first 30 days.
. Hacker News: Two posts hit the front page and
brought over 20,000 readers
. Reddit: Several different posts hit #1 on
multiple subreddits
Marketers typically avoid these because it is very, very hard to “sell” to these people.
The solution? Don’t sell.
For example, look at my top 2 Reddit submissions:
Both of them are personal stories.
Each of them:
. Tells a personal story. I put the time in to do an interesting personal experiment. It’s not corporate at all. That makes people listen.
. Is tailored to the community. I am a nerd. They are nerds. When I do something super-nerdy, it resonates with people.
. Provides value. I shared personal experiences and lessons I learned.
. Doesn’t ask for anything. It’s really rude to put 0 effort and just leave a link on the page. I always try to give people the OPTION to visit my site, but never shove it in their faces.
My #1 Quora answer of all time, with 10,000+ upvotes:
Again, notice:
. It’s personal. The picture is of ME. Can you get any more personal?
. It’s interesting. He’s using the chair wrong. I wonder why?
. It’ valuable. I provide 7 tips that were incredibly useful in simplifying my life.
. Takeaways? Throwing money and fighting for attention isn’t the only way to market your website.