This week we chat with Noah Kagan of OKdork.com about content marketing, startup growth and much more.
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Competition – Win Noah Kagan’s undies [CLOSED]
Tell us what the best city in the world is in the comments below and Noah will send you a pair of SAXX underwear.
*Update: This is closed now. The winner was Jon Myers aka Keyser Soze with this bullet:
Best city for bootstrappers.
Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam
Low-cost, high-value urban lifestyle. Live on $1,500 – $2,000/ month.
Your runway extended, your life optimized and focused on work, self and fun.
1. Services – housekeeping, high-quality low-cost food, laundry, doing dishes, etc..
2. Transportation – get a motorbike, get there in 5 – 10 minutes, valet it. Done.
3. Gym – nice western style gym, done.
4. Housing – get moved in – in hours, not days or weeks.
No visa run bullshit. 3 month-multiple entry visas are easy. Renewing is easy.
Educated labor pool – we have two exceptional Rails guys working with us, $20usd/ hour.
Transit hub – hop on AirAsia to Bangkok, etc.. for $50 bucks.
Cafe Culture – The city has a cafe culture that rivals Paris. Hundreds upon hundreds of cafes have fast, free wifi.
Large, vibrant expat entrepreneur scene – great active scene here with entrepreneurs working on real, ambitious businesses not bullshit lifestyle businesses chasing coconuts and hammocks.
Show notes
First stages of entrepreneurship
.com starting to happen in the 90s
Had a bike and not much money
Wrote a 17 page business plan!
“How do you take advantage of what you have available to you”
USP was ‘$5 to deliver anything’
Never launched and that’s influenced him launching quickly
2005 till today
Graduated from Berkeley
Had a job offer from Google, but took an early Gmail invite instead
Worked at Intel
His first site was Come Get Used
collegeup.org was a Craigslist for college campuses
These projects helped him get the job at Facebook
Current projects are appsumo.com monthly1k.com & sumome.com
What is Sumo Me
Twilighter – enables people to highlight text and create a click to tweet
List Builder is a ‘non annoying’ way to grow your email list
Launching blog analytics, AB testing and ad tracking
Sign up for free at sumome.com
Goal setting vs processes
If you only have goals, you’ll hit them and get depressed
Processes enable you to maintain your motivation
Uses a calendar to do things to keep his life fulfilled
Has a weekly Sunday email for what to accomplish during the week
Don’t set an end point, instead simply schedules the work required
Suggests a process for ‘Live a healthy life’ as opposed to a goal ‘get a 6 pack’
Work out a good way for you to filter things out
Spends money on a therapist and personal trainer
What is the common reason why people don’t start a business?
Excuses about not having money or co-founders
Waiting for some other ‘things’ to be figured out
Fear of yourself, fear of rejection and fear of friends
StrangerChallenge.com
FailureGames mobile app
On pitches – If you can’t explain your idea in a sentence or two, you are overcomplicating it. Think about how you can solve the problem and explain it in a simple way.
Startup Chat exclusives!
AppSumo - Infinity Skills deal launches tomorrow
Sumome - Launching stats on email collection, ad tracking and split testing
Anton’s birthday present
isantonmasturbating.com
Trying to be a bit more patient and doing things himself
Why is Sumo me a priority?
sumome.com
Wanted to build things that he used himself
Came out of the idea of having a ‘Death list’ which lists the biggest risks to your business. AppSumo product sales meant no guaranteed ongoing revenue
Taking their time and not rushing, even with the mounting pressure from peers
On customer development and ideas
Don’t tell people about your idea, ask them what their problems are
Don’t build something, tell them to pay you for it
Ask people what their priorities are and what they are working on
Ask them what they are doing today, what did they do yesterday – work out how people are spending their time
Two favorite question to close a sale or land a job:
‘Did I do everything to make this the best x you have ever done’
‘Is there any reason why you wouldn’t offer me x right now’.
Blog analytics app
Will depend on what people want
Idea generation could be part of it – e.g. what to write about that will provide good traction on the blog
Noah’s simple content marketing framework
Have 1 priority (objective)
What types of content helps the most towards this objective
In Noah’s case they were long detailed posts about Marketing
Where are the ‘Anomalies of success’ i.e. what content is really getting traction – do more of that
BuzzSumo allows you to see what blog posts in a given topic area are going viral (this is not Noah’s product)
Quora or Google trends – look at popular sites to work out what topics are getting traction
Try to fill an unmet need
How to fill an unmet need – podcasting
Analyze all of the top podcasts in iTunes
Only look at the ones with a lot of comments and activity on the blog and reviews
Look at:
Formats
Least popular posts
Reviews – what do people say they want improved, what do they love
What the popular books are on Audible
Most popular posts – consider the guest’s profile in looking at popularity
The length of the podcast episodes. Is there an optimal length or a length that no one is doing?
How can you use an existing service to make things easier for himself.
Found that psychology and meeting new people were high on the popular topic lists.
Mentions in the content marketing section
Video Fruit and Hubspot as good creators of content
Art of Manliness
James Schramko post about podcast creation
Noah’s interview on Smart Passive Income with Pat Flynn
Experimented with giving things away to get comments
How do you put your flyer up at other people’s parties
Go and respond to every comment on guest posting as well
Playing with submission of content like subreddits and growthhackers.com
Go to the people who already have your audience and get yourself positioned up high on their sites
Keep your content actionable
Find a balance between what others want and what you want
At the end of the day it’s better to serve yourself, it’s easier to keep going and stay motivated
Noah’s post about his Tech Events company
What topics can you talk about that people want, as well as what you want to talk about?
3 things that have driven AppSumo’s growth
Promoting great products
Paid adverting
Giveaways
Best business growth strategy for monthly1k.com
Successful members
Best business growth strategy for OkDork.com
Long form content specifically about marketing
Advertising
Use quant based marketing to work out 3-5 that work the best.
What skill is the skill that’s responsible for the most revenue
Advertising
SQL to enable people to get access to customer data without interrupting developers
Sumo Jerky
Sumo Jerky 24 hour business challenge
sumojerky.com
Dan mentioned his book the 7 day startup
Tips on cold email outreach
The post Startup Chat #61 – Business growth with Noah Kagan from App Sumo appeared first on WP Curve.