Growing a startup is not about sketchy marketing tactics and loopholes to “game the system”.

It’s not about loopholes or tricks.
It’s about systems.

Hacks don’t drive growth.
Systems do.

I’ve ALWAYS promised that there’s a better, more systematic way to grow your business. A way that doesn’t involve soul-crushing sales calls and endless “hustle”.

That’s the core of growth marketing.

And I know that it’s possible, because I’ve been there.

In fact, the Double Academy itself hums along quite nicely without any sales calls, without any hustle, and without even much of a team. Consider this…
+ We have a simple, systematic way to drive traffic —I can take a month off, and nothing happens to the business
+ Everyone gets channeled into this email course, where I can give value(!!)… without having to do one-on-one sessions with anyone. Easy peasy. Lots of value for relatively little work.
+ Some people want to pay, to learn the advanced ins-and-outs of user acquisition & growth (and our premium course is so good that people need hardly any personal support, either)

It’s all running like a machine.
In fact…

Everyday I can change someone’s live,
… without ever having to lift a finger!

Of course I’ll be the first to point out that building those systems is hard. And it’s not like I only sit sipping cocktails on the beach. There is maintenance, too.

But it’s an asset.
And owning assets is a whole lot better… than doing sales calls all day. Every sales call you make, you need to “start over” again. And trust me: sales gets pretty boring, pretty soon!

Anyway.

Below are the exact three systems that ANY BUSINESS needs, to turn into an automated selling machine…
1. A way to attract gobs of traffic
2. A way to convert those leads into customers
3. A way to make & keep customers happy

Make a promise => build trust => deliver

There’s more to it, of course. But let’s unpack each system a little bit further. (this is the stuff that marketing gurus package as a $1,990 course, but here’s the digest…)

1. GROWTH ENGINE :: make a promise
You need a way to get exposure…. a way to reach people, and drive traffic.

A growth engine is an automated system that plugs into an acquisition channel, and generates traffic out of it.

That system can rely on paid ads, or SEO, or referrals, or any other kind of mechanic.

Growth engines typically consist of a cluster of growth tactics, bundled together. They play nicely together, to drive traffic.

Such an engine can be build on any distribution channel… whether that’s Amazon Alexa, messenger platforms or magazine ads. How this works, deserves it’s own email.

But in either case, you need a system that brings you in front of your audience, and that brings people into your funnel…

2. SALES FUNNEL :: build trust
In the world of today, you don’t have to do high-pressure selling anymore. Once you have someone’s email address, you can take it easy. You give value first. Whether it’s an app, an online training or legal advice…. you show that you can help FIRST.

Once you do that, something magical happens: people will love to do business with you. Because they like you and trust you. In most cases, you can set this up to run “on autopilot” (like this email course!). Instead of dealing with cold traffic, you only deal with pre-qualified, warm leads.

Some simple funnel examples:
+ Freemium apps (e.g. Evernote, Slack, etc.)
+ Free trial
+ Webinars
+ Blogging & free content
+ Etc.

In your business… How can you provide value —first—, instead of pushing for a deal?

3. RETENTION SYSTEM :: deliver the promise
Okay, so you got them signed up—great! Now… How do you make those people successful? How do you deliver value to customers? How do you make them stick around? Better yet, how do you turn them into “power users” of your app?

This is an incredibly underrated part of marketing. Retention and onboarding have a profound impact on your business. Here’s why, in 4 parts…
+ Retention —> Higher revenue per user
Users that stick around longer, will generally pay you more over time
+ Retention —> Higher virality
the more often people use your product, the more opportunities they’ll have to talk about it to friends
+ Retention —> Faster earn-back cycle
If you can quickly move customers to purchases and follow-up purchases, it takes shorter time to earn back your acquisition costs you paid to acquire them
+ Retention —> Increased acquisition costs allowance
If each user is worth more, you can also spend more to acquire them. High retention opens up new acquisition channels, and allows you to out-bid competitors (e.g. on paid ads)

And of course, you’ll just get happier users (Duh!). Besides the fact that happy people rave about your product… it’s also probably the reason you started your business in the first place!

For the sake of the length of this email, I’ll have to get back to you about the details of each system. But the details don’t matter nearly as much as the big picture:

Growth happens through systems
Create those basic systems (don’t sweat it)… then optimize relentlessly

Growth will start accelerating NOT because of one individual system, but because those different systems start to create feedback effects into each other.

(the exact ways how these systems are meant to interact, are not as obvious as it might appear)

But that’s for later.
We’ll get to those feedback effects in a few days.

For now, simply start thinking of your business as a series of interconnected systems.

Systems drive growth.
User growth happens systematically (at the strategic level, not the tactical)