Hey friend 👋

Today I want to talk about the marketing strategies I've found to work where you don't need to spend any money. I think these are useful to people who are just starting out.

Before we get started, a quick question for you -

Which stage of revenue are you at?

• <$100
• <$1000
• <$10000

In the November cohort of Indie Masterminds, we’re forming groups based on revenue.

I think this is the best way for founders to learn from each other without feeling out of place.

So just hit reply and let me know. This will help me assign you to the right group.

I’ll also do an onboarding call once you join. There we can go deeper into your product and understand how you can get most out of the program.

Please note: This is the last time the program will run this year, so if you want to build a solid Black Friday strategy, or kick-off 2023 with a bang, then this is the perfect time for you to join.

Registrations close - 31st October.

Here’s the link to join.

PS: There’s a 100% money back guarantee, so you’ve got nothing to lose.

Cheers!

Now, onto today’s topic -

Marketing is one of those things that most founders and makers find awkward and uncomfortable doing.

But it's still super essential.

Without marketing, there's no business, there's only a product, that makes no money.

So we must do it.

But most marketing methods are expensive.

Over the last 12-15 months I've found 5 marketing channels for my projects to work well, where I don't have to spend any money into them.

These are also common patterns that have emerged from the hundreds of hours of research I’ve put into this newsletter.

If you don't have much of a marketing budget (like me), then you will find these useful -

1. Building in Public

This is a totally legit way to market your product in the early days. You're sharing your thought process, your lessons and your reasons for building the product.

Your ideal customers are bound to be attracted to it.

Pick a channel and talk about your business every day -

• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• YouTube
• Or anything else.

Make sure to pick a platform where your customers also hang out.

Once you grow, you can choose to stop building in public and to prevent your secrets from the competition, or keep building in public to share lessons with your followers.

• Related: 5 Build In Public Myths busted

2. Go to communities

Subreddits, Hackernews, FB groups, Slack communities, Quora.

Your users are hanging out somewhere online.

Go there every day and talk about your product.

Explain how you can solve the problems of the community. Don't be overly promotional otherwise you will get banned. Communities don't like self promotion.

But they do love value.

So provide them with value, and you will benefit from it in the long run.

• Related: How to build an audience driven business | Arvid Kahl

3. Collaborate with an influencer

You don't have an organic audience, but someone else might have it.

• A newsletter writer
• A YouTubers
• A TikToker

Barter a deal with them.

Maybe give them an extended free trial of your product in exchange for a shout out.

• Related: How TweetHunter became a million dollar juggernaut

TweetHunter partnered with a Twitter influencer that absolutely exploded their growth.

4. Submit to directories

There are directories for all types of products -

• Product Hunt
• AppSumo
• BetaList

There are even newsletter directories you can submit your newsletter to.

Whatever be your project, there are directories that would love to collect and feature your information. And their audience will be mostly early adopters - perfect people to give you feedback in the early days.

The backlinks from them can even help you with SEO as well overt he long term.

• Related: How Founder’s Book reached $34000 revenue in 7 months

Product Hunt launches was a big lever in the growth of Founder’s Book.

5. SEO

Search Engine Optimization.

Write blog posts answering specific questions that your ideal customer maybe asking on Google.

This will take time to kick in.

But once it starts working, it can be a source of regular free traffic over the long term.

• Related: How Jordan O’Connor reached $38K MRR with Closet Tools.

Long tail keywords was an important acquisition channel right from the early days of Closet Tools

Bonus - Go 1:1

The best strategy I like in the early days is to just go 1:1.

You know who the perfect user of your product is?

Reach out to them and ask them to use it. Reach out cold via email or DM.

It would be easier if they knew you before hand, this is where point 1 helps a lot.

Building in Public can make 1:1 outreach easier.

• Related: Flying past $23K MRR in 2 years🦅 | Hypefury

1:1 high touch interactions with users was an important strategy in the success of Hypefury.

All these methods don't nee money, but they do need time.

Once you know the channels that are working for you, and you make some revenue, you should start looking at paid marketing channels.

That is the only way to scale your marketing activities.

Until then, focus on these 6.

That's it from me this week.

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Thanks,

Ayush