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34 Comments

How I Got My First 100 Email Signups, What’s Working & What’s Not Working

What’s up hustlers! I’ve just reached a very hard earned milestone of 100 email signups to my landing page at Logobly.com.

I know there’s a lot of you out there trying to do the same thing. So I thought I’d take a moment to share with you what’s working so far. And what’s not working.

Before I get into the details, a reminder that my website is brand new. I started from ground zero. It’s a brand new business on a brand new domain name.

Because I’m a bootstrapped, single founder my marketing budget is zero. Good times.

Time wise, I’ve been hammering away on it for about a month now, part time. My only goal has been to drive traffic to my landing page and get people to join my launch list.

👍WHAT'S WORKING

In short, content marketing is working. In order to drive traffic to your site you have to create and share interesting content made for your target audience.

Things I’ve done that are working:

• Writing and sharing interesting / controversial blog posts ( https://logobly.com/blog/ridiculous-business-ideas/ )
• Creating shareable content ( https://logobly.com/startup-logo-archive/ )
• Creating and sharing a free ebook in exchange for email ( https://logobly.com/business-names/ )

Websites driving the most traffic:

• My LinkedIn ( 1600 followers )
• My Twitter ( 700 followers )
• Hacker News
• Indie Hackers

👎WHAT'S NOT WORKING

I’ve tried a whole bunch of things. Amongst others, I’ve written an exhausting amount of content in an effort to get some organic SEO traffic. Some days I was pushing out 2000 word blog posts! No joy. SEO is a long term game folks. It’s not a short term thing. If you want traffic now, you’ve gotta create stuff and share it yourself. Here's the stuff I’ve tried that hasn’t worked:

• Writing SEO targeted blog posts
• Posting to Reddit
• Joining Product Hunt’s Ship

Based on the above snapshot, I’m going to continue to create and share interesting content that appeals to my target audience. My main channels will be LinkedIn and Twitter. I’m not going to continue with large scale SEO efforts, although I still will try to write around one blog post a week.

Good luck folks! If you’ve done stuff that has worked, please share it below.

  1. 2

    Hey Craig,

    I built an email list for my last startup to around 1400 subscribers in 3 months.

    In my experience, I have had the most dramatic impact in discovering a way to spur interest. How can I get people interested and talking? Additionally, you have to be able to find your audience (go where they hang out), and engage with them without being overly suffocating. You’re not trying to sell them lol.

    Anyway, just wanted to share my experience - thanks for sharing bud!

    Also, paid ads to grow likes did work as well but it took a bit of tweaking. I ran ads to get get someone to like my page, they were able to see what we are all about and decided if we were interesting enough/convincing enough to get them to sign up.

    Really good copy helps too! ;)

    Steve

    1. 1

      Hey Steve! Wow, that's an awesome effort. Interesting that you're paying to get subscribers on board, but if it pays off in the long term I guess it's worth it.

      Well done and thanks for your input. Keep up the good work : )

      1. 2

        Thanks bro.

        Ever think about selling that landing page as a template?

        1. 1

          Hey there, glad you like it. No, I'm not a coder : )

          FYI, it's built on a Wordpress Theme called Jupiter.

          1. 1

            Awesome!

            Is it the Jupiter by Artbees?

            If so, how do you like the customization boxes? How’s your site speed?

            1. 1

              Yeah, that's the one. I still use the old Jupiter. Not the new one. Site speed is all about the hosting, and I use and recommend Siteground. ( I've tried A2 Hosting, and before that Media Temple ) Siteground is hands down the best I've had for speed and customer service : )

              1. 1

                Yeah I hear ya. I use WPX - no cpanel so it helps with speed. Site speeds are pretty quick although I’ve seen speeds like lightning on here. Its amazing how many people under estimate site speed / UX for SEO purposes.

  2. 2

    That's good stuff you have shared, the highscore website/game is hilarious!

    1. 1

      I know! Some cracking ideas there right? My favourite was the original and still the best 1M home page! : )

  3. 2

    I got lots of value out of this post 💥Thanks, Craig!

    If you don't mind me asking, how are you approaching content creation? (How you're deciding what to create, choosing what to actually post, etc.)

    1. 2

      Hey there,

      Yes, it's all based off keyword research.

      You HAVE to see what people are searching for and go after that, otherwise it can be a waste of time.

      Use Neil Patels Ubersuggest to find popular keywords, create blog posts around that.

      https://neilpatel.com/ubersuggest/

      1. 1

        Love it. Thanks for the response :)

  4. 2

    Appreciate the share @CraigBarber. Content is king especially if you know it's gonna be valuable for your audience.

    1. 1

      Thanks! Yes, it's cheap and if you have the time... you should do it. Otherwise it's paying for it I guess.

      1. 1

        It is definitely! :)

  5. 1

    Thank You for this Craig <3

  6. 1

    Hey Craig, be interesting to know what traffic referrers are converting to customers the most, do you have that data?

    1. 1

      Great question, I don't have that data - I should know it.

      LinkedIn and Twitter have the lowest bounce rates, and the most consistant visits - I do know this.

  7. 1

    Great input on the topic Craig, I'm also in the process on bootstraping a product site and will start collecting email signups, so your insights are very interesting. I also feel that content marketing is the best bet on gaining an audience with in the community. Have been posting new stuff on my dribbble account regularly (on weekly basis) and have seen some increase in following there. Also leaving feedback to others, liking, sharing their stuff definitely gives positive results.

    1. 1

      Hey Tom, glad I could help. Yes, try a bunch of things, see what's working and double down. If nothings working keep trying new stuff.

  8. 1

    How'd you get Linkedin/Twitter followers?

    1. 1

      Been on LinkedIn for years as I have a day job. Twitter again, just plugging away. No secrets.

  9. 1

    Hi Craig! Thanks for sharing this!

    I may be a potential customer, and these are the only two things I really care about:

    • Logo quality
    • Price

    I like the logos on your landing page, but there is nothing about the price. If I can get a logo like that for less than $100 I would be very interested, but if it's more probably not (but maybe you are targeting startups and not solopreneurs, so that would be ok!)

    However, you should add at least a ballpark range to get my email 😀

    As for the traffic part, SEO is a looong game. If I were you I would test Twitter ads!

    1. 1

      Hey Andrea!

      Great to hear from you, thank you for the feedback : )

      Okay, logos will be priced at $49 - you'll get a full logo package including PNG's SVG's and different logo layouts.

      Re SEO - I'm only now seeing a small trickle, it's a tough, long game - you're right!

      Hey lastly, you can get a sneak peak at the app I'm building here: ( not a working demo )

      https://logobly.com/beta/

      Would love some feedback on it if you have a moment.

      Cheers,

      Andrea.

      1. 1

        That's a great pricing 😀

        About the test page, I click the button but nothing happens...

        1. 1

          Hey there,

          Thanks for the feedback!

          RE: beta page, I've just updated the page.

          I would love your feedback if you have a moment, for a limited time only I'm offering a FREE logo for feedback on my beta : )

          https://logobly.com/beta/

          1. 1

            Hi Craig, I just did it!

            Send me an email, I would love to expand on my icons comment.

            1. 1

              Thanks Andrea! Much appreciated : )

              Sent you an email follow up.

  10. 1

    Appreciate the share, also really good to know what isn't working, often we only share what is!

    1. 2

      Cheers Rosie! Shout out to my fellow UK maker in Brighton! : )

  11. 1

    Congratulations Craig & thanks for sharing!

    1. 1

      Thanks Lisy, keep making : )

  12. 1

    This comment was deleted 4 years ago.

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