🖊 Notes from 1 Year of "Newslettering"

Creating products is hard.

Hustling them is harder.

Being Succesful is the most difficult of all.

It's not easy to be in the entrepreneurial space - especially if you have a family and a full time job on top of everything. I have a wife and four-month-old baby, so it's difficult to hustle.

However - it's not impossible.

Last year I realized something - I was 26 years old and had "talked about" becoming an entrepreneur since I was 22.

I finally said "Screw it" and started a newsletter because my strength is writing and content curation. Simply put, I'm very good at finding interesting and useful content. I really like helping people discover interesting content, new tools, and awesome resources.

Thus - I started "The Land of Random" - a newsletter for fun internet content. Marketing tools, Coding tools, Cool websites, UI inspiration, and more. Random - but interesting and useful.

So - I got to work. I created a newsletter on Substack and started publishing. Awesome, but I knew I was missing something . . . an audience.

Then - I realized a simple truth. I would have to hustle like hell to market my newsletter to others.

So - I started learning about growth hacking. I networked with other writers and started studying like a madman. Lead magnets, value bombs, etc.

You have to create value in order for people to take an interest in you or pay attention to what you have to offer.

So - I got to work creating lead magnets, and I've made two really good ones so far that have driven quite a few subscribers to my newsletter.

However - I need to keep going. I need to keep creating value in order to grow my subscriber base.

I've 6x'd my growth this year and I'm going to push until I've 60'000x'd this year. It might take a year - or 3. I'm determined to make it happen.

Today, I want to encourage you. Don't get discouraged. Keep going. You can do this! Join communities, get feedback, and never stop pushing.

 1). Network with other creators in your space - it really does help!

 2). Join micro-groups of other creators in your space and grow together. Everyone has cool little hacks. Don't be an island.

 3). Don't be afraid to promote your product. Otherwise, how will others see it?

 4). Don't throw money away. A year ago I would have told you that you should spend money on Facebook ads to grow an audience. Now - I can give you a lot more ideas of where to go in addition to paid traffic. Product Hunt, Twitter, Indie Hackers, Hacker news, Reddit, Etc. 

 5). Twitter is amazing for growing an audience. Add value to other people's tweets and you will go far. Over the past month I've gotten over 85K impressions with this strategy.

My goal is to completely break free of the 9-5. I don't know if this newsletter will be the way or another project.

I know one thing - I won't give up.

If you're interested in following my journey, please join me at http://thelandofrandom.substack.com I would love to see you there!