EIA2019HK - Building Landing Pages and Acquiring First Users - Gilles de Clerck

BUILDING
LANDING PAGES
& ACQUIRING
FIRST USERS

Find this and all other amazing EIA slide decks over at:
https://www.slideshare.net/InnovationAcademy/presentations

USER ACQUISITION
Finding potential customers somewhere, somehow and
triggering them to click through to your landing page.
LANDING PAGES
Enticing potential customers with your value
proposition in a way that triggers them to express
interest (e.g. leaving you their email address).

→ LANDING PAGE BEFORE USER ACQUISITION
Before you start hustling on getting potential customers to your
landing page, make sure that landing page is effective at conveying
your value proposition in a way that converts visitors.
LEAKY BUCKETS NEED THEIR HOLES FIXED, NOT MORE WATER

SIMPLE.
It’s easy to understand by prospective customers.
COMPELLING.
It describes something that is interesting or desirable to them.
SPECIFIC.
It captures what your product does, not an overly abstract statement of it.
DIFFERENTIATED.
It highlights what makes your product unique.

GETTING YOUR STORY STRAIGHT
Value proposition generation
A product quality matched to a customer benefit
“Here’s what our
product can do.”
“Here’s what you can
do with our product.”
vs.

VALUE PROPOSITION GENERATION
Imagine your product
is fast
Benefit: Quicker output → Value prop: Get work done faster.
Benefit: Greater output → Value prop: Get more work done.
Benefit: Greater efficiency → Value prop: Save yourself time

is secure
Benefit: Protection → Value prop: If you lose or misplace your card,
freeze it from the app.
Benefit: Control → Value prop: Turn off contactless, online payments
and ATM withdrawals from the app.

is secure
Benefit: Privacy → Value prop: Only friends can see your messages.
Benefit: Protection → Value prop: If your phone is stolen, your data
stays safe.

doesn’t charge fees on international transactions
Benefit: Spend globally → Value prop: Spend abroad in over 150
currencies at the real-time exchange rate.
Benefit: Transfer globally → Value prop: Transfer money to anywhere in
24 currencies. No additional fees.

How to write effective value propositions
Column 1
List all bad (non-desirable) alternative solutions people resort to when they don't have your
product. Illustrate what makes each one bad. 
Column 2
For each bad alternative, write one value prop that highlights that badness and point out
how your product offers a better solution to make life better. 
Column 3
List top personas and identify the two things they most care about.
Ignore lower priority audiences.
Match column 2 with column 3
Reduce your list of value props in column 2 to those that are most appealing to your top personas.

Example: Livechat software
BAD ALTERNATIVES VALUE PROPS TOP PERSONAS
Low quality sales calls 
Wasted sales resources
Visitors bounce 
Lost sales opportunities
Long, boring FAQ’s 
No one reads them
Support emails 
Most don't bother
Process more leads using
fewer senior sales reps by
asynchronously handling
customer objections via
templated live chat.
Hear visitors' objections
proactively so you can
address and close more
deals before they bounce.
Head of marketing 
Conversion rates 
Traffic volume
Chief revenue officer 
Reduce churn 
Increase ARPU/LTV
Head of sales 
Increase qualified leads 
Qualify leads accurately

Example: Digital banking services
BAD ALTERNATIVES VALUE PROPS TOP PERSONAS
Transaction fees
Moving money costs money
Transaction delays
Wastes productivity. Hinders opportunity.
Limited control
Difficult to budget. You lose money.
Cumbersome to open an account
Takes a lot of time.
Not available for everyone.
Spend, withdraw and send money
anywhere in the world. No additional
fees.
Send and get money in real-time, to and
from anywhere in the world.
We’ll send real-time spending
notifications and show you exactly
where your money is going every month
so you have full control over your
personal finances.
Open an account in seconds without
street address or credit checks.
Traditional account holders
Travel & move money without extra fees 
Better overall service
Increased budget control
International freelancers
Maximum control and flexibility 
Get paid instantly from anywhere in the
world
Expats
No street address needed, no credit
checks
Easy, quick account setup

You’ll only get one chance
to make a first impression
LANDING PAGES

THE GOOD NEWS IS
I’ve ruined enough first impressions
to help you make a stellar one

If you’re marketing to China,
it’s probably more relevant to create a mini-site for
WeChat instead of a traditional landing page.
The essence however, is the same.
Whatever form your landing page comes in, it’ll always
be a story told in a way that maximally resonates with
the audience you’re marketing to.
→ For WeChat specifics, stay tuned for Olivia’s keynote.
We’ll focus on how to put together copy and creatives for
compelling story on your landing pages, WeChat mini sites
and marketing materials in general.

Landing page conversion as an equation
Conversion = Desire - Labor - Confusion

+ Increase Desire
Entice with value. Create intrigue. Go out of your way to make it
as easy as possible for visitors to imagine their improved lives
with your value prop in it.
- Decrease Labor
Minimize the work visitors have to do to get your value props. The
more words and imagery to process, the harder and more tiresome it
becomes. Aim for every word, visual and element to add meaning.
- Decrease Confusion
Make it crystal clear how your product improves visitor’s
lives. Be specific and consistent at every step and turn.

Messaging > design
1. Hone your message. Identify the selling points that
are most enticing about your value proposition.
2. Put together copy and imagery to convey those
selling points as clearly and concisely as possible.
3. Design your page in a way that enhances the clarity
and impact of your messaging.

INFORMATION DENSITY
Use copy and visuals to maximize information density: the art of saying
a lot with a little. A high ratio of ideas to elements (words + visuals).
DECREASING LABOR & CONFUSION
VALUE PROPOSITIONS
Use copy and visuals to tell a compelling story of a world with
your product, setting it off against a world without your product.
INCREASING DESIRE

GET TO THE BEST COPY VARIATION
Don’t settle for the first phrasing that comes to mind.
Write variations until you find the most enticing and
concise version. Ask others for feedback. 
REMOVE UNNECESSARY WORDS
Every word on your page must be necessary. If you
can remove a word without reducing how enticing,
clear or critically informational a sentence is, do it. 
DON’T PITCH EVERY VALUE PROP IN FULL
Stick with the ones that entice your ideal customers
most. Take a 80/20 approach. The more visitors must
read, the less they’ll read in total.
NO SALES FLUFF
Avoid meaningless sales speak. Steer clear of empty
cliché words like ‘revolutionary’, ‘incredibly’,
‘powerful’, ‘best-ever’ and whatever else. They don’t
tell visitors anything and you’ll seem like a copycat.
Instead, specifically describe exactly how you're
unique. 
MINIMIZE SCROLLING
Provide the main value props at the first impression.
Visitors shouldn’t have to scroll to understand
fundamental value propositions.
Nailing information density

The winning formula
1. NAVBAR — Top of the page: company logo and site links. 
2. HERO — Big section with header text, subheader text and most enticing imagery. 
3. SOCIAL PROOF — Logos and/or testimonials of best-known clients. 
4. CALL-TO-ACTION — Signup button or similar with a concise incentive to go for it. 
5. FEATURES & OBJECTIONS — Key value propositions. Why people would choose you.
6. CALL-TO-ACTION REPEAT — Repetition cooks an idea into people’s heads. 
7. FOOTER — Miscellaneous links.

Navbar
LOGO —————————-——————————————-——————————— LINKS —— CTA
• Logo
• Links to key sections on your page
• CTA - button (e.g. Buy now, Notify me, Request access,…)
The fewer links, the better. Maximize focus on the CTA.

Hero
—————————-—————————————— (IMAGERY) ————————————-———————————
HEADER
SUBHEADER
—————————-—————————————— (IMAGERY) ————————————-———————————
If the visitor reads nothing else on your page,
they should still get your product and why they should use it.

Hero — Imagery
The purpose of the hero imagery is to visualize the value propositions
conveyed by the header and subheader.
It should complement and reinforce the copy. Not distract from it.
This often comes down to showing off your product.
Software → screenshot or mockup of screenshot (thumbs up for animated flows) 
Physical products → picture of the product
Services → illustration

Make them want to scroll. But don’t require them to scroll.
Descriptive, while concise.
Hook them. Or lose them forever.
Be specific. Don’t be vague. “Improve your workflow!”
If a visitor reads only this text on the page, would they know exactly what you sell?
Hero — Header

Hero — Imagery
“In advertising, the greatest thing to be
achieved is believability. Nothing is more
believable than the product itself.”
LEO BURNETT

Hero — Header
How to write great headers
01
Identify a compelling feature that captures your product’s purpose
02
Point out the high-level purpose

Hero — Header
What makes a compelling feature?
“I want that!”
“Finally, a reason to sign up for one of these products!”

Hero — Header
1. Compelling features — Example: Video Chat App
Chat with anyone quickly.
Chat on your phone, tablet, or desktop.
Auto-translate real-time conversations regardless of language.
Get transcripts for every conversation — emailed to you.
Have auto-translated chats with foreigners.
Find someone to video chat with in less than 30 seconds.

Hero — Header
2. High-level purpose
Does the visitor get why the value proposition matters?
Riley texts your real estate leads for you — to automatically qualify them.
Have auto-translated chats with foreigners — to have fun learning any language.

Hero — Header
Good examples
Visually design and develop sites from scratch. No coding.
Groceries delivered in 1 hour. Skip traffic, parking, and long lines.
Invest in crypto even if you’ve never invested in crypto.
Create engaging animations for any app or website.
Rent real people's homes. So you can experience a city like a true local.

Hero — Header
Bad examples
BAD Forest: Stay focused, be present.
BETTER An app that prevents phone addiction. So you can focus on what’s more important.
BAD Extend your software development team. 
BETTER Add experienced remote devs to your team. Higher quality for lesser cost.
BAD Keep your money safe.
BETTER — We create secure virtual cards for you so you can pay without revealing your real card details.
BAD — The smarter way to send business payments internationally. 
BETTER — Send money to anywhere in minutes at the real-time exchange rate. No hidden fees.

Hero — Header
“When I write an advertisement, I don't want you to tell me that you find it
'creative.' I want you to find it so interesting that you buy the product.” 
DAVID OGILVY

Hero — Subheader
When you depict an amazing life, here’s what visitors typically think:
“Ok great. But how?”
Now that people understand what your product does,
use your subheader to describe how.

Hero — Subheader
Examples
Riley texts your real estate leads for you — to automatically qualify them.
A network of vetted concierges monitor your lead chats to respond whenever you're busy.
Have auto-translated chats with foreigners — to have fun learning any language.
In real time, we transcribe and translate your words into 100 languages.

Hero — Subheader
Examples
CRYPTO PAYMENT SOLUTION
Our app accepts cryptocurrency payments, converts it into your currency at a locked-in exchange rate,
then transfers it to your account.
INTERACTIVE VIDEO SOLUTION
Mindstamp helps you engage and educate your viewers by adding notes, pop-up questions, and CTAs
to any video in seconds.

Hero — The Ladder Of Product Awareness
They’re motivated to solve the problem and are convinced your product is the best solution
They’re motivated to solve the problem, but aren’t sure which solution is best
They’re aware solutions exist, but aren’t sufficiently motivated to solve the problem.
They’re experiencing the problem, but are unaware solutions exist.
They’re not experiencing the problem.
To what extent is your target audience (not) aware of your solution and the problem it solves?

The lower on the ladder, the more you’ll need to go out of your way to educate them.

This applies to landing pages, ads, content,… and anything that qualifies as marketing material.

Social proof
As soon as visitors look/scroll down from the amazing value props in the hero, they should
be seeing other people/companies that are not you, vouching for those value props.
LOGO —————————-— LOGO —————————-— LOGO —————————-— LOGO
TESTIMONIAL ——————TESTIMONIAL ————-— TESTIMONIONIAL ————-— TESTIMONIAL

Social proof
Aim to make the visitor feel as if everyone (people/
companies they identify with) is already using your product.
Except for them. Create irresistible FOMO.
What if nobody is using your product because, well, you’re an early-stage startup?
Give people your product (or mockup) for free, then ask them for a testimonial.
Let’s say the idea of “fake it till you make it” is relevant here.

Call-to-action
—————————-——————————-— HEADER —————————-——————————-—
—————————-——————————-— (FORM) —————————-——————————-—
—————————-——————————-— BUTTON —————————-——————————-—

The visitor is excited now.
The goal of your header is to get them to act on that excitement.
Call-to-action — Header
Aim to make the CTA header specific about how close they are to your amazing value prop.
Make it tangible how the awesomeness is only 1 step away.
“You just have to do this and you can get all of this!”
“Get a new logo in 24 hours.”
“Just set your price and go.”
“Open an account right from your laptop.”

Have the button specifically describe what happens after,
what specific action the visitor is taking.
For you, this is most likely something like
Notify me, Request early access, Join the waiting list
Call-to-action — Button + Form
To collect email addresses, you’ll need a form.
Consider including the form directly in the CTA section.
(Cut out as many steps you don’t necessarily need.)
• Name
• Email address
• “How did you hear about us?” (+ dropdown)

Features & Objections
FEATURE #1 —————————-——————————————————————-———————————
—————————-——————————————————————-——————————— FEATURE #2
FEATURE #3 —————————-——————————————————————-———————————
This is where you put all of your chips on the table for visitors that don’t
convert from the hero + social proof (spoiler: many won’t).
In other words: time for the full sales pitch.

This is where you go all out with value props. While you’re at
it, seize the opportunity to proactively address possible
objections visitors may have concerning them.
• Header that states the value proposition (~ framework Hero section)
• Paragraph to elaborate on the value prop and address potential objections
• Image/illustration to visualize/reinforce the value prop
Elements

Features & Objections — Examples

The more expensive or unintuitive your product is, the more
objections you should address.
If you’re having a hard time deciding which objections to
highlight, study your competitors’ messaging to learn how
to differentiate yourself from what people expect you to say.

Features & Objections — Header
3-7 WORDS DESCRIBING FEATURE OR VALUE
Avoid vague language → “The bank of the future”
Be descriptive so visitors can decide whether it’s relevant to them as they scan the page.
If they don’t care, they can skip → You reduce labor and increase focus.

Features & Objections — Paragraph
Blunt brevity
Concisely describe the feature.
~ Value proposition generation 
+ Address possible objections.
Point out how the status-quo is no good and
describe how you make it better.
Keep it short and simple.
Specific. No sales fluff.
Bullet points.

Features & Objections — Examples (Copy)
Header
A simpler workflow for docs & tasks
Paragraph
Tired of linking Google Docs and Trello? Notion seamlessly
blends the two. Full-powered project trackers with docs inside.
Save your team from context switching.
Header
Invest for free
Paragraph
We’ve cut the fat that makes other brokerages costly, like manual
account management and hundreds of storefront locations, so we
can offer zero commission trading.
Header
Truly Private Messaging
Paragraph
Status uses the peer-to-peer protocol Whisper and end-to-end
encryption to protect your communication from third party
interference. Only you can view your messages.
Header
With LOOP, parents are more connected with each other.
Bullet points
• Create a chat room to organize school carpools.
• Find a trusted babysitter on the fly.
• Arrange playdates and (kid-free) social gatherings.

Features & Objections — Imagery
Product screenshot (or mockup).
Image that demonstrates the feature in action.
Illustration that captures the purpose.
Make sure it adds value to your story.
Avoid meaningless eye candy.
Thumbs up for animated GIFs.

The essentials
1. HERO — Big section with header text, subheader text and most enticing imagery. 
2. SOCIAL PROOF — Logos and/or testimonials of best-known clients. 
3. CALL-TO-ACTION — Signup button or similar with a concise incentive to go for it. 
4. FEATURES & OBJECTIONS — Key value propositions. Why people would choose you.
Mix up as you see fit

Landing page tools
landerapp.com
instapage.com
leadpages.net
unbounce.com
wix.com
webflow.com
These tools typically include:
• Drag-drop building blocks for various elements (including forms)
• A built-in mechanism for collecting your leads
• Easy integration services like Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel, Hotjar

Inspiration
https://persistiq.com
https://streak.com
https://copper.com
https://frontapp.com/
https://gyrosco.pe/
https://figma.com/
https://tryshift.com/
https://cindergrill.com/
https://monzo.com/
https://managedbyq.com/
https://grammarly.com/
https://duolingo.com/
https://cover.com/
https://frame.io/
https://withjoy.com/
https://slite.com/
https://flat.io/
https://shape.space/
https://paste.bywetransfer.com/
https://wake.com/
https://usepastel.com
https://goodweb.design https://pageflows.com/pages

“You’ve got a world-class product.
Now you just need to tell people
and it will sell itself.”
USER ACQUISITION

“Trust me. You can dance.”
THAT ADVICE IS TERRIBLE AS

“Trust me. You can dance.”
THAT ADVICE IS TERRIBLE AS
WHEN IT COMES FROM

Marketing at a startup starts from the
inside out. As you build your product,
you start talking about it to as many
potential customers as possible. Only
when you know what you’ve built and
have a deep understanding of who
buys it, why they buy it and how they
talk about it does it make sense to
structurally start pushing marketing.

STARTUP MARKETING 101
Get as many potential
users as possible to learn
and talk about your startup

Mind the difference
Marketing strategy
Everything you plan to do to attract, convert and monetise users as a funded
startup. Including things like paid advertising, content marketing, events and
building product features that are inherently viral.
→ Ask me about best marketing strategies for your product during mentor hours
Early, zero-budget user acquisition
Finding potential customers whichever way you can so you can get a
sense of where to reach them, how well your message resonates and
how (not) interesting they find your value proposition.
→ Whatever you need to do to get at least 500 signups
→ Quick-to-implement tactics with fast feedback loops

01
Try to understand the behaviors and mindset
of the people you’re trying to reach.
02
Choose a particular marketing tactic based on
those exhibited behaviors.
How to think about acquisition

No.
You can’t reach users in ways they’re not reachable.
As much as you can’t phone people who don’t have a phone,
you can ‘content market’ to people who don’t read.
(Or at least don’t read the stuff you’d write about.)

• If you’re selling a cool new piece of technology to developers,
like Twilio, community-focused activities such as meetups are
going to work better than paid ads.
• If you’re selling clinic management software to dentists, then
speaking at/sponsoring a dentistry conference will probably
outperform social media.
• If you’re selling dating apps to millennials, then clever PR or
on-campus, offline campaigns will likely beat event
sponsorship.
• If you’re building an iPhone game for teenagers, Snapchat Ads
are more likely to work than opinionated articles on the
educational duties of the gaming industry.

How to think about acquisition
1. Nail your messaging
2. Understand your customer
3. Ideate on ways to reach your customer
4. Score and rank each idea
5. Test your best ideas

Clearly define how your product makes
the lives of your target customers
better than it is right now.
If you have multiple target audiences, do
this for each one.

Example
Our AI-powered shovel helps onion farmers dig
holes faster, so they can plant more and sell more
with less back pain than traditional shovels.
What is the product?
An artificially intelligent shovel.
Who is the customer?
Onion farmers.
What value is generated for them?
Time saved through faster planting.
How is it better than the old way?
Less back pain than traditional shovels.

The better you’re able to grasp the
mindset and behavior of your target
customers, the better you’ll be at
reaching them with the right message, in
the right place, at the right time.

The more specific you are about your customer,
the easier it is to understand how to reach them
and what message should be used to do so.
For our our AI Shovel, for example, onion farmers are
a smaller audience with different behaviors than do-
it-yourself homeowners. That means their needs and
habits are more specific, which in turn makes it
easier to understand them.

• How do your target customers buy products like yours today?
• Where do your customers hang out online?
• What kind of content do your customers seek and consume?
• Which apps do your customers use?
• What questions are my customers asking?
• Where do your target customers connect with people like them?
• Where do your target customers get their information personally?
• Where do your target customers get their information professionally?
• Who do your target customers look up to?
• Who do your target customers trust?

Dream up all the ways you could reach your
audience and write each idea on a giant list. Don’t
worry about thinking big and crazy at this point.

• Buy sponsor slots on the annual OnionCon conference.
• Get a speaker slot on the annual OnionCon conference.
• Get an interview on the OnionPod podcast.
• Start a YouTube channel for onion farmers.
• Facebook advertising based on interest in onions and shovels.
• Google Ads targeteted to keywords like ‘shovel’ and ‘onion farming’.
• Content creation on onion farming & shoveling.
• Sending sample shovels to all the speakers at OnionCon.
• Referral program to incentivize word-of-mouth among onion farmers.
• Make distribution deal with retailers where onion farmers shop for gear.

More resources for ideating on acquisition tactics
• 19 traction channels
• Bullseye brainstorming exercise for the 19 traction channels
• Cheap traction tests you can run to validate channels

CAN IT SCALE?
SCALABILITY
EASE & COST
AVAILABILITY
PRODUCT/CHANNEL FIT
RELEVANCE
GUT FEELING
BLINK
1-5 1-5 1-5 1-5

SCALABILITYAVAILABILITYRELEVANCEBLINK
What do you think
about the idea before
you even realize you’re
thinking?
Based on Malcolm
Gladwell’s stellar book.
Don’t try to sell hearing
aids on Snapchat. Or
find B2B customers on
Pinterest.
How easy is it to set up?
How long will it take?
How much will it cost?
YouTube videos may
work very well, but are
expensive to make.
How easy is this channel
to scale up?
Answering Quora
questions may be
effective, but you have to
write them one by one.

AVAILABILITYRELEVANCEBLINK
What do you think
about the idea before
you even realize you’re
thinking?
Based on Malcolm
Gladwell’s stellar book.
Don’t try to sell hearing
aids on Snapchat. Or
find B2B customers on
Pinterest.
How easy is it to set up?
How long will it take?
How much will it cost?
YouTube videos may
work very well, but are
expensive to make.
SCALABILITY
Don’t worry about
scalability at this point.
It’s more important that
you get a sense of your
customer’s behaviour
and validate your
messaging.

CAN IT SCALE?
SCALABILITY
EASE & COST
AVAILABILITY
PRODUCT/CHANNEL FIT
RELEVANCE
GUT FEELING
BLINK
1-5 1-5 1-5 1-5
= BRAS Score
X X

5. Test your best ideas
Take your best 2-4 ideas and start executing.
Adopt an experimental mindset while doing so.
If something works, put more of your chips on it.
At all times, aim to understand why ideas (don’t) work.
Then use those insights to generate new, better ideas.

Zero-budget user acquisition tactics with fast feedback loops
This list is non-exhaustive (that would take an entire EIA program of keynotes)
Focus on the concepts. It’s always about what your target customers are asking, searching
for, what content they consume, what influencers they follow, what other apps they use etc.
For equivalent China tactics, see Olivia’s deck.

WHAT ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS ASKING?
Quora
Quora means to give the world the best possible answer to
any question humans could possibly have.
Users can ask questions, write answers and upvote/
downvote answers. Answers with the most upvotes (and
least downvotes) end up on top.
People from your target audience have likely posted
questions you can answer. You just have to show up and
gently point them to the solution: your product.

Quora — What you can get out of it
Highly-qualified traffic
Because of the 1-1 relationship between what
the user is looking for and your value, on-site
conversion for Quora traffic is typically higher
than for many other channels (10% -15%).
Thought leadership
As you help out your target audience in what
they care about by answering questions
relevant to them, you’ll become an influential
voice and they’ll start valuing your opinions.

Quora — Researching questions
• Study what people are asking and what language they use to do so.
• Study the most upvoted answers for relevant questions and try to understand
why they seem to resonate most.
• Study the numbers of followers, answers and views of questions to get a sense
of their market relevance.
• Questions with significant traction also hold more potential for you to acquire
users by writing good answers to it.
• Don’t be discouraged by low metrics for questions. Your target audience may
just not be the type to be on Quora or voice the questions they have
altogether. Metrics say something, but don’t tell the whole story.

Quora — Researching questions
If you mean to target users from non-
English speaking countries, check out
Quora in other languages.

High-value questions typically have more followers than answers. The
higher this ratio, the better. This means a lot of people are interested
while not a lot of people have provided answers.
Quora — What makes a question worth answering?

1. Use the search module — Quora has a search functionality that lets you find
questions, answers, topics, users and spaces from search keywords.
2. Related questions — On every question page, Quora will show related questions
on the right-hand side of the page.
3. Topics & influencers — Quora also organises similar questions around topics. For
each topic, you can identify influential writers by checking out Most Viewed
Writers. These influencers will most probably also have answered other relevant
questions.
4. Use Quora Ads Targeting — Within Quora Ads Targeting, you can view the
average weekly views for every question. Creating an Ads account is free and you
don’t have to run actual ads to get these insights.
Quora — Finding questions to answer

Don’t be spammy and mindlessly pitch. Instead, focus on providing real help.
From the start, align your answer to the question and gradually build a convincing
narrative towards your value proposition.
Then try giving them a good reason to check it out (call-to-action).
To ensure relevance, combine the best ideas from already present answers and bring
them together in your own way.
Be mindful of who you’re writing to and make the value obvious and relevant.
It’s not that different from building great landing pages (;
Quora — How to write good answers

Quora — How to write good answers

• Ask team mates to upvote your answers.
• And downvote the other answers on the same question.
• Pro level: create a group chat with all teams that are active on
Quora so you can support each other.
• Quora may penalize upvotes - and downvotes for coming from the
same IP address (since we’re all on the same network here). Try to
up - downvote from your mobile phone instead.
• Pro level: use a VPN to change your IP + location (Hola VPN is a
free browser extension)
• I recommend to use one account per team to write answers from.
Quora — How to get your answers to the top
Facebook Group to get upvotes

The Ladder Of Product Awareness
Whether your audience is asking questions on Quora gives you a sense of where they are on the LOPA

SPEAKING OF PRODUCT AWARENESS — WHAT ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS SEARCHING FOR?
Keyword search volume gives a sense of market relevance
Keyword volume
How many people are searching this term
within a specific geographical region.
Keyword difficulty
How hard is it to rank highly for a keyword. Put
differently: how much competition there is.

Free keyword research tools — Keyword Sh!tter
Generates keyword suggestions from a
source keyword.
Warning: it generates a lot.
https://keywordshitter.com

Free keyword research tools — Keywords Everywhere
Shows keyword search
volume, competition and
related keywords.
Comes as a browser
extension for Google
Chrome & Mozilla Firefox.
https://keywordseverywhere.com/

Free keyword research tools — Answer The Public
Maps what questions people are asking
about your niche.
https://answerthepublic.com

WHERE DO YOUR CUSTOMERS CONNECT WITH LIKE-MINDED PEOPLE?
Product Hunt
Product Hunt is Product Geek Heaven.
It’s where early adopters come together to connect
over their passion for new products and technologies.
Match made in heaven for EIA projects.

Product Hunt — The Basics
The Daily Hunt
Every day again, new products for users to check out.
Products compete to be on top by the end of the day.
Upvotes
You rise in the ranking by getting upvotes from
community members. But that’s not the only thing that
counts (there’s a secret algorithm).
Hunters & Makers
Only community members with Hunter permissions
can post new products. Members that created the
product are called Makers.

Product Hunt — What you’ll get out of it
You’ll get on the radar of early adopters
These are the type of people who’ll try your
product when it’s still a baby. They’re okay with it
still having growing pains.
You’ll get invaluable product feedback
While the traction is awesome, early stage this is
still mostly about getting as many people as
possible to talk about your product.
You’ll get traffic and signups
People come flocking to your landing page to
check out your product and get early access.

Product Hunt — How to launch
Since only Hunters can post products, you’ll first need to get ahold of one.
This may take a couple of hours or even days, so start early.
If you want to launch, talk to me and I’ll get you a Hunter.
(WhatsApp +32478638070)
Since you can’t really give users access to the product just yet, position your
submission and landing page as a Pre-launch with a call-to-action along the lines
of Request early access, Notify me or Join the waiting list.
You can put as much effort in a Product Hunt launch as you like. You can prepare it
meticulously and aim for the top spot or you can just have it posted with some
minimal prep and see what happens.

I wrote one of the most used guides to launch on Product Hunt
following a launch I did with a startup.
The Ultimate Playbook to blowing your Product Hunt Launch out of the water
If you want an additional perspective, I also recommend this resource:
10 Steps to Launching a #1 Product on Product Hunt

In case multiple teams would want to go for this, you
can leverage the power of EIA in a similar way as
previously recommend for Quora upvotes.
Create an upvote group chat to coordinate.

WHO DO YOUR TARGET CUSTOMERS TRUST?
92% of consumers trust recommendations
from friends and family over advertising

Leverage the networks of early enthusiasts by
incentivizing them to share with their friends and family
Rhyme your marketing campaign with a waiting list system that
lets leads move up the leaderboard by sharing your campaign
with their friends and family.

Referral Programs — The Startup Prelaunch

Referral Programs — The Startup Prelaunch
You can implement this quickly and without
coding with Viral Loops.
Register for a free 14-day trial at https://
viral-loops.com and get started with the
Startup Prelaunch template.
If you need help, talk to the guys from Viral Loops via the
livechat on their site. Tell them you’re running an EIA
project and that I referred you (I gave them a heads up).

Referral Programs — Other formats
Other relevant Viral Loop formats to run for
making the most out of a launch would mostly be:
• Milestone referral
• Leaderboard giveaway
However, for these (and others), the format kind
of demands you to have rewards to give users that
share most. While for the Startup Prelaunch it’s
fine if you just promise them early product access.

Facebook Groups
This is about aligning your story to the audience you’re targeting it too.
That becomes easier as an audience is more homogeneous (i.e. the people that make up
the audience increasingly similar to one another)
This is what makes Facebook Groups so powerful.
You can group a bunch of people that correspond to your ideal customer, that share that
one pivotal interest. Then you connect with them, learn from them, and market to them.
Except it won’t feel like marketing. It will feel like you’re helping them.
And that’s about the best marketing can get.

Facebook Groups
Facebook Group for writers created by an entrepreneur who’s
looking to create software to help writers write better, faster.
The takeaway: don’t spam, help and care.

Facebook Groups — Join existing groups
Resist the temptation of blatantly posting your landing page asking for signups. There’s few things
people hate more than spam. Instead, try to start a conversation. Create the narrative of you trying to
solve a specific problem for them and wanting to work with them to get it done. For example, say
you’re building a solution to solve a to them specific problem but that you need their help on
some key things. Link a 3-question survey, then add in a 4th line saying something like
“leave your email address if you want to receive updates on the launch.”

Facebook Groups — Create your own
Can’t find Facebook Groups on your topic?
This tells you something about the (un)awareness of your target audience.
Find Facebook Groups on your topic but no good ones?
Great.
That’s a sign of an underserved niche. And you can fill that need by creating a
killer community of which you’ll be the king.
This can be extremely powerful. But takes careful recruiting, lots of content
creation and community building. And thus time.

Other communities
designernews.com
For designers.
stackoverflow.com
For programmers.
getcrafty.com
For DIY artists (by Etsy).
sephora.com
For makeup affecionados.
LinkedIn Groups
Like Facebook Groups.
slofile.com
Directory with Slack Groups for
developers, marketers, entrepreneurs,
designers, scientists, crypto, sports,
music, travel, health,…
shethinx
For girl power.

Other communities
Every Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitch, Tik Tok,
Snapchat… account with substantial following is essentially a community.
They’ll all be about one specific topic that unites an audience.
If your value proposition is related to that topic, the account is relevant you and
should have your attention when coming up with acquisition tactics.
The question is always the same
Where is your audience hanging out?

Reddit — Where viral stories are born
Reddit is the world’s 17th website for traffic (5th in the US).
Because users are anonymous, you should probably not consider this a
sustainable customer acquisition channel.
Because of its huge user base, high levels of engagement and wide
variety of subreddits however — it’s also a great place to create buzz
and momentum around your startup.
Reddit is where stories go viral before they reach social media and
mainstream media. But it’s usually hit or miss.

Reddit — What you need to know first
Reddit likes laws and law enforcement.
There’s lots of posting rules you’ll need to comply with, often specific ones per
subreddit.
Moderators are ruthless and will take every opportunity to take your post down.
For every subreddit you try to post in, read the rules, study the posts that stay up
and get traction, plus make sure you post with a high-karma account.

Reddit — What you need to know first
Reddit doesn’t like outsiders.
As a Reddit user you can accumulate karma through the amount of upvotes and
comments your posts get. A user’s karma indicates the seniority of a Reddit user and
determines how severely moderators judge their actions.
In short: don’t create a new Reddit account and immediately post a story about yourself.
Instead, accumulate karma first in easy subreddits or get your hands on an account that
already has a good amount of karma (let me know if you want to use my account).

Reddit — Maximizing your chances of big time buzz
To go viral on Reddit, content needs tell a story that makes an audiences feel something.
This can be happiness, motivation, inspiration, sadness etc. in a way that makes them want to share it with
other people.
Rather than the startup itself, focus on the story, even if that story doesn’t directly involve your product.
To get people to read the story in the first place, you’ll need to write a hook (subject) that stands out in the
list of posts in the subreddit.
Think of the type of headlines that you would click. At the same time, avoid clickbait where the story doesn’t
deliver on the promise of the hook. Users will feel cheated and vote your post down.
Mind that it doesn’t need to have a text post: images and (especially) videos can work too, if done well.

Reddit — Example
I once (unintentionally) made a startup from Rwanda that makes shoes out of tyres and banana leaves go
viral on Reddit. It was afterwards posted to BBC World and other sites.
I think it’s a good example of how to approach writing the subject line for a post you mean to get traction.
+ Another great example.
How to get your startup on the front page of Reddit
Reddit hates blatant marketing: here’s how you can still get thousands of visitors
List of subreddits

Reddit — The quick win
In the specific subreddit for startups they actually want you to spam your startup. Look at that.
In my experience, this is unlikely to get you significant traction. But it takes about 2 minutes.
https://www.reddit.com/r/startups/

Betalist — A hybrid of Product Hunt and r/startups
https://betalist.com

Betalist — A hybrid of Product Hunt and r/startups
Betalist also wants you to spam your startup.
To help enthusiasts discover new startups and provide startups with early user feedback.
Similar to r/startups, this is a quick win that is unlikely to get you real traction.
But why not? You never know.

WHAT CONTENT DO YOUR CUSTOMERS SEEK AND CONSUME?
Instagram acquisition on autopilot
You can reach target audiences on Instagram via other other accounts that post content
related/similar to your value proposition.
For example, if want to reach people that love bread — target the users that follow and engage
with accounts about wine, cheese, gastronomy etc.
You can then automate your IG account to engage with those users
This will make your account pop up in users’ notifications. And, if they are triggered by your
profile picture + name, they’ll click through to land on your profile page.
Then it’s up to you to convert them with relevant content an appealing CTA.

1. Identify accounts your target audience follows and engages with.
2. Make sure to have a nicely filled feed with relevant, quality content. For
inspiration on what to post, study target accounts, identify the posts with the
most likes/comments and have that inspire the content you create + post. Or
steal it. Up to you.
3. Automate engagement like following, liking and commenting to get on the
radar of your target audience.
4. Include a convincing offer / call-to-action on your account page so you can
send users that land on your profile page to your landing page.
That’s the nutshell version. Here’s the long, step-by-step version. 
(You don’t need to use the specific tools mentioned in the guide.
There’s plenty alternatives available with free trials and similar features — just Google, or ask me).
Instagram acquisition on autopilot

Make friends with your customers’ favourite creators
“This video was made possible by Brilliant. Learn everything you want, including how I make videos
like these. The first 200 to sign up via the link in the description will get 20% of a yearly plan.”

1. Figure out which YouTube videos your customers watches,
which podcasts they listen to, what blogs they read.
2. Build a relationship with the creator and provide a special
deal for their audience.
3. Creators with a big audience will ask for a fee, but smaller
ones may be happy to try out your product and be able to
give their audience something special.
4. A variation of this would be to ship products to relevant
creators and ask them to review it.

You can also turn this around by creating content (blog, video)
around influencers/creators relevant to your audience.
For example, I and 21 others were sent 4 questions about
LinkedIn marketing — super quick to fill out.
The content creator then aggregated all of the answers into
one giant blog post that got lots of traction.

• For the influencers it’s a quick and easy. Minimum effort for significant exposure.
• Getting such a request makes the influencer feel important, especially if the
content project also includes other influencers.
• All of those influencers will be happy to share the content piece with their
respective audiences once it’s ready.
• For the content creator, this is a quick and effective way of creating highly relevant
content while gaining exposure with multiple relevant target audiences at once.
Why this works

DES TRAYNOR, CO-FOUNDER INTERCOM
“In the early days, I used to literally email people and ask
them to use Intercom. If you look at the first 200 emails I
sent from my Intercom email, almost all of them were along
the lines of, “Would you like to try Intercom?” For a customer
we really wanted, I’d mock up a screenshot showing how
we’d nail a reasonable use case for their product. That
helped people understand both what we could do for them
and what it would look like in their product.”
Livechat software, founded in 2011, valued today at ± 1.85bn
BE A HUMAN BEING AND TALK TO YOUR CUSTOMERS
Use email and direct messages
to start conversations and build relations

B2B Sales
Can you get your ideal customer to talk to you?
The more your B2B company targets enterprises, the more sales
will be your largest acquisition channel.
If your potential audience is fewer than, say, 5,000 businesses, it’ll
be tough to get traditional channels to work for you.

B2B Sales
Can you get your ideal customer to talk to you?
User acquisition strategy at this point becomes about setting up
processes to your potential customers interested in talking to you — be
it in-person, over the phone or via email and similar (direct messages).

B2B Sales — Lead generation
• Content marketing (SEO) — Potential customers find you because
they land on a relevant piece of content via Google, learn about your
value proposition and express interest by indicating they’d like to
learn more (demo). Your sales people now start the sales process. 
• Advertising — B2B customers can be targeted just as well with ads
as B2C, however targeting possibilities are a lot less. LinkedIn is
about the only channel with serious targeting possibilities. The idea
is the same as with content marketing: people from your target
audience land on your site and agree to be contacted.

• Events — Events like conferences and trade shows are like online
communities: a big gathering of your target audience you can start
talking to, if only you know how to get ahold of them and tell a story
that resonates. 
• Cold outreach — This is where you identify targets you want to sell
to beforehand, and then reach out to them pitching your value
proposition, trying to get them to agree on a sales call or product
demo.

For the investor pitch next week, it would be great if you can get a couple of your
target B2B customers on a sales call to learn more about their specific needs and get
them to say they’re interested in your value proposition as soon as you launch in on
the market. This shows validation.
Because content marketing takes too much time to work for next week and ads
are expensive, let’s look at how you can get this done with outreach.

B2B Sales — Finding prospects
1. Your already existing network — Comb through your address book and social connections. Anyone in
there worth talking to or who might be able to get you an intro somewhere? Make a post on Facebook/
LinkedIn or send an email to your address book so you don’t have to ask people one by one. 
2. Warm intros — Ask your mentors, coworkers, friends, and family for intros to anyone who may be in the
market for your product. 
3. Conferences — A big gathering of your target customers you get to talk to in-person, which will always
be more effective than any type of medium you have to use to do so. Try to get your hands on the guest
list beforehand to determine whether the event is worthwhile. This also allows you to reach out to
people you want to meet beforehand. You can even reach out to them without going to the event 
4. The internet — Your target customer is somewhere among the 4 billion on the internet. We’ll cover how
to quickly find them in a way that you can reach out to them in later slides.

B2B Sales — What to write in emails or DMs
Know who you’re talking to
Always align your pitch and tone to the specific persona you’re
reaching out to. If you’re an online design testing platform, don’t pitch a
designer the same value proposition as you’d pitch a marketer.

Be contextual, give them a reason to care
You’ll have to convince leads you’re worth spending time on in just
about the first 1-2 lines of your messages.
If you can’t trigger them right then and there, they’ll most probably
ignore you. They’ll be busy and have loads of other people trying to get
their attention. Why should they give you theirs?

The hook: Give them a reason to care, set the tone, be contextual.
• Remind them where you know each other from (event, school, LinkedIn, intro)
• Describe a relevant bad situation and show or offer help
• Invite them as early users - make them feel ‘special’
• Invite them to an exclusive event you’re organising (or as speaker)
• Invite them an online community like a Facebook Group
Cold Email Playbook by Mailshake

Make your pitch (2-4 lines)
• After the intro, get to the point. What do you have to offer and why should they care?
• Think back to the idea of header + subhead on your landing page.
• Your users hate video ads. We can solve it, without losing you money.
• Keep it short and simple. You want prospects to read your message before they even
realize they’re reading it. This is impossible with big, chunky paragraphs of text.
• If you feel you can’t make the pitch in such few words, attach a 3-4 slide deck. That
way you leave it up to the prospect to decide whether they need more or not.

Make it easy for them to take action
• End your message by asking a specific, easy-to-answer question or propose an
action that is easy to take.
• For example, don’t ask whether they’d be interested in hopping on a call next week.
This means they’ll have to go check their calendar, find a good time, propose that
time to you etc.
• Instead, propose a specific day+time right then and there.
• Even better: provide a calendar booking link so the prospect can pick a time that
works for them in two clicks.

Mixmax
Calendly

B2B Sales — Outreach example

B2B Sales — Outreach template
Hi {{prospect firstname}},
I noticed you guys at {{prospect company}} help brands to generate qualified leads by building tools their
audience can use for free. It’s a great new space, but I know it’s hard for agencies to scale their offering
because development takes up a lot of time.
Because these apps tend to have the same building blocks, we’ve built {{your startup name}} software
that gives you those building blocks so you can develop and deliver much faster. Agencies like {{similar
company to prospect company}} tried our first version and were impressed.
Here’s what their {{decision-maker}} said: {{testimonial}}. I’m confident {{prospect company}} would have
similar results.
Do you have time next week for a chat? You can book a slot with me here.
{{your firstname}} ,
Co-Founder {{your startup name}} {{landing page URL}}

B2B Sales — Outreach subject line
No matter how great your email, it won’t get read if you don’t manage to
make its subject line stand out in the prospect’s packed inbox.
Remember you’re a stranger whose name they’ve never seen before.
Aim to entice, create intrigue, spark curiosity. Try triggering a question in their
heads so they’ll need to open the email to answer that question.
At the same time, avoid looking spammy.
For inspiration, check out the resource below.
The 87 Best Email Subject Lines by Sumo

B2B Sales — Follow-up
After sending your first message, have two follow-ups scheduled.
Data proves your chances of success improve if you follow up at least two
times.
You don’t want to be a pest, but the bottom line is persistence wins. And the
marginal cost of each email you send is low.

B2B Sales — Follow-up
But you need to do it right.
Few will respond to your first email. Each follow-up is an opportunity to build
credibility to finally get to a "Fine, I'll respond.”
So don’t waste follow-ups on a limp “bumping this” or “checking in." That’s a
useless nudge. And therefore annoying.
Instead, follow-ups should build atop your original message. For example,
provide video demos visualizing what you originally pitched. Meanwhile,
remember the objective: relate about their world.

B2B Sales — Metrics
To get to the best possible copy and, even more importantly, subject line,
it’s a good idea track a couple of basic metrics of emails you’re sending out.
• open rate — emails sent / emails opened
• response rate — replies / emails opened
• clickthrough rate — links clicked / emails opened
You can use a tool like Streak to do this. (free to use)

B2B Sales — Finding email addresses
You can find just about anyone’s professional email from:
• First name
• Last name
• Company domain
Just use one of these these tools (all have a free option for you to use):

B2B Sales — Finding prospects on LinkedIn
LinkedIn is the world’s biggest B2B database.
You can find prospects by:
• Industry
• Job role
• Geographical location
• Company size
• Specific companies
• Groups around specific topics
• … and more
All you have to do is use Search.
The free version doesn’t have all filters, but enough for you to find relevant decision-makers.

B2B Sales — Finding prospects on LinkedIn
Next, you can get in touch in the following ways.
1. Connection request with personal message — Be relevant. Don’t pitch your product right
away. Aim to start a conversation instead. Intro messages are limited to 300 characters so
you’ll have no choice but to keep it short and sweet. 
2. Find email addresses from first and last name — Plug their names and company domains in
an email finder and reach out to them via a cold email.

B2B Sales — Finding prospects on the internet at large
Phantombuster is an automation service that can extract (contact) data from
various platforms and sites based on criteria you define. Free to use for 14 days.

B2B Sales — Phantombuster: where are your customers?

What to do with the data?
Whatever you can do get them to talk to you.
• If you get an email address, you can send them an… email
• If you get Facebook profiles, you can send a friendship request and start a chat,
or add them to a Facebook group.
• If you get LinkedIn profiles, you can send connection requests + intro message
or find their emails using a tool from name + company
• If you get Product Hunt upvoters, you can contact them on Product Hunt or
send them tweets (PH accounts are linked to Twitter accounts)
• If you get Instagram accounts, you can follow them and send direct messages.

… Or you can you analyse the data to get better ideas.
Which influencers are they following on IG? Which Facebook Groups are they in?
What events do they attend? What other products on Product Hunt do they
upvote? What Medium articles do they read?
Remember:
1. Understand their behaviour and mindset.
2. Use that understanding to ideate on tactics to reach them.

Or just do what your competitors are doing

WHAT ARE SUCCESSFUL COMPETITORS DOING?
Similarweb
Similarweb is a free-to-use Chrome extension that reveals
marketing analytics for websites you’re visiting.

Similarweb

Similarweb
Here’s what a referral traffic profile looks like if you have one

Doing > (over)thinking
Don’t break your head over how to communicate in Facebook Groups before you’ve validated there’s actually
relevant Facebook Groups to communicate in.
Don’t break your head over whether you should start answering Quora questions before you’ve validated there’s
Quora questions to answer.
Don’t break your head over how to acquire users from Instagram accounts before you’ve validated that that is
indeed the best place to start (Facebook Groups? YouTube channels? Snapchat? Is your audience B2B?)

Doing > (over)thinking
You’ll get a lot better ideas by starting to browse around, writing some messages and
talking to some potential customers than you’ll get from studying this deck start to end.
Or hypothesising with your team for hours about what would and what wouldn’t work.
The only way to know if something works, is to try and see.
If it does, go all-in. If it doesn’t, understand why and turn the why into a new tactic.

https://www.slideshare.net/InnovationAcademy/presentations

EIA2019HK - Building Landing Pages and Acquiring First Users - Gilles de Clerck

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