PTCC #001 The Blueprint for 1300% Increase in Email Sign Ups

Mixing things up when you need to

Eve Arnold

Aug 20, 2022

This week you’ll find out about how to change strategy when you need to boost growth. Let’s dive in.

In the mail 📧

Small ideas: Things to ponder.
Stories: Shifting gears on your strategy.
People: Cool creators on the internet.
News: An update on the name change.

Read time: 2 minutes

SMALL IDEAS

Aggressive iteration is innovation: if you can keep moving, keep learning and keep building a foundation of content, you’ll always be ahead of the game.
Fun is (the not-so-secret) secret: the only way to stick around long enough for your part-time creator journey to take off is to enjoy the process.
Forget flow states and think flow levers: Everybody talks about flow states being the best, I agree but focus on what creates your flow.

Why I Binned My 2-year Creator Strategy in 2 minutes

2 sign-ups.

That’s my usual daily number of subscribers. It’s a reasonable number. I’m not complaining, the opposite in fact. I’ve always been pretty happy that 2 people in the world had signed up for a newsletter from me.

Yet over the last day, things have gone, a little, wild. I’ve just hit 28 sign-ups today. That’s a 1300% increase.

And I think I know why.

A brand makeover

I recently overhauled my newsletter branding.

It used to be called ‘Occupation Happy’ a newsletter made for people that wanted to find out how to work happier. I’ve always had a really tough time finding my ‘thing’ so I thought I would share what the science says about making work a better experience.

The trouble is I wasn’t really writing about that stuff. What I was actually writing about what building something on the side.

I was really writing about part-time creatorship. It was the realization that I was branded one thing but talking about another that made me think again.

I changed my branding to align with that.

But branding is just one piece of the puzzle.

The magic is when content meets the right minds

I recently wrote an article about being a part-time creator.

It was born out of an article that had an article go viral a few months back. I wrote about a 9–5 being a huge asset to any creator. From a risk perspective but also from a time management perspective.

I wrote that piece, it blew up. All of a sudden, all over the world people were resonating with this idea that you can have both a 9–5 and create on the side.

It was a narrative I’ve always been passionate about. This 9–5 cubicle stuff I found to be nonsense but I also admired creators doing it for themselves.

It seems I’d accidentally found my product market fit.

That rally of articles was my aggressive iteration.

You must deliver and entice

Recently I’d hit the goldmine.

Here’s the secret: your call to action (CTA) has to marry up with whatever your content is.

Before I was writing about writing online and then I’d have a CTA for my newsletter that was about work happiness. It was clear the two things didn’t link.

Why would anyone reading an article about writing want to sign up for a newsletter about work happiness?

It didn’t make sense.

The newsletter didn’t serve the audience that read my article so they inevitably didn’t sign up.

You have to create clarity about your product or service

Why is it that Dickie Bush, Nicolas Cole, and Justin Welsh dominate the Twitter space?

Because there it’s crystal clear what they are delivering. You go to Dickie for writing online active, you go to Cole for business and writing advice, and you to Justin for understanding how to create a company of one.

It’s simple.

Clarity = confidence.

People had uncertainty. If they don’t know exactly what they are getting from you and why you, then they won’t buy into the thing you are doing. You must provide clarity.

Tell them what you’re about, deliver content that resonates and follow it up with a service that will benefit them.

Product market fit is aggressive iteration

2 signs up were good. 28 is exponential.

Iteration is about trying, listening, and learning. Assessing what works and what doesn’t. When you apply this model, the sky is the limit.

I recently watched a video where this guy hits 300 sign-ups a day. Can you imagine? You get there through aggressively iterating. Working on what you are, what your content is about, and what you have on offer.

Putting it altogether

It took me 2 years to get here. After 2 years I think I’ve just about found what my content is about.

That’s okay by the way. You won’t know the answers straight the way. Experimentation is the best way to inform yourself of what you like to write about and most importantly, what your audience wants from you.

After a 1300% increase, there were 3 standout ideas:

Build on the foundations of your other content.
Create content that fits your brand.
Deliver on your promise.

Good luck creators.

PEOPLE

NEWS

Let’s talk about the change of this newsletter’s name. You’ll notice it’s changed from ‘Occupation Happy’ to ‘Part-Time Creator Club’. The change was mostly described above.

I found that most of the content I was posting centred around working alongside your 9-5 and finding the space to create online. So that is the direction this company will move in going forward.

As ever find out more: website, Twitter, Medium and find out more about books here.

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