The guide to making your website a revenue machine

Before we begin, I just posted a podcast with Tiago Forte (author of Second Brain and productivity leader) brainstorming $1M+ startup ideas. Watch it on YouTube or listen on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Enjoy.

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Most websites look the same.

Homepage, contact us, about, maybe a shop. That’s about it. You can browse it in your sleep.

And in this world where standing out is essential, it’s rare to find a website that makes you click buy or contact us. That’s why most websites convert at a dismal 1-2% range and leave 98-99% of potential customers left looking for the exit door.

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I’ve put together a little guide for you to turn your website into something people talk about and make them not think about smashing the close button.

A few tabs you can consider to add to your website for increased revenue, growth and word-of-mouth:

1) What we stand for

People can decide to buy from whoever, but you want them to buy from you.

Make it be known what you stand for. It's such a low cost way to make people feel comfortable and connected to you.

Pretty much everyone has an about page, not everyone has a what we stand for page.

The about page revels what your story is, but your "what we stand for" page reveals your heart.

Small subtle difference, but major impact.

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2) Behind the scenes

People want to know how the sausage is made.

Example:

The founders of functional chocolate brand Mid Day Squares (revenue ~$20M/year) are constantly showing the good, the bad and the ugly behind building their brand. And it's working. Hundreds of thousands of followers and rejected an acquisition offer from Hershey's.

People feel like they are along for the journey.

More trust, means more sales.

3) Free membership

What’s some free membership you can offer that gets you in the door with the customer?

This is where you can prove value to them.

Imagine Lululemon adding a free membership.

Maybe it’s yoga videos once a week by yoga legend Sri Dharma Mittra who just happens to be wearing Lululemon pants.

You want to brainstorm some digital assets, newsletters, guides that doesn't cost you a lot but turns a 1 way conversation (you to them) to a 2 way street.
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4) Shop

Okay, I know what you’re thinking… you already have a shop or you don’t need one.

Well, if you already have a shop…do you have any free products in it? Think iPhone wallpapers, guides, reports etc. Stuff that costs you basically zero.

Items that you can checkout on Shopify for free. You get their email and start building trust.

The "buying" of a free item in a shop makes it feel like a steal. People love it.

And if you don’t have a shop, adding a shop with free items is a trend that's only beginning. You'll be one of the first and have plenty of pleasantly surprised customers. Then you layer on paid products as you scale.

5) Learn

Whatever you’re selling, there’s an opportunity to teach.

Selling green juices, teach about health

Selling social media consulting, teach about growing an Instagram following

Selling whatever, teach whatever makes onboards people into your world

When you learn something, you earn trust with the teacher.

That trust goes a long way. They are way more likely to buy from you with trust in hand.

6) Workshops

This is an extension to learning. It’s live events to teach or entertain. Bonus points if you can co-host with another creator who brings their audience.

I started thinking about building businesses as a event planner. It’s all about these events to bring your community together. They win, you win.

What's your event calendar this year?

7) “Refer and earn”

“Affiliate marketing” has become a bad word. And it shouldn’t be.

Incentivizing the behaviors you want (word-of-mouth) is a no brainer.

Turning your customers into advocates. I think we’ll see a resurgence of affiliate marketing especially with software startups.

Any business with 50%+ gross margins should be thinking about refer and earn strategy. Play with margin to give to your customers instead of Mark Zuckerberg.

Example:

If you sign up for a 14 day free trial to community platform Skool, I’ll get 40% of revenue for life. And I love the platform which I'd talk about anyways.

That 40% affiliate cut is a huge incentive for me to talk about it even if it's subconscious.

I think that’s why Alex Hormozi probably put the largest check of his life into the business. It’s becoming a referring engine.

The question for you is how much margin can you allocate to refer and earn?

8) Achievements

The more you add tabs and experiences like this to your website/app, the more you realize you’re kinda building a game.

That’s when you layer on achievements. YouTube gives out achievements if you get really big like 1M subscribers.

But for the average YouTube creator, they can use some pats on the back along the way. There's a product for creators called VidIQ that gives competitive awareness of other YouTube channels but also customizes your YouTube to share with you achievements you've made.

See below I just hit 12,500 subscribers on YouTube. Woo! Btw, subscribe over here.

When I log into YouTube, I see all my recent achievements with an extension called .

Achievements show you care and that the customers are along for a journey

To conclude:

It's worth potentially adding these to your website (doesn't have to be main nav bar)

1. What we stand for
2. Behind the scenes
3. Free membership
4. Shop
5. Learn
6. Workshops
7. Refer & earn
8. Achievements​
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Next up, bookmarks I saved this week worth reading

1. VCs used only really care about growth and now they care about margin. View tweet​
2. How to come up with AI startup ideas. View tweet​
3. The EU now allows "alternative app stores". Tons of opportunity here. View tweet​
4. How to build a minimum viable product in one photo. View image ​
5. “The things that we love tell us who we are.” — Thomas Aquinas
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That’s a wrap!

I hope you enjoyed this week’s post. Tag me on X if you did with the link to the post. I read every mention.

And if you're anything like me you love business ideas. Don't forget to listen to the podcast the latest podcast I did with Tiago Forte brainstorming $1M+ startup ideas.

Watch it on YouTube or listen on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Enjoy.

Thank you for reading. Hope you found it valuable. Forward to a friend if you did.

I'll keep writing if you keep reading.

Until next week.

Be well,

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