A Guide to Freelancing Marketplaces · 98% Off Domains Next Week · Twitter Inspiration Handbook

Channing here. Hypothetical question for you: if it were possible, would you live forever?

Well it may not be hypothetical for much longer. A new study suggests that a protocol of oxygen treatments can reverse the aging process. So don't let anyone tell you that 2020 is all about bad news!

On to the newsletter (browser version here). Here's what you'll find in this issue:

• Freelancing marketplaces are booming. Learn how other successful founders have taken advantage.
• In the news: 98% off domains for Black Friday. Gumroad's new membership feature. Hire Lamba School grads for a free month.
• Trying to grow your audience on Twitter? A marketer with over 75K followers shares his handbook after years of trial and error.

Special thanks to Darko Gjorgjievski, Harry Dry, and Pete MacLeod for contributing to this newsletter. Want to contribute a piece of your own? Check out this doc for an idea of what I'm looking for. —Channing

🦅 A Primer on Freelancing Marketplaces

by Darko Gjorgjievski of User Acquisition Channels

We're in the golden age of freelancing. Things were already trending in this direction pre-2020, and the coronavirus is just speeding up the inevitable.

So out of the 34 acquisition channels I've identified in my analysis of all 489 Indie Hackers interviews, I'll be reviewing freelancing marketplaces today. (See Zero to Users for more details.)

Freelancing sites like UpWork help companies connect to freelancers who can do a certain service for them. Can you use these marketplaces to promote a SaaS, though? It turns out the answer is yes.

Take ActionWins and ActionPages ($4k/mo), a referral marketing SaaS. The whole idea behind creating ActionWins was to take an open-source tool and create a SaaS around it:

ActionWins' founder Alex Kehaya used UpWork to successfully find clients for his products:

His pitch was basically something like: "Hey, why pay an expensive developer when you can get a SaaS and pay monthly for it?" Something many people found compelling.

Another example is StoreMapper ($21k/mo), a SaaS that enables you to put a store location map on your e-commerce website. The way Storemapper's founder Tyler Tringas got inspired to create the site was by being a freelancer:

He then realized that many people were repeatedly asking for something like this on freelancing sites and used that fact to promote his SaaS:

Freelancing platforms can be a viable acquisition channel if people are actively looking for a developer to build them something your product already does. Give them a shot.

What's your experience with freelancing sites been like? Go here for a discussion with other indie hackers.

📰 In the News

🔥 Up to 98% off domains: Namecheap's having a Black Friday sale starting Tuesday.

💰 Gumroad announces a new membership feature. Creators can now charge for access to online content.

🎓 Lambda School will let companies hire their graduates for a free four-week trial.

🎨 Tailwind CSS 2.0 is out. The second version of the popular UI framework offers dark mode, 220 new colors, and does not support IE11.

🦸‍♀️ Blogger Steph Smith announced "12 Scholarships in 12 Months", where $500/mo scholarships will be offered for various social causes.

📹 YouTube will soon start placing ads on videos without creators' permission.

🍎 Apple to pay $113m to settle claims it slowed down batteries in iPhones in 2016.

📖 A Marketer's Handbook for Twitter Inspiration

by Harry Dry of Marketing Examples

A few years ago I was trying to use Twitter to promote a few side projects. But I had no idea what I was doing.

So I made one big Google Doc where I started saving the best “brand tweets” and grouped them into different categories.

I've spent the last few weeks turning that into this little handbook. I hope you find it useful.

1/ Quick tips

Teach people something new in a tweet. Short, sweet, and shareable.

2/ Threads

People don't click links. So if you've got a story worth sharing write a thread.

3/ Memes

Make your brand relatable.

Sparknotes sells literature study guides. Twitter and literature study guides don't mix. So Sparknotes use pop-culture to make literature relatable.

4/ “Quick reaction” tweets

Each day a new story consumes Twitter. Think fast and you can go viral.

5/ Build in public

Makes your brand feel ALIVE. People want to come on the journey.

6–17/ Click here to read the full article

If you'd like to learn more about marketing you might like my newsletter. Each week I share a new short, sweet, marketing case study. They're normally shorter than this haha!

Or check out my website to browse all the previous case studies :)

🐦 The Tweetmaster's Pick

by Tweetmaster Flex

Yo! Every day I post the tweets indie hackers share the most.

This one's an easy call. The daily pick goes to @StevejLamar 😂

Flex out.

🏁 Enjoy This Newsletter?

Tell me how I can make it better! Or help me out by contributing to it directly. —Channing