The Growth Newsletter - The Growth Newsletter #053

The Growth Newsletter #053

Hey, Julian here. This newsletter curates growth insights from the Demand Curve Slack community. It keeps you up-to-date on growth tactics.

 

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1. Leverage TikTok creators for top-of-funnel acquisition

Insight from Tactiq.io and Demand Curve.

 

A single TikTok collaboration video can go viral and generate millions of views and tens of thousands of new users for your app.

 

But that's unlikely to happen for you unless you understand how to work with content creators.

 

A few tips to maximize your top of funnel acquisition through TikTok creators:

• Search for creators in your niche with 50k - 250k followers via relevant hashtags. Next, cross-check their 20-30 videos to get a rolling average of engagement—weed out some of the larger accounts that have poor recent engagement. Look for a minimum of 3 videos above 100,000 views, since this de-risks your opportunity to reach many new users.
• Personalize your creator outreach by mentioning the creator's specific audience, and how your partnership will benefit their audience. Also, email them at their listed email instead of sending a DM. Response rate is generally much higher that way.
• Work with your creators to make persona-centric videos. They tend to outperform generic problem-oriented creatives. Top-performing creatives often follow a standard formula:
  • Open with a hook identifying the persona
  • Highlight the problem
  • Solve the problem through your product
    • High performing examples: Student, UX designer
• Make sure creators clearly mention how and where to get your product—seems obvious, but many advertisers drop the ball on this and lose out on conversion.

Following these tips, Tactiq.io—a video meeting transcription tool—was able to generate 150,000+ new users on $1820 USD in spend.

 

This strategy works for some types of products better than others:

• Freemium SaaS products, since there's a low hurdle to get TikTok users to try for free.
• Broadly appealing products that solve a real problem. With TikTok's algorithm, it's harder to reach a very specific audience—your creator's content will be surfaced to very different users. Broad appeal ensures many types of viewers have a reason to get your product.

2. Create urgency with time and stock limits

Insight from Demand Curve.

 

One reason why some ecommerce stores convert poorly:

 

Their products are too available—they're always for sale on site. And shoppers are always within a few clicks of buying from competitors.

 

Put another way, there's no urgency driving people to purchase now.

 

Urgency motivates action. Entrepreneur Marcus Taylor tested two versions of a landing page. One showed just the price of an offer, and another had a “time left to download” countdown just above the price. The conversion rate was almost three times higher for the version with the countdown.

 

Two ways you can increase urgency on your ecommerce site:

1. Show limited stock levels to highlight scarcity, using an app like Stock Level Inventory Quality (for Shopify stores). Shoppers who feel FOMO buy faster.
2. Set a deadline. Add a countdown to indicate how little time is left on a deal, or show customers how soon they should order to get a product by a certain date. You can take this a step further by inviting shoppers to set a calendar reminder so they don't forget to buy before the deadline.

Don’t go overboard by using countdowns, stock limits, and “act fast” language. Nobody likes a pushy salesperson, even when that “person” is a piece of code on your website.

 

Bonus: If you run an ecom store on Shopify, check out our brand new playbook on Shopify conversion.

 

3. Create a microsite to increase top of funnel reach

Insight from DBS Interactive.

 

Microsites can meaningfully increase web conversion. A microsite is a separate web entity from your main website that's created for marketing purposes. It usually has its own domain name and URL. Marketers generally use microsites to promote events and new products, often with more creative freedom than their main brand allows.

 

And here's the benefit. If you create something remarkable (fun, useful, or novel), it could get shared more than your main site otherwise would.

 

A few examples:

• The meditation app Calm created Do Nothing for 2 Minutes, a site that challenged visitors to not touch their mouse or keyboard for two minutes.
• Adobe set up Creative Types, a personality test that identifies how different people perceive the world and create things.
• The virtual music lesson platform Rock Out Loud Live bought the domain IKilledZoom.com to showcase how its audio quality is better than Zoom's.

For better results, consider these best practices:

• Focus on a relevant topic. Your microsite should relate to the industry or problem your brand solves.
• Link to your main site. Your brand's logo doesn't need to be the focal point of your microsite but it should be easy enough to notice to connection.
• Make it interactive. Interactive microsites like Adobe’s quiz or Calm’s game engage users and make it more likely they'll share it with others.
• Avoid overcomplicating it. A single landing page is fine; so are minimalist designs. Case in point: Digiday's WhatTheFuckIsMyTwitterBio.com, which attracted 100,000 users organically, was set up in two hours.

Brand new links

Shopify playbook: We just released a new playbook covering how to launch a Shopify store that converts. There’s a lot of content out there about how you should sell on Shopify, so we decided to create a tactical guide on conversion best-practices.

 

We break down exactly how fast-growing startups structure their Shopify stores, covering:

• Homepage
• Product pages
• Themes
• Menus
• Creating urgency
• Conversion tactics
• How to get people to buy again and again

Get the playbook here.

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New landing page teardown: We're breaking down the methods used by the highest-converting webpages. We'll help you understand the copywriting decisions behind every section—so you can apply them to your startups and projects.

 

This week, we're breaking down Ahrefs. Learn how Ahrefs increases conversion by pushing visitors to read their educational content before having them sign up. Get the teardown here.

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Top content role: Mutiny is looking to hire a great storyteller to own content and community. You'll build a content strategy and grow a community of top growth marketers. This is a unique opportunity to join a fast-growing startup and inspire thousands of marketers through content. Apply here.

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Top product role: SuperLayer is hiring a founding product manager. You'll serve as the Head of Product, working with the leadership team to build and execute a product roadmap. Apply here.

New marketing jobs

 

If you're looking for a top growth role, check out the opportunities below from our job board. Companies can post jobs here.

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Something fun

Want more growth tactics?

We're giving away our entire back-catalog of tactics to folks who refer two friends to this newsletter. Here's your referral link to share: https://sparklp.co/385a143f. You can track your referrals here. We'll automatically email you the password-protected tactics page once you've referred two people.

 

Know any good CEO coaches?

Founders often ask us for CEO coach recommendations. If you know a coach who you'd recommend, reply to this email and let us know.

We read every reply.

 

Who's Demand Curve? We're who startups rely on for professional growth. We dive into your ads, funnels, landing pages and more. Take a look at our startup growth program. Or Bell Curve will grow your company for you. We've worked with clients like Microsoft, Segment, and Perfect Keto. Hire us here.

 

You can also apply for our advanced growth marketing Slack community. Come talk with the heads of growth of all major tech companies.
 

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing with a friend! If this was sent to you by a friend, get the next growth report by signing up here.

 

— Julian Shapiro, Nick Costelloe, Stew Hillhouse, Joyce Chou, and the DC team.