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Andy Black

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It was just after midnight on 10-Nov-20 and I was annoyed with myself for not starting a particular project I'd been thinking about for a few weeks.

I decided to quickly post a short note to my Facebook profile before hitting the hay. At the time I had 880 friends on Facebook and had been a bit more active the previous few weeks than normal so thought I might get a bit of interest.

This is what I posted, and I woke to 17 people saying they were interested:




Only after people expressed an interest did I wonder what to do with them.

I didn’t have a domain setup for this project, and no “squeeze page” to get people’s email addresses and put them on a wait list.

I wanted to know a bit more about the people who were interested enough to reply, what they wanted and how to help them - so I knocked up my first ever Google Form (they’re free btw!).

I then privately Facebook messaged each person with “Hi <name>” and then this:



As of 20-Jan-21 I’ve messaged about 50 people, and 40 filled in the Google Form. (I no longer send people a link to the form but send them a link to the Bootcamp instead.)

The great bit about Google Forms is they can insert the data automatically into a Google Sheet.

Here’s the questions I asked and just some of the amazing responses:





Here’s a 10 min video a day or so later showing how I got 28 Google Form responses. Some of the insights are gold and will really help me serve people better.

View: https://youtu.be/PMvGzNvg1mg


EDIT: Here's where I'm interviewed about this:


Learnings:
  1. You don’t need a fancy announcement or “launch”.

  2. You don't need a domain or website to get started.

  3. You don’t need to build an email list with email software such as MailCheat(Chimp) or ActiveCampaign.

  4. Ask people what they want so you know to create it for them.

  5. Just be conversational and natural. Stop with the formal "sales speak".

  6. Just get started and adjust as you go.


Your turn:
  • What's your takeaways?

  • What will you do different?


EDIT: 26-Oct-23
I did it again on 13-Sep-23 and got over 30 responses just on Facebook. I had some on LinkedIn as well.

2023-10-26_11-49-25.jpg
 
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Last edited:

TheKingOfMadrid

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Definitely agree, too many entrepreneurs think they have to talk like what they think sales people talk like 24/7 and everything has to be executed on a fortune 500 level schematic.

I always say there's always something someone can teach so there's really no excuses.

In terms of execution, the only thing I would say is that this is far easier if you have already established an audience and they are reacting to both your social proof and your perceived value.

Which is why it should be stressed that you should always be building up a network of active interest leads. 880 contacts sounds small, but if you've vetted them accurately you only need 20% of them to be genuinely interested to get your idea moving.

Recently I've been playing around with my LinkedIn which has a very low contact count and trying to see how much I can get my stuff to convert and its really difficult! It's made me a lot more aware of connecting with the right type of people, at low <200 followers your approach needs to be on point.

When I used to be in the teaching game this was the crucial difference between those that said "oh no one needs my services" and those that were saying "WOW! I can't believe so many people want this".
 

Andy Black

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Definitely agree, too many entrepreneurs think they have to talk like what they think sales people talk like 24/7 and everything has to be executed on a fortune 500 level schematic.

I always say there's always something someone can teach so there's really no excuses.

In terms of execution, the only thing I would say is that this is far easier if you have already established an audience and they are reacting to both your social proof and your perceived value.

Which is why it should be stressed that you should always be building up a network of active interest leads. 880 contacts sounds small, but if you've vetted them accurately you only need 20% of them to be genuinely interested to get your idea moving.

Recently I've been playing around with my LinkedIn which has a very low contact count and trying to see how much I can get my stuff to convert and its really difficult! It's made me a lot more aware of connecting with the right type of people, at low <200 followers your approach needs to be on point.

When I used to be in the teaching game this was the crucial difference between those that said "oh no one needs my services" and those that were saying "WOW! I can't believe so many people want this".
Ah... good point!

I posted the same thing to LinkedIn where I have 11,000+ connections and only 4 people responded. My connections on LinkedIn are just connections to increase our networks, not many are connecting because they know what I do already (unlike many of my Facebook friends).
 

TheKingOfMadrid

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Just watched the Video and the one aspect EVERY entrepreneur should definitely learn today is the power of your Google Form and the way you've deliberately structured your questions.

The more questions your prospect answers the more their own answers are eliciting fantasies of the course.

I consider myself an expert in what you're teaching, but even I feel like I want to join after reading your questions.
 
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Andy Black

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I consider myself an expert in what you're teaching, but even I feel like I want to join after reading your questions.
That’s interesting. I stopped sending people to the form once I had created the course. Maybe getting people to answer the survey would help me keep getting data and may even improve the signup rate. Something to test.
 

TheKingOfMadrid

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That’s interesting. I stopped sending people to the form once I had created the course. Maybe getting people to answer the survey would help me keep getting data and may even improve the signup rate. Something to test.
The Form feels like an almost personal experience, as you said in the video you feel like "WOW, finally someone who knows what they are on about".

Hope you post the results as most people would stop sending the form once they had things running, but I bet there's tremendous value in keeping it OR introducing it periodically in a transparent way such as course updates etc.
 

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Great thread as always Andy!

This is a good demonstration of how you reach people, notice how much they want it, and lead them to your service or platform that serves their needs. While not an entrepreneurial pursuit, I did the exact same thing you did, but it was more for getting people together to form a hobby group in my local area. The only difference was scale.

I never had any audience, contacts, or much of anyone that knows me. But what I did do was post my hobby group on a subreddit, aligned with the subreddit's interests, and I got a couple people interested in the idea.
What really drove up the hobby group's membership was someone who recommended it to his thousands of followers.

All it takes is for people to like the idea and spread it through word-of-mouth.

Once you lead those people to some sort of survey (Google Forms), it became really satisfying to understand and know what they really want and align it with the group's interests in mind.

I no longer run the group anymore, but it taught me the importance of understanding your audience.
 
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Andy Black

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josh_ting

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Fantastic Interview! Keeping it very lean, staying on the critical path and not worrying about the peripheral fluff. @Andy Black one thing I love about your philosophy is how down to earth and practical it is, literally things that every single one of us can do. For example, instead of thinking, how do I go and get a customer, think who can I help in my current existing network. Then do that again. Then again. Then again. Until you eventually get to the point where you have to do those things to help scale (i.e. bring on more people, run ads etc). Love your work Andy!
 

Andy Black

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Fantastic Interview! Keeping it very lean, staying on the critical path and not worrying about the peripheral fluff. @Andy Black one thing I love about your philosophy is how down to earth and practical it is, literally things that every single one of us can do. For example, instead of thinking, how do I go and get a customer, think who can I help in my current existing network. Then do that again. Then again. Then again. Until you eventually get to the point where you have to do those things to help scale (i.e. bring on more people, run ads etc). Love your work Andy!
Thanks for your takeaways Josh. Yeah, we have a habit of overthinking and getting in our own way. It’s often a lot simpler than we think.
 
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Two Dog

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Here’s the questions I asked and just some of the amazing responses:
This reminds me strongly of Glenn Livingstone's survey methodology and better known protege Ryan Levesque.

Glenn would import survey data into Excel and run simple analytics. Length of the response was a big factor.
 

Andy Black

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This reminds me strongly of Glenn Livingstone's survey methodology and better known protege Ryan Levesque.

Glenn would import survey data into Excel and run simple analytics. Length of the response was a big factor.
Aha. I think I mention in the video that I took one of Glenn Livingston’s courses in about 2010.

How the heck did you know about Glenn Livingston?
 

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Aha. I think I mention in the video that I took one of Glenn Livingston’s courses in about 2010.

How the heck did you know about Glenn Livingston?
Cuz I studied with Perry Marshall in the same era. ;-)
 
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Andy Black

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Cuz I studied with Perry Marshall in the same era. ;-)
Good old Perry Marshall. I found his 80/20 book while clearing out the shed at the weekend. I’ll whizz through that again.

I guess you know what wracking the shotgun means too.
 

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Thanks for writing both this thread and "What's your biggest problem?" thread. I've pondered over them for the past few days and they really pushed me towards getting my head un-stuck.

I'm currently on the thought that my most immediate mentality problem is overthinking strategies, plans, speech, and that I am too focused on trying to build a compelling narrative whenever I speak without purpose.

It smothers my results and makes me waste retarded amounts of time. I should just say the things, that I want to say during formal matters instead of rethinking time and time again. It's taking up way more energy than it should take, and the impact is minimal (beyond basic coherence checks anyway).

Hell, even this post was re-written once (and had to stop myself from thinking what to change as I wrote this last comment).

You're a great influence, Andy!
 

Andy Black

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Thanks for writing both this thread and "What's your biggest problem?" thread. I've pondered over them for the past few days and they really pushed me towards getting my head un-stuck.

I'm currently on the thought that my most immediate mentality problem is overthinking strategies, plans, speech, and that I am too focused on trying to build a compelling narrative whenever I speak without purpose.

It smothers my results and makes me waste retarded amounts of time. I should just say the things, that I want to say during formal matters instead of rethinking time and time again. It's taking up way more energy than it should take, and the impact is minimal (beyond basic coherence checks anyway).

Hell, even this post was re-written once (and had to stop myself from thinking what to change as I wrote this last comment).

You're a great influence, Andy!
I edit posts all the time. Trying for clarity, succinctness, and to get the desired result. I think it’s normal and is how we get better at writing.

As for overthinking. Post this on your wall:

“Overthinking is the art of solving problems you don’t have.”
 
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Two Dog

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Good old Perry Marshall. I found his 80/20 book while clearing out the shed at the weekend. I’ll whizz through that again.

I guess you know what wracking the shotgun means too.
LOL. Perry had a home office that was sort of tacked onto the house like a porch. Three of the four walls were all glass windows, so he'd cover them endlessly in notes using whiteboard markers. God, the random memories that pop up.

Love that quote. It's on my wall.
 

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It was just after midnight on 10-Nov-20 and I was annoyed with myself for not starting a particular project I'd been thinking about for a few weeks.

I decided to quickly post a short note to my Facebook profile before hitting the hay. At the time I had 880 friends on Facebook and had been a bit more active the previous few weeks than normal so thought I might get a bit of interest.

This is what I posted, and I woke to 17 people saying they were interested:




Only after people expressed an interest did I wonder what to do with them.

I didn’t have a domain setup for this project, and no “squeeze page” to get people’s email addresses and put them on a wait list.

I wanted to know a bit more about the people who were interested enough to reply, what they wanted and how to help them - so I knocked up my first ever Google Form (they’re free btw!).

I then privately Facebook messaged each person with “Hi <name>” and then this:



As of 20-Jan-21 I’ve messaged about 50 people, and 40 filled in the Google Form. (I no longer send people a link to the form but send them a link to the Bootcamp instead.)

The great bit about Google Forms is they can insert the data automatically into a Google Sheet.

Here’s the questions I asked and just some of the amazing responses:





Here’s a 10 min video a day or so later showing how I got 28 Google Form responses. Some of the insights are gold and will really help me serve people better.

View: https://youtu.be/PMvGzNvg1mg


EDIT: Here's where I'm interviewed about this:


Learnings:
  1. You don’t need a fancy announcement or “launch”.

  2. You don't need a domain or website to get started.

  3. You don’t need to build an email list with email software such as MailCheat(Chimp) or ActiveCampaign.

  4. Ask people what they want so you know to create it for them.

  5. Just be conversational and natural. Stop with the formal "sales speak".

  6. Just get started and adjust as you go.


Your turn:
  • What's your takeaways?

  • What will you do different?
Thank you, Andy, helpful as always. Right now it's 2:30 am and I'm going to sleep. Tomorrow morning I will stop THINKING about being perfect and will star DOING and being authentic. Your words always stop me from action faking. Thank you A LOT

- Stepan : )
 
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jfirefly556

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It was just after midnight on 10-Nov-20 and I was annoyed with myself for not starting a particular project I'd been thinking about for a few weeks.

I decided to quickly post a short note to my Facebook profile before hitting the hay. At the time I had 880 friends on Facebook and had been a bit more active the previous few weeks than normal so thought I might get a bit of interest.

This is what I posted, and I woke to 17 people saying they were interested:




Only after people expressed an interest did I wonder what to do with them.

I didn’t have a domain setup for this project, and no “squeeze page” to get people’s email addresses and put them on a wait list.

I wanted to know a bit more about the people who were interested enough to reply, what they wanted and how to help them - so I knocked up my first ever Google Form (they’re free btw!).

I then privately Facebook messaged each person with “Hi <name>” and then this:



As of 20-Jan-21 I’ve messaged about 50 people, and 40 filled in the Google Form. (I no longer send people a link to the form but send them a link to the Bootcamp instead.)

The great bit about Google Forms is they can insert the data automatically into a Google Sheet.

Here’s the questions I asked and just some of the amazing responses:





Here’s a 10 min video a day or so later showing how I got 28 Google Form responses. Some of the insights are gold and will really help me serve people better.

View: https://youtu.be/PMvGzNvg1mg


EDIT: Here's where I'm interviewed about this:


Learnings:
  1. You don’t need a fancy announcement or “launch”.

  2. You don't need a domain or website to get started.

  3. You don’t need to build an email list with email software such as MailCheat(Chimp) or ActiveCampaign.

  4. Ask people what they want so you know to create it for them.

  5. Just be conversational and natural. Stop with the formal "sales speak".

  6. Just get started and adjust as you go.


Your turn:
  • What's your takeaways?

  • What will you do different?
Yes yes yes hell yes !! thank you andy. you gave me some food for thought!
 

Andy Black

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jfirefly556

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Nice. What were your takeaways and food for thought?
it was the fact i can help the people around me in what im good at. What i thought was something common sense, alot of others find it valueable, i just put the peices together and was able to help the immediate people around me, now i just have to adjust to the market around and make it better then the competition. Thanks again!
 
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Hayden Layne

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Exceptional content as always Andy.

The biggest lesson I have learnt from this post is how important it is to just get the ball rolling.

I think so many of us are guilty of worrying about all the intricate details of something before actually starting. Being concerned that we don't have the website set up yet, don't have the right logo or don't have any social media presence.

At the end of the day none of this actually matters if you don't even have a product to sell. If you aren't actively out there trying to help people and utilising your services that you can offer to someone, then the rest is all irrelevant.

It reminds me of people who want to get in shape but say they aren't ready yet. They want the right gym clothes, they want the protein supplements, they want to get their diet sorted. All of this before they have ever actually stepped foot in a gym and just started to work out.

You won't know exactly how to get in shape at first, but you learn as you go and you seek out further knowledge when you need it.

It's a really dangerous place to be and I hate to think how many people have missed out on opportunities because they felt they weren't ready to start. I dread to think how many I must have missed out on personally.

Really appreciate you sharing this and I will definitely be changing my outlook on this going forward and just starting and figuring the rest out later.
 

Andy Black

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ninjacopywriter

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It was just after midnight on 10-Nov-20 and I was annoyed with myself for not starting a particular project I'd been thinking about for a few weeks.

I decided to quickly post a short note to my Facebook profile before hitting the hay. At the time I had 880 friends on Facebook and had been a bit more active the previous few weeks than normal so thought I might get a bit of interest.

This is what I posted, and I woke to 17 people saying they were interested:




Only after people expressed an interest did I wonder what to do with them.

I didn’t have a domain setup for this project, and no “squeeze page” to get people’s email addresses and put them on a wait list.

I wanted to know a bit more about the people who were interested enough to reply, what they wanted and how to help them - so I knocked up my first ever Google Form (they’re free btw!).

I then privately Facebook messaged each person with “Hi <name>” and then this:



As of 20-Jan-21 I’ve messaged about 50 people, and 40 filled in the Google Form. (I no longer send people a link to the form but send them a link to the Bootcamp instead.)

The great bit about Google Forms is they can insert the data automatically into a Google Sheet.

Here’s the questions I asked and just some of the amazing responses:





Here’s a 10 min video a day or so later showing how I got 28 Google Form responses. Some of the insights are gold and will really help me serve people better.

View: https://youtu.be/PMvGzNvg1mg


EDIT: Here's where I'm interviewed about this:


Learnings:
  1. You don’t need a fancy announcement or “launch”.

  2. You don't need a domain or website to get started.

  3. You don’t need to build an email list with email software such as MailCheat(Chimp) or ActiveCampaign.

  4. Ask people what they want so you know to create it for them.

  5. Just be conversational and natural. Stop with the formal "sales speak".

  6. Just get started and adjust as you go.


Your turn:
  • What's your takeaways?

  • What will you do different?
That is such a great advice.

I saw this creator Jay something mentioned this...that one way to test your audience is doing EXACTLY something like your post... and starting with "i am thinking" - it shows that you might do it or not (you are not commiting to it) and then checking to see if there is interest...

This advice of you and him (which btw i only saw today) blew my mind!!

You dont need an MVP Landing Page at all..

Ok..i dont have an audience or following yet...but i am starting to add more people on LinkedIn, commenting on their posts too...and doing what you said about not lurking.

Twitter seems a little different.
 
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Andy Black

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That is such a great advice.

I saw this creator Jay something mentioned this...that one way to test your audience is doing EXACTLY something like your post... and starting with "i am thinking" - it shows that you might do it or not (you are not commiting to it) and then checking to see if there is interest...

This advice of you and him (which btw i only saw today) blew my mind!!

You dont need an MVP Landing Page at all..

Ok..i dont have an audience or following yet...but i am starting to add more people on LinkedIn, commenting on their posts too...and doing what you said about not lurking.

Twitter seems a little different.
Twitter and LinkedIn are just platforms. People are people. Get in with the right people and it doesn't matter which platform you met on.
 

Andy Black

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It can be simpler than you think to get started...

I spent a whole two minutes knocking this up Sunday night and posting to Facebook and LinkedIn.

For everyone who replied I DM'd them the link and then replied to their comment so I'd know who I'd done. That's about 19 people raising their hand on Facebook and 8 on LinkedIn.


Facebook:
FB.png


LinkedIn:
LI.png
 
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Andy Black

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I did another of these about a month ago and over 30 people raised their hand on Facebook (I've only 1k connections):

2023-10-26_11-49-25.jpg
 

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