Marketing For Founders | Growth Hacking | Startups | Direct Response Marketing

Nov 17/2023

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  Have you ever asked yourself, what happens to your business if you get hurt or really sick? We break down the necessity to build systems in your company that allow you to take a hiatus, without slowing down progress.   Jack speaks about his experience with Ruby and touches on outsourcing any sections of your[...]
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  In todays episode Tim and Jack discuss the differences between good money and bad money. Your host debates what type of startup money is safest, and what kind of cash can get you in a lot of trouble. Often when we start new businesses and ideas, it requires some sort of startup investment. It is[...]
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  In today’s episode we talk about the tech fad of building apps, depending on ad revenue, and using celebrity endorsements to tweet about your company. Jack tells a classroom of Penn State Telecommunications Majors, who are working on a business idea, that not all problems can be solved with apps. Your success in business should[...]
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  In todays episode Tim and Jack discuss placing all your eggs in one basket, and how to recognize when you are losing focus. A successful startup will require as many resources as you can divulge. Time, money, or a mixture of the two. Many new businesses find themselves chasing after short-term traction, and losing focus[...]
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  In this episode Tim and Jack discuss a few classic mistakes in their careers launching products and online companies. Every market receives information in a unique way. Understanding how to communicate with your customers is the first step to surviving a launch. Tim tells us about his huge mistake of using an email marketing campaign on[...]
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  How to properly execute an MVP…In todays episode we explore some common mistakes made by new businesses on a path to success. Startups often fall into the trap of trying to “do it all.” In these moments of frustration, when the wheels feel like they’re spinning in place, we must ask ourselves the following questions.[...]
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  Turning Waste Into Fortunes   In this episode we explore ways to increase profitability by selling your waste, literally. Tim and Jack discuss the importance of understanding and locating potential wastes which your business can profit from.   Jack is working on an interview training service for university students where they do a phone interview and[...]
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  A Postmortem Of A Startup Postmortem   In todays episode we examine the final “nail in the coffin” of bad business marketing, margins, mistakes, and quality control, as we dive deep into online and offline business strategies.   Are you making enough money to hire contractors or employees? Which should you choose and why?   We[...]
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  The mind of an entrepreneur is a powerful thing. Often times our brain gets far ahead of us, trying to organize and attack many ideas at once. Are you asking yourself the most important question of your business?   What are the 20% of the things you do for your business that make the largest[...]
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  A sales funnel is the mechanisms you create or don’t create that guide people to your buy button. What techniques, materials, information, media, and marketing are being used to convert a potential customer into a buyer? Are you using explainer videos, info graphics, email marketing, image marketing, free books, or other free materials? What are[...]
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  The are many key components to creating a successful podcast. From the technicalities of recording the audio to the format of the show. Asking the right questions before you sit down to create your podcast, is the first step. Determining the information and content of your show, will ultimately determine how well it sells your[...]
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  When You Came Up With Your Idea Was It Love At First Sight?   Many entrepreneurs believe that their next big business plan is as easy or hard, as coming up with an original idea, and putting it down on paper. What many don’t realize is new markets don’t often blast off into riches. Many[...]
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  Most startups enter the world of SaaS (Software as a Service) thinking everything is going to be rainbows and gold coins falling from the sky; where you upload your final code and watch the money pour passively into your Cayman Island bank account every single month without lifting a finger. Turns out this is NOT the case[...]
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  Knowing How To Increase Your Revenue Starts With Knowing Where To Look… Many startups know to track Cost Per Click (CPC), but not what to do with that knowledge.  CPC really isn't that important until a startup needs to optimize their costs.  What is really important is how much a new customer costs to acquire[...]
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  Because Having A List Doesn’t Mean Much If You Never Use It… As most online startups by nature require an e-mail signup, chances are you’ve already got yourself an established mailing list. In many cases though, startup founders fail to actually contact these potential or current customers, and if they do they’re usually not doing[...]
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  How To Reduce Churn By Offering A Complete Solution… On the face of it, combining a product and service-based business seems like it would solve some of the big problems many startups face. The problem is though that productizing a service and building a SaaS business can be much more difficult than it may seem,[...]
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  Exploring Jay Abraham’s ‘3 Ways To Grow’ Concept… When it comes to growing a business, it’s easy for us to over-complicated matters and lose sight of what’s really going to bring us both short and long term results. Sometimes the best way to move forward is to forget what the internet gurus throw at us[...]
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  Setting Up An Early Loss For A Long Term Gain… I bet there aren’t many founders out there who are happy to see the word ‘loss’ anywhere, but stick with us here. This week we’re dealing with two marketing concepts which we see most often in the retail world, but can have enormous potential when[...]
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  Why You Shouldn’t Put All Your Marketing Eggs In The One Basket… It’s an age-old marketing question. As founders, should we be focusing on building our companies image and branding or should we be targeting our audience with a killer direct response strategy? There’s no doubting that both forms of marketing will prove to be[...]
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  Planning Ahead For Your Startup’s Long Term Success… So many startup founders love to meticulously plan out the development process of their product, from the initial stages all the way through to having a completed product. The reality is though that great marketing is still the tool which is going to convert all that hard[...]
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  Deliver Live, Interactive And Effective Content Directly To Your Audience… Webinars and web conferencing have come a long way since the dark days of less-than-stellar internet connections, frequent dropouts and questionable video quality. These days all it takes to educate and sell to a live audience is a smartphone and high speed internet – though[...]
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  Taking Your Direct Mail To The Next Level… We’ve talked previously on the show about the importance of implementing a direct mail strategy in to your startups marketing, so now we’re taking those concepts one step further. While sending regular flat envelopes to your target market can be super effective, it’s undeniable that receiving a[...]
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  The Best Salespeople Know Your Product Inside And Out… There is a whole lot of information out there for startups on how to sell to VC’s, but as founders, knowing how to sell to your customers can prove to be so much more valuable. Of course there will come a time when you just can’t[...]
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  Fitting A Square Peg In A Round Hole… So, you’ve built up a complete product or service and you’re absolutely sure the customers are going to come straight at you with all their money. You know your product is going to provide a huge amount of value for others and people would be crazy not[...]
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  Our Expert Marketing Automation Panel Fills Us In… Manually tending to the many facets of online sales marketing can become a real time drain when working on smaller projects, let alone larger scale ones. What we want to do is take all those repetitive tasks and put them on autopilot. This way we can use[...]
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  A Follow Up On Our Education Based Marketing Topic… So, you’ve put in the hard yards and landed a ton of new clients. For many founders the automatic response is to keep pushing for an increase in customers, bigger is better right? This is a common mistake and can lead us to seriously neglect some[...]
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  Grab Their Attention And Get Yourself A Quick Win… When writing effective headlines for our content, our objective is simply to become the signal amongst all of the online noise. So what methods can we use to interrupt someone’s day, grab their attention and keep them focused on the stuff we want them to read?[...]
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  Achieving Inspiration Through Education… People don’t usually search for a product to fix their problem, they simply want to find a solution. By being the solution itself, rather than just going all-in with a sales pitch, we’re able to captivate, inspire and really connect with our customers. This week is all about education based marketing,[...]
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  You Can’t Go Past The Classics… We all love to focus on our branding and advertising being as pretty as possible. But sometimes as founders we have to step back, forget all the shiny marketing tricks, and start focusing on what’s important for our business. How are we going to get someone to buy our[...]
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  People Don’t Like Being Sold, But They Love To Buy… OK so we’ve generated our leads, set up customer engagement and begun the education process, so when’s it time to actually make some money? Building on our initial e-mail marketing strategies, this week Tim and Jack get to the business end of it all and[...]
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  Time To Get Smart About E-mail… While we’d all agree that social media can’t be beat for communication, branding and image, e-mail is still king when it comes to actually making money. By applying some key fundamentals to how we approach e-mail marketing, we can start generating more leads, increasing our conversions and then cash[...]
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  Our Startup Marketing Panel Sheds Some Light… This week on Marketing For Founders we’re mixing it up a bit with a killer panel to give us some of their valuable insight, experience and knowledge in to the startup marketing scene. Joining our hosts Tim and Jack is Patrick McKenzie of Kalzumeus Software, and Rob Walling,[...]
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  Marketing To The Mailbox… Really? It’s all too easy for us as online entrepreneurs to disregard or not even consider implementing a direct mail strategy in to our marketing campaigns. Surely physical, offline marketing can’t possibly have a significant impact on what we’re doing online? While our inboxes are becoming increasingly crowded with easily avoidable[...]
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  Who creates your landing pages? Your designer?  Your SEO?  Whoever is available? Landing pages need to function like an old school sales letter... They should tell the story of your unique value proposition, share benefits that solves the visitors' problems and have a compelling reason to take an action that is important to you and[...]
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  Welcome to the inaugural episode of Marketing For Founders.  Your hosts, Tim Conley and Jack Zerby, break down direct response marketing for startup founders. Many founders work diligently on their product and then leave marketing to the last or worse put it in the hands of an expensive PR company that will get them mentioned[...]

Tim Conley and Jack Zerby slam old school direct response marketing into the startup world. Tim has been creating direct response campaigns for 16 years and Jack has just recently discovered the power of these marketing principles that are largely ignored most of the startup world. Join Tim and Jack each week as they share strategies and tactics that take startups out of the hope-and-pray efforts and into the measurable impact of direct response marketing. You’ll learn everything from online marketing (email, ads, content) to offline marketing such as sales letters and space ads. The over-arching vision is that marketing should take place where your prospects are and then get them to act.