A collection of 12 mental models, frameworks, and principles you can use to market your SaaS: 1. Hick's Law

The time it takes to make a decision increases with the number and complexity of choices.

This comes back to Ockam's Razor & Overfitting.

Simpler = less time = easier decision

Message for SaaS founders: Expired trial emails don't have to be boring or awkward.

Let me show you how Abstract converted free users into customers using their expired trial email 🧵 TL;DR: What makes this email so good?

1) The design
2) It's straight to the point
3) The use of psychology: Loss Aversion
4) An implied question
5) A huge button
6) The sender's picture
7) The P.S

Let's break these down 👇

Every startup headline claims to be better.

Or faster. Or easier to use.

This is lazy copywriting, and you'll end up sounding like every other startup out there.

Don't get lost in the sea of mediocrity.

Stand out with these 7 proven headline copywriting formulas (+ examples): 1/ {Achieve desirable outcome} without {pain point}

Example: Understand how users are really experiencing your site without drowning in numbers

Being upfront about their main pain point will make users confident that your product is the right fit to solve it.

I reviewed over 1,000 SaaS company analytics in my time as the Head of Growth at @Baremetrics.

I saw every size company, every growth rate, every churn rate, every ARPU...

And after all that, I came to a realization:

Your SaaS metrics are lying to you.

Here's how 👇 1/Higher growth = higher churn

Higher growth means a lot of new customers, and not all of them will be a good fit.

Which means churn.

This freaks founders out. They turn off acquisition channels and try to figure out how to stop it.

The reality is that its par for the course.

I'm excited to finally launch my new course:

🎥 Marketing Like A Media Company

You've probably heard that "the best marketing looks like building media company"

Well, I spent the last few months studying what that *actually* looks like and how to do it. "Marketing like a media company" represents a paradigm shift in the way we earn attention.

The goal is to OWN the means of distribution.

Similar to Web 1.0/2.0/3.0 eras, marketing strategies evolve as content creation and distribution get democratized.

https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1264359909702787072

A collection of mental models, frameworks, and principles you can use for marketing.

🧵 1. First Principles Thinking

The mental model of mental models.

A first principle is a basic assumption that cannot be deduced any further.

It forces you to think like a scientist. Or maybe more specifically, a chemist.

What I've learned about SaaS growth talking to hundreds of founders, marketers, and operators over time.

🧵👇 Everyone always wants to know:
• What’s working right now?
• What are other companies doing that I’m not?
• What’s working for them?
• Why are we hitting a plateau?

They always wants to know, “what’s the one thing?”

I'm tired of hearing about LTV:CAC being a useful metric for SaaS/subscription

I think it should be EXTINGUISHED from our vocabulary.

Why?
1. LTV is a shoddy way to measure value capture
2. You need piles of VC $$$
3. There's a superior metric you should use instead

↓ LTV:CAC is fundamentally trying to answer two questions:

1. How quickly can I recoup the cost to acquire a customer?

2. How much can I reasonably afford to pay to acquire a customer?

We'll get back to these at the end.

Study B2B SaaS companies and you'll find that they do these parts of marketing better than anyone else:
• Onboarding
• Content marketing
• Conferences
• Engineering as marketing
• Partner & reseller programs

Steal these lessons ↓ ONBOARDING

Onboarding is the crux of making a SaaS business work.

You can have the best marketing in the world. But if you can't successfully onboard users into your product, they'll churn out.

This is why SaaS companies are world-class at onboarding: THEY HAVE TO BE.

It's Friday night and you're looking for a place to grab a drink.

One bar has a line out the door.

The other is empty.

Which one do you think is better?

This is social proof — one of the most powerful marketing forces coined by Robert Cialdini in his book Influence.

🧵: First, a definition:

Social proof is a psychological phenomenon where people assume the actions of others in an attempt to reflect correct behavior for a given situation.

We look for cues in how other people behave to figure out the best and safest decision.

A collection of mental models, frameworks, and principles you can use for marketing.

🧵 1. First Principles Thinking

The mental model of mental models.

A first principle is a basic assumption that cannot be deduced any further.

It forces you to think like a scientist. Or maybe more specifically, a chemist.

What I've learned about SaaS growth talking to hundreds of founders, marketers, and operators over time.

🧵👇 Everyone always wants to know:
• What’s working right now?
• What are other companies doing that I’m not?
• What’s working for them?
• Why are we hitting a plateau?

They always wants to know, “what’s the one thing?”

Marketers today have become obsessed with tactics and data.

But at the heart of marketing is the ability to think like the customer.

Here are 6 buyer psychology concepts to master marketing. 🧵 1. INTELLECT VS INSTINCT

There are two sides to every buying decision:
1. Logic
2. Emotion

👋 my @webflow pros

I'm trying to create a masonry/Pinterest style page with CMS items for a "swipe file" and I'm hitting a wall.

Anyone have ideas on how to finesse this page?

preview.webflow.com/preview/swipef…

swipefilesco.webflow.io/brain I've also got @Jetboostio hooked up for advanced search, filters, and pagination.

It's also using some custom code courtesy of @c_spags

8 easy ways to create a swipe file 🧵 🤔 What is a swipe file?

If you don't have one already, you need to start building one right away.

It's a marketer's greatest asset.

A swipe file is a repository of marketing examples (emails, ads, pages, videos, etc) that you can reference later for inspiration.

8 easy ways to create a swipe file 🧵 🤔 What is a swipe file?

If you don't have one already, you need to start building one right away.

It's a marketer's greatest asset.

A swipe file is a repository of marketing examples (emails, ads, pages, videos, etc) that you can reference later for inspiration.

A while back I started writing down all the life principles that resonate with me.

Here's the list (in no particular order) 🧵: 1. Simple, not easy

The truth is often so profoundly simple that it seems too easy. So we ignore it. But simplicity doesn't equal ease.

Simple things are easier said than done. They're hard *because* they're so simple. But that's what makes it true.

20 practical copywriting exercises to think and write like a pro 🧵: 1. Create signage for a local business

Pick a small business in your town and mock up simple signs that can bring in more foot traffic.

The constraint of a sandwich board forces creativity.

@nevmed actually did this and increased foot traffic by 50% overnight!

After reviewing the responses and what people are excited about, I'm making a couple of adjustments.

The maven.com is also allowing me another week to gauge interest. I need 100 to make this happen and currently 50% there.

Updated version below 🧵:

https://twitter.com/coreyhainesco/status/1390666477796315136

The course will be split up into two parts.

Part 1: Fundamentals — buyer psychology, copywriting, brainstorming campaigns.

Part 2: Strategy — experimenting with channels, crafting a plan, creating a marketing roadmap.

All through interactive workshops and community events.

The ORB Framework

I've found that marketing strategies and tactics can be broken down into three main categories: Owned, Rented, and Borrowed platforms.

Here's how it can help you craft your marketing plan and continually build an audience. 🧵 There's an endless amount of strategies and tactics available today.

Newsletter referral program, blog posts, programmatic SEO, PR stunts, engineering-as-marketing, TikTok... the list goes on and on.

How do you choose what to do?

This is where the ORB framework comes in.

1/ How To Be a Podcast Guest

Guest podcasting is the new guest blogging, but no one is taking it seriously enough.

If you actually want to get results from it, you have to treat it like a performance.

Here's how to be the best podcast interview on every podcast you go on. 🧵 2/ Think: What makes a great podcast interview?

When you listen to other interviews, what makes a guest really stand out?

What makes you go follow them, subscribe to their newsletter, or buy their product?

Let's reverse-engineer it.