The 3 Principles of Marketing Strategy in Any Business (Noah Kagan) | My First Million Podcast

Noah Kagan

What is my unique strategy, or what is my strategy for doing that? I think where I've been very successful is that I just do a lot of stuff, and eventually, something works. So, I think there are a few things in marketing. I'll say three things that I think are the simplest. **Number 1:** How about just having a singular goal? Facebook did it, AppSumo.com has done it, and I think even recently with my Dork World and helping people overcome fear and start businesses, I'm kind of like having a bunch of goals. I'm like, "Here's our TikTok goal, here's our Instagram goal, here's our email list goal, here's our organic traffic goal." I'm like, "What is our most important goal?" I realized that we should just pick one for some time. So, I think I've come to that realization: let's just pick YouTube and just be okay with that. Guess what? That'll rise all other ships. So, don't be ignorant of those other ones, but just focus on one. **Second thing:** As I was doing a lot of this content recently, which has gotten me really fulfilled, it feels good... it feels great.

Sam Parr

on youtube or okdork.com

Noah Kagan

Mostly YouTube... mostly in the YouTube world. The second thing that's been most critical—and this is really hard because everyone says they do this or wants to do this but doesn't—is: Who is my audience? Who is the audience that I really want to be helping and communicating with? Because on one hand, I want to connect with like 9-figure CEOs and 10-figure CEOs. I actually don't think there's a lot of content on how to go from 7 to 8 or 8 to 9. I can share how we do it, but that audience is really small and they don't really need as much help. So we've realized that our audience is guys aged 25 to 40 who have tried to start a business but haven't been successful. They are afraid of failing and need a little bit of help. I think the second part of marketing that I've been revisiting is: Who am I really trying to talk to and what are the words? Here are some words that we've identified that our audience resonates with: "rat race," "freedom," and "self-doubt." Those are some of the things that I'm thinking about. Then the third part that we're considering, which I think is applicable for every business, is: What is your unique strategy for success? With that, we have two parts. 1. What's our core message? This is our unique "bread and butter" that you will know. I was talking to Ramit about this and he said, "You have so many messages, just pick three." So I was like, "Alright, challenges to overcome, fear, $1,000,000 weekend, and behind the scenes of an 8-figure company." That's the three that we're going to do, and that's it.

Sam Parr

wait say that again so those 3 are the 3 what the 3 basically

Noah Kagan

Let's take a step back. **So, one, what's your goal?** Pick one goal. **Number two, who is your customer?** **Number three, what are your core messages that people know you for?** For me, those are the three things I'm going to be known for. **Challenges:** I always tell people to do the coffee challenge, which is to ask for 10% off when you buy coffee. You're going to be afraid, but you're going to learn about yourself and you're going to grow. Secondly, it's about the behind-the-scenes of any figure company. There aren't a lot of people that have that experience, and I can provide that. The third part is how you actually get a $1,000,000 business started in a weekend. I've done that many, many times, and I can share that, which is unique. The last part of this marketing equation that I'm exploring and revisiting is: **What is my unique strategy?** I think where I've been very successful is that I just do a lot of stuff, and eventually, something works. However, I believe I will be even more successful by slowing down and being a little more thoughtful with these things. Our unique strategy lately has been to do the fast stuff but on lower-risk items. Basically, tweet, and post on Instagram and LinkedIn—just throw it all out there unlimitedly. Then, based on what works, we align it to our core messages. That's what we'll go deeper into. That's what we'll write a blog post about, do an interview about, or create a YouTube video about. It's just about having a higher likelihood of home runs. Let's go over it.

Shaan Puri

and how would you

Noah Kagan

Hi Sean, you're a mobile mic. You look like a therapist. Yeah, tell me how you really feel.

Shaan Puri

so how old do you have this you're almost 40

Noah Kagan

I'm... I look and feel 32, but I'd say I'm about 38 in physicality in our society, not in the traditions of 38.

Shaan Puri

Okay, cool. In human years, I am 32, and I look and feel 38.

Noah Kagan

you do look 38 bro I'm trying to

Shaan Puri

go the other way so I

Noah Kagan

said I would love

Shaan Puri

So, if you were 21 again... 21, no network, no name brand, you're starting up from scratch, and you don't have to go the same pathway you went. I'm curious, you know, if you had the luxury of picking any path now that you know of so many more paths than you probably knew about when you were 21, what path would you go down?

Noah Kagan

honestly I think I'd copy my path

Shaan Puri

which which would be what so you're 21 what do you do

Noah Kagan

I'll tell you exactly what I did I didn't know what the fuck to do so I wouldn't try to bunch of stuff out to figure out what to do I think the only I think one question is what delta would I have chosen and I'll tell you exactly what that was so at 21 I didn't know I didn't even know what a b s was I got I got it from berkeley I was like oh bachelor of science is cool everyone kinda follows a stream right like when you graduate from college which I I think less and less is becoming important everyone's like oh get a job go to intel go to wherever and I was like okay I guess that's what everyone's doing but I've always wanted to start my own company I just didn't know what to do and so I think the 2 things that I did really well when I had that day job at intel was I use that as my investor and the 2 things I'd recommend is that I started a lot of businesses so if you're like I don't have any idea 2 things you can do 1 go to sendfox.com and start a newsletter and send an email once a week for 365 days or for 52 weeks that's number 1 or number 2 go on youtube take the ryan holiday challenge and post a video on youtube for 30 days start there the second thing that I did is that I connected with people very aggressively and I asked anyone I knew for anyone that they knew that was really smart that's how I met tim ferris that's how I met orin hoffman dave mcclure james hong max levchin ramit sethi I basically put on events I hosted lunches I organized conferences I didn't know anyone but I wanted to bring smart people together so if you don't know any smart people find 1 smart person say hey you should meet this smart person and then just go and hang out with both of them guy guy and girl guess what you could do on zoom if you're in remote country or if you don't have any connections I think one of the ones I've really observed lately every person I've hired that's been the most impressive has done 2 things they've offered something for free to a value that I've wanted and they did it without asking and those people live in the most impressive and guess what now they're like hey I wanna meet this person I wanna do this thing I wanna grow here I'm like that most of them are now working with me and so I think I would have that was something very early on I was very aggressive on meeting people and just trying to build my brand in terms of career I I think the 2 thing one thing I did very well is I was really great about following my curiosity and things I was really excited about so I really loved facebook and I really loved mint and I was like I'll do whatever it takes to work there I think the only difference I would have chosen is find someone 10 to 20 years ahead of me that I think is doing the things I would like to do in 10 to 20 years and be obsessed or aggressive in figuring out how to make them excited to wanna be a part of my life so I had one guy doug hirsch who was my boss at facebook and it didn't really work out as well for as a mentorship but it's nice because like you can say oh that's how you do a relationship oh that's how you do a career and it'll shortcut it you just have to figure out the real most important thing is how do you get them to give a fuck about you and the best way to do that is help them with whatever things they're working on

Sam Parr

So, I think this is... you wanna hear something crazy, Sean? I don't know if you know this, but I... I don't know if Noah knows it, but I launched my... I created my company, which is like, it's an okay company. It's been good for me. It started because Noah had a blog post about organizing conferences. I was like, "What was it called? It was called like, 'How I Made $90K Hosting a Conference' or something. Was that it, Noah?"

Noah Kagan

mhmm I made a quarter of $1,000 in conferences because I I didn't know I was gonna make money doing them

Sam Parr

Yeah, so I saw that and I was like, "Well, I had a book club at the time." And I thought, "I've been hosting these meetups but I don't make any money from it. I should make money off this thing." So I started my company, and I've made **$1,000,000** personally off conferences because of that blog post. And more importantly - or maybe not more importantly - I've met actually all three people on this call and most of my friends and coworkers.

Noah Kagan

doing because of that blog post

Sam Parr

Because of that blog post, I met Neville. Because of that blog post, Neville - the best man in my wedding - I met because of that. Good for you! So, what you're describing of what you would do, and how... basically you described like hosting events, which is similar in the same vein as posting content. I did the same thing, and it made me millions of dollars. And it... I... it met all my best friends that way.

Noah Kagan

Awesome! I mean, I think the only other thing that I was doing at the time, and that I think everyone should do, is: **Number 1:** Build your brand in some way. Even if you're not trying to be a personal brand, I think practicing writing is a skill you can use in sales, development, design... you can use it almost literally forever. I think the connection is very valuable. Literally, probably the reason I'm a multimillionaire is because I've been able to meet, help, and connect people. **The third thing** was that I was starting a lot of businesses. What's beautiful is that, especially earlier in your life, your cost of living is so low. My cost of living is still low because I haven't grown up in some ways, and I'm maturing in certain ways. It's so low that you should take a lot of risks very early on in trying a lot of things out. For example, when I was working at Intel, I was doing college consulting. I did a thing called NinjaCard.com. I was putting on these conferences that I charged for. Then I was working at Mint, and I started doing Facebook apps. I created all these games and started making a lot of money. I was working at morning, on weekends, during lunches, and at nights. I kept going and trying a lot of things. Eventually, after probably two and a half to three years, I got to know... three years later, my side hustle finally became my main hustle.