Hand-to-hand combat
Despite what some “experts” may tell you, there are no “growth hacks” in marketing.
Think of marketing like hand-to-hand combat. You have to get in the trenches, especially when you’re building something from the ground up.
In the tech startup world, you’ll hear people say “do things that don’t scale” for as long as you can. It’s the same idea.
So what does hand-to-hand combat look like in practice?
When I started Therapy Marketer, I reached out to every therapist in my network individually and personally invited them to subscribe. Almost all of them did.
It would have been more efficient to send a mass email, but that wouldn’t have been as effective.
As a therapist, hand-to-hand combat looks like responding to every social media comment and message to get your first 100 followers, and then your first 1,000.
It looks like reaching out to every therapist in your area to build your referral network.
It looks like doing the small podcast interviews so you can work your way up to the big ones.
In marketing, hand-to-hand combat is about building trust through one-on-one interactions.
Don’t settle for a shortcut. The real “growth hack” is consistency.