Category Archives: Case Studies

TikTok Millionaire Case Study

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While I am still having trouble typing “TikTok” (my fingers invariably type “TickTock”) there are folks making a million dollars a year and more on the platform.

I guess I’m a little bit behind the times, which is why I reached out to someone who is a TikTok authority and asked if he could point me to someone making serious money on the platform.

He got me in touch with Sandy (not her real name) and she agreed to be interviewed as long as I wrote nothing that would reveal her real name or niche.

While some TikTok-ers brag about their earnings, others don’t want to alienate their audience with their wealth. Imagine if you’re trying appear as someone who is 22 and just like your audience, for example, when in reality you own a dozen houses outright and you could retire today. The image they’ve carefully crafted would be in jeopardy if their viewers knew their income and they would likely lose some of their revenue because of it.

Research indicates TikTok stars may be making as much as $1M per post according to The Guardian. This is hard to fathom but imagine if it were only 1% true. That would still be $10,000 per post. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/feb/22/tiktok-viral-stars-could-make-up-to-1m-per-post-say-researchers

Just a quick recap of what TikTok is: Launched in 2017 by China, TikTok is a social media platform that has exploded in size with 1.2 billion active monthly users and $4.6 billion in revenue in 2021. 47.4% of its users in the U.S are between the ages of 10 and 29 and globally the average time spent on TikTok per day is 52 minutes.

Advertisers take note: TikTok has an engagement rate of 5.30% on accounts with 100,000+ followers, compared to Instagram’s 1.10% and Twitter’s 0.30%.

Like most on TikTok, Sandy’s channel is in the entertainment category. And while Sandy herself has no real skill at making music, dancing, acting or anything else generally associated with classic entertainment, she is especially good at creating these 30 to 60 second videos that go viral.

When Sandy first started on TikTok, she made a study of what sort of videos had a life of their own, garnering views and subscribers as they went viral. She made careful notes of these videos and spent a full two months on the app studying what was working and more importantly, why it was working.

In other words, she didn’t just jump in and start making stupid little videos, hoping something would spark interest.

Once she had a good idea of what would perform the best, she chose her niche and her target audience, same as any content creator who is planning on success.

Then she started making videos and getting noticed. When she hit the 1,000 subscriber mark, she began doing regular live broadcasts. On these broadcasts followers can gift her ‘coins’. TikTok users go into their profiles to purchase coins at 100 coins for $1.39. Then when a creator goes live, audience members can send them coins as a way of giving thanks for the content they send out on TikTok. This is a virtual currency that can be exchanged for real money via PayPal.

When creators go live they engage with their fans and call them by name, asking them questions and interacting.

The money made from Sandy’s first “Lives” wasn’t much, but as she gained more followers and ardent fans the income from just one “Live” started growing into the hundreds of dollars and eventually into more than a thousand dollars each time.

One way Sandy built her own audience was to watch for creators in her niche to message their fans and ask them to donate. Sandy would then donate to these creators in exchange for a “shoutout” on their live. When the creator doing the shoutout had a lot of followers, Sandy would then gain many of those followers as her own.

Once Sandy became popular, brands started to reach out to her, asking her to partner with them as an influencer. Keep in mind that top TikTok creator’s estimated earnings are about $50,000 to $100,000 per post for a brand partnership. That’s super easy money once you’ve built the loyal following.

The catch is that the content created by the TikToker has to relate to the brand in some way, and here is where Sandy reverse engineered her channel. In her research Sandy also took note of the businesses that were active on TikTok. She then chose to tailor her material to a particular set of advertisers, knowing it would likely take a few months before her channel was big enough to attract those advertisers. But when it did, her paydays became larger and larger.

A super basic and easy example of this is TikTok creator Charli D’Amelio who frequently mentioned her love of Dunkin’ Donuts iced coffee in her videos. Sure enough, once she had a lot of followers Dunkin’ Donuts offered her a brand partnership and even named a drink after her.

Sandy made a major mistake when she took a sponsorship from a company she didn’t like with a product she didn’t use. Her endorsement of the product sounded like a paid commercial rather than an authentic endorsement, and her fans called her out on it and she lost several thousand viewers in less than a week. She immediately dropped the company, paid back the money and swore to never work with a product she didn’t use herself again.

Once Sandy’s followers exceeded 100,000, she received an invitation from TikTok to join the TikTok Creator Program. This opened up more avenues for brand sponsorship. She received a media kit from TikTok showing her who viewed her TikToks the most and how much engagement she was getting.

The TikTok Creator Program also pays creators based on the engagement each video receives. Payment varies based on a number of factors including how many creators are in the program. Estimated funds appear in the Creator Fund Dashboard three days after the day in which video views are accrued. Funds can be withdrawn 30 days after the month ends in which they were accrued.

And you no longer need an invitation to join the TikTok Creator Program, but you must qualify and then apply. Eligibility requirements are that you be 18 years or older; be a legal resident of the U.S., UK, Germany, Italy, France or Spain; meet a minimum following threshold of 10K authentic followers; have accrued at least 100K authentic video views in the last 30 days; and post original video in line with the Community Guidelines.

Sandy sells her own merchandise based on her own brand. To do this she uses a company called Fanjoy. Her most popular item is actually a hoodie but she also sells shirts, sweaters, phone cases and more. Her income from this alone is now over $10,000 a month.

Keep in mind she’s been at this for awhile and none of this happened for her overnight. In fact, she made nothing for her first six months, but as you can see her work is now paying off big time.

Once thing Sandy tried that she said didn’t work well for her was building an email list. She found it difficult to get people to join her list, and when they did they weren’t nearly as responsive as they were on TikTok. She doesn’t know if it’s because of her particular niche, but she suspects it is.

Another TikTok creator and good friend of hers has had tremendous success building and monetizing an email list through TikTok. This friend is in the fashion business, and she sends out fashion tips each day along with an offer. Sandy, on the other hand, is in a niche that is much more entertainment than anything else.

Tips from Sandy on how to build followers on TikTok:

1: Cross promote by placing videos on Instagram and YouTube to get more followers. Then ask them to follow you on TikTok as well.

2: Consider using a content creation company. While Sandy didn’t take this route, she has several friends who did. It takes more money upfront to do this, but it can be a faster way to build a following. Content creation companies are agencies that help you figure out what kind of content you need to gain a large following.

3: Participate in challenges. This is when you ask or dare users to do or try something. Some challenges spread like wildfire, and some don’t. It just depends on how easily they can be recreated and how relatable they are. Put your own personal spin on your challenge to make it stand out and apart from others.

4: Use a branded hashtag for your challenge. This allows users to create content for you and in the process do your advertising, too. Reach out to popular creators and offer to pay them to create a video for your challenge and you could see a massive influx of new followers.

5: Use hashtags in general. Hashtags are easily searchable and make it easier for people to find both you and particular content in the topic they’re searching for. Use the in-app hashtag suggestion tool to find out which hashtags are trending. When you’re creating a caption for your video, hit the # and suggestions will pop up. Use those that are appropriate for your topic.

6: Create engaging content. Unlike YouTube and Instagram, TikTok accounts with few followers can still go viral with the right content. As always, make your content entertaining, relevant, trendy and high quality for best results.

7: Create lots of content. The more content you have, the better your odds of landing on the “For You” pages. For You Pages are individually curated for each TikToker based on the videos they’ve watched. When your video lands on this page, you stand a good chance of getting a new subscriber.

8: Don’t delete videos without a good reason. Sometimes a video that’s been posted for weeks suddenly goes viral and hits the For You Pages on a massive scale.

9: Quality rules. Users are more likely to interact and engage with your content if the picture is crystal clear, the audio is crisp and the framing is good.

10: Post when your audience is online. When you switch to a TikTok Pro Account, you’ll have access to TikTok Analytics which give you metrics and data insights, including the best time to post. Or you can use HootSuite’s TikTok scheduler to recommend the best times to post your content.

Advanced methods:

11: Consider using TikTok ads. This is only one of two paid traffic methods mentioned here, but if you have the funds, you can get your videos seen by the right people to grow your following fast.

12: Turn your best videos into ads with TikTok’s ‘Promote’ tool. Promote lets you turn any organic TikTok video into an ad. Note that costs on this are high, so be sure you know what you’re doing before you spend your money.

13: Use trending songs in your video. Some new songs are super popular on TikTok, and when you use one of these songs in your video, you have a greater chance of being played. To find out what’s trending, go into TikTok’s video editor, press the plus icon at the bottom of the screen, tap sounds and scroll through what’s trending.

14: Use TikTok Side-by-Side Duets. These are side-by-side videos. One video is the original and the other one is from a TikTok user like yourself. You can make these to comment, compare, compliment and respond to the original video.

15: Use TikTok Green Screen Duets. This option lets you make the original video into your background. Both types of duets should get you traffic from people who’ve viewed the original video.

16: Use Stitch. This allows you to clip and integrate scenes from another user’s video into your own. Like Duet, Stitch allows you to add to or contrast another user’s content, building on what they’ve done.

17: To learn more about becoming a creator on TikTok, you might want to check out the official TikTok Creator Portal here: https://www.tiktok.com/creators/creator-portal/

How to Turn One Blog Post into a 7-Figure Business

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Amy Morin never thought her article would be read by millions of people in just days.

In fact, she initially didn’t even write the article for public consumption – she wrote it for herself.

The blog post was titled, 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do, and it was written as a letter to herself during one of the lowest points of her life. When she was 23 her mother suddenly died from a brain aneurysm. 3 years later to the day, her 26-year-old husband died of a heart attack.

If that wasn’t enough, her father-in-law was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Overwhelmed at the thought of losing yet another loved one, she reminded herself that indulging in a self-pity party wouldn’t help.

That’s when she made a list of all the things mentally strong people don’t do. She published the list on her blog, hoping it might help someone else.

And that’s when lightning struck. The post went viral, garnering millions of views within days. Soon Forbes.com picked it up and more than 10 million more readers saw it.

Within a week national radio shows were talking about the article. Major publications wanted to reprint it and news channels wanted interviews.

A literary agent contacted her and within a week of submitting a book proposal to the agent, they had multiple offers from big publishing houses and a new career was born.

She took the deal with Harper Collins and spent the next few months writing the book. 13 months after publishing the article her book came out and quickly shot to the top of several major bestseller lists. She also got publishing deals in more than 20 other languages.

She has since written a sequel to the book. She does speaking engagements at corporate events, global conferences and TEDx. She provides webinars to companies on mental strength.

She’s created an eCourse for passive income and as an affordable alternative to individual coaching. She writes for magazines and other websites, and she consults with business leaders and executives.

As she says, “One piece of content could change your life.” Her monthly income now exceeds what her annual salary as a therapist used to be.

Keep in mind that this was not the first blogpost she ever wrote. Her other posts were not met with anywhere near this kind of enthusiasm, but those posts gave her experience in writing and publishing online.

A few tips when creating your own content:

Just keep writing. Like Amy, you never know when your very next post will be the one that goes viral and is seen by millions.

Make sure your website is ready to capture email addresses and social media followers when you get a viral hit.

Keep a professional headshot handy. If the media wants to interview you, they’ll also want a picture of you.

Update your bio. Media outlets want to know who you are and what you’ve done.

Go for quality, not quantity. It can be tempting to throw as many blogposts into the stratosphere as possible and see what sticks. But unless your posts are well researched and well written, none of them will go viral.

When lightning does strike, take full advantage of it. Say yes to interviews, joint venture deals, publishing deals and anything else that comes your way that makes sense for you.

Ride the wave and make the most of it while you can. That way even if it doesn’t lead to an entire career like it did for Amy, at least you got to have fun and make money while it lasted, and now you’ll have a much better idea of how to go viral again.

The One Auto Responder Email that Increases Your Income by $1,000 Per Month

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Now and then I coach fellow marketers on how to take their $1000 a month business and quickly level it up to $10,000 a month.

Just between you and me, it’s easier to go from $1,000 to $10,000 than it is to go from $0 to $1000.

That’s because once an income reaches $1000 a month, there are already systems and funnels in place that are making it happen. Then it’s just a question of tweaking those systems to increase the income.

If you don’t already have a list, a funnel and so forth, you can still make money from this ‘trick’ by going to other marketers who are building their email lists and offering to add another $1000 a month to their income.

And if you’re already building your list, then you are going to LOVE this.

A few weeks ago a new coaching client came to me asking for help in scaling his business. The first thing I did was ask to see his autoresponder sequence. These are the automated emails that are sent out to someone on a regular basis when they join his list.

I’m most interested in seeing that first email he sends; the one that always reads something like, “Welcome to the ABC list, here’s the link to your free download!”

That is the standard email and I’m here to tell you that it’s a sin to send the email this way, and here’s why:

This first email that new subscribers receive from you is opened somewhere between 50% to 90% of the time.

Check your own AR stats and see if this isn’t true.

Opened 50% to 90% of the time! No other email comes close to reaching these numbers.

And yet, most marketers do NOT do any selling in that email.

“I don’t want to come across as pushy.”

“I’m worried if I try to sell something they will unsubscribe.”

If you have thoughts like these then it’s time to turn your thinking on its head.

If you’re building a list, 99 times out of 100 it’s because you want to sell that list something.

Maybe you’re a non-profit and you want to sell them on making a donation.

Maybe you have a certain belief system and you want to sell them on believing what you believe.

Or maybe, like most of us, you want to sell them products and services that help them to reach their goals.

Now then, if you are building a list so that you can sell to them, then what’s wrong with… selling to them?

If seeing a sales link in that initial email scares them off, then they were never going to buy anyway.

Otherwise, by placing a link in that email, you are training them to EXPECT to see links in all of your emails.

You are training them to expect offers and click links.

As you can imagine, this is profitable for you and beneficial for your list because you are helping them to get the benefit(s) they seek.

Now then, back to my coaching student…

His “Welcome” email was just what I expected.

“Welcome to the XYZ Studio, here’s the link to your free video.”

And here are the changes we made:

First, in the email we promised to send a second free gift the following day. We do this to train new subscribers to open emails, and in fact every email for the first week promises another free gift the following day. We also added 3 or 4 hot bullet points to make them salivate over those free gifts and anticipate receiving the email the next day and opening it.

This method alone can greatly increase your income in the long run because your list becomes accustomed to opening any email that comes from you.

Continue to give them free gifts now and then to keep that momentum up, and make sure the free gifts are short, sweet and totally awesome.

Okay, before I tell you about the second thing we added to that first email, let’s do a little math:

If you get 100 new subscribers each day, and 3 out of 4 open that first email, that’s 75 opens.

If you get 300 new subscribers each day, that’s 225 opens.

225 opens times 30 days a month is 6750 opens each month.

That’s 6750 people you can be sending to the link of your choice, and here’s how to do it:

P.S. While you’re eagerly waiting for that free gift tomorrow, I’ve got one more thing for you today – a special 20% off discount code ***for NEW subscribers only***.

After you visit our catalog, if you decide to try out any of our best selling products, you can use the check out code “WELCOME20” to instantly save on as many products as you choose.

My personal favorite is the XYZ product because it will reveal exactly how you can get (benefit) in just 7 days.

Don’t wait too long to use your discount because it’s valid only on first time orders and only for the next 24 hours.

Visit our store here <<LINK>>

With these two tweaks (free gift, P.S discount) my student added over $1000 a month to her income almost immediately.

$200,000 First Year Digital Marketing Agency

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No real names allowed (we’ll call him Gary) and I’m not allowed to tell you his niche, but I can reveal pretty much everything else.

As you know a digital marketing agency is simply a business that works for other businesses, performing one or more needed services.

SEO is a classic example, but the work could be anything a business needs to have an online presence and get leads and sales including email marketing, content creation, advertising, paid search, social media marketing, video marketing, mobile marketing and so forth.

This agency is essentially a one-man operation. Gary does outsource a lot of the actual work* but he acquires all new accounts himself and is the one who deals directly with the businesses.

In other words, you can do this yourself by focusing exclusively on gaining new clients and keeping current clients happy while the actual work is performed by outsources.

Gary just launched his niche digital marketing agency 6 months ago, and he’s just passed $100k in total sales.

I’ll outline how you can follow in his footsteps, and keep in mind this will work for you whether you’re building an agency offering SEO, PPC, content, social media, web design, copywriting or all of the above.

Step 1 – Solve One Problem

You already know that a successful business solves problems, but what you might not realize is that a highly successful business goes all in on solving one problem extremely well.

For example, let’s say that you’re craving ice cream.

There are two places in town that offer great ice cream.

One of them is a restaurant that serves all kinds of food including sandwiches, meals and ice cream. The ice cream is really good and the place is always packed.

The second place offers only one thing: Home made ice cream. Really great, awesome ice cream. They have every flavor you can think of and some flavors that are out-of-this-world unique. They use all fresh, local ingredients. They support local farmers and they’re owned by a local family. You feel welcomed like you’re one of the family the moment you get to the door, and every bite tastes like heaven. No one does ice cream like this place.

So where do you go when you want ice cream? It’s not even a close contest, is it?

You want to be the ice cream place, because when people want ice cream, they will come to you and to you only.

Your agency should do one thing, and it should do that thing better than anyone else. Then when people want that exact one thing, they’re not even going to think about going anywhere else.

Step 2 – Copywriting

Your website design doesn’t need to be drop dead gorgeous. In fact, if it looks okay then that’s good enough for now. You can use WordPress if you like, or a service such as Squarespace. Just get a decent theme or page builder and don’t sweat it.

Later you can use profits from the business to design a fancier looking website, but for right now just focus on getting your site up as quickly as possible. This is not the time to win awards for website design.

While appearance isn’t all that important in the beginning, what you say on your website is.

On your homepage, you’re going to create copy that converts on the spot.

Here’s the formula I use for writing that copy:

A.I.D.P.G.A.

Attention. Interest. Desire. Proof. Guarantee. Action.

Attention: Quickly grab your reader with the problem and the solution (you). Your goal here is to get them reading the page.

Interest: Get your reader thinking hard about the problem they’re facing and how it’s negatively impacting them. Make them want to solve the problem as fast as possible, preferably right NOW.

Desire: You have the solution they want. You are going to make their life far better. Everything is going to be great if they work with you.

Proof: Prove it. Use testimonials and link to case studies if you have them.

Guarantee: Show them why it’s 100% safe for them and how they are taking zero risk.

Action: This is where you issue the call to action. They need to (insert action here) right now to get this solution and make their life better. The action you want them to take might be contacting you or it might be signing up right then and there. For most services, you’ll be wanting them to get in touch with you and then you’ll sell them via email or Zoom.

This formula works no matter what you are selling.

If you can’t write this yourself, then get a copywriter to write it for you.

Step 3 – Make Sales

Let me say right off that you’re not a salesperson; you’re a problem solver. They have a problem. You want to solve it for them. So don’t think you need to sound slick or use some trick to get them to hire you, because you don’t. You don’t need to manipulate, you don’t need to be pushy and you don’t need to do or say anything cringeworthy.

Let’s say you’re getting inbound leads via email, since that’s exactly how Gary does it.

When Gary gets a lead, he wastes NO time in responding, and he never sends a boilerplate response.

He does send a highly personal response that is short in length, friendly and professional, like this:

Hey Greg,

Thanks for getting in touch. We’d love to (insert service) for your business.  I love what you’ve done with your (homepage copy, testimonials, blog content – whatever it is that you can compliment and that shows you’ve spent time on their site.

We can jump on a zoom call if you like (no worries if not), or I can just send you pricing and details if you prefer.

What would work best for you?

Thanks Greg,

(Name)

The main goal is to get a conversation started. People buy from people they like and are already engaged with. Your competitors are going to send a template response. You’re going to stand out by being down to earth, engaging, accessible, and actually interested in THEM and THEIR BUSINESS, not just talking about yourself and yours.

Step 4 – Communication

Once you’ve made the sale, you’re going to regularly check in and make sure they’re happy. Have a system in place where you track client communications and ensure they feel looked after.

The key is to build relationships, get referrals and get to know them as a person. This will ensure they keep buying from you and no one else.

Step 5 – Testimonials

Testimonials are your digital salespeople, creating interest, trust and sales for you.

Ask for testimonials when they are loving working with you and when you’ve achieved success for them.

Hey Greg – I’m wondering if I can ask a favor of you.

I’m updating the website to feature a few of my very best clients as testimonials. Would you be open to writing a few lines for me?

If it’s easier, I can write something based on your campaign so far. And if you’re happy with it, you can just approve it to go on the site.

Thanks Greg,

(Name)

This works tremendously because everyone says yes. This costs them nothing and you’ll do the work for them.

Write a testimonial that exactly hits the pain point and solution that you offer, then feature their real name, business and photo alongside it.

How easy is that?

Gary gets his leads from SEO, Adwords, LinkedIn and Facebook. Where you get your leads will depend on your niche and your target market, but if you’re performing any kind of service for businesses, be sure to get on LinkedIn, since that’s where the bulk of Gary’s business comes from.

Whatever service you offer, you can either perform the work yourself or outsource it. If you outsource, then you can focus your full efforts on bringing in more clients.

And that’s about all there is to it. Do these things right and you will never struggle to convert clients.

Earning Six Figures by Capturing Birthdays

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This one is familiar and yet entirely different. Which is to say, I’ve seen people doing something similar, but never from this angle before.

And I think it’s absolutely genius.

We’re gonna call our guy Mark and I’m allowed to tell you that Mark operates in the US, but this could work most anywhere.

Mark works with businesses to set up SMS messaging with customers. He targets mainly restaurants, bars and movie theaters, although he also has a few amusement parks and others.

The idea is to find businesses where a group of people might go to celebrate a birthday.

He sets up SMS messaging for the business and then trains the staff to capture customers’ phone numbers and birthdays so the business can send out a free birthday gift redeemable on that person’s birthday.

For example, a restaurant might offer a free meal to the birthday person on their birthday. But who eats alone on their birthday? The birthday person ends up bringing at least one friend and often several friends, all of whom eat and drink, too.

Plus, the birthday person might have drinks, starters or dessert, too, so that adds up as well.

Now here’s the beauty of this plan: People can be reluctant to receive SMS messages from a business. But if you’re offering a FREE MEAL, much of the resistance is overcome. People want the free meal, and they won’t mind so much if they also get some other offers the rest of the year, too.

And when that birthday person is in the restaurant celebrating with their friends, what does the server do? She offers to give everyone else at the table a free meal on THEIR birthdays, too!

Now that one person who came in to celebrate their birthday not only brought in a lot of other business from their friends, but their friends are signed up for SMS and will be bringing their friends in on their birthday, too.

It’s a sneaky way to build an SMS list FAST while simultaneously increasing profits.

Just 2 birthdays a week in which they bring 4 other friends can easily result in an extra $200 plus per week to the business. 10 birthdays could bring in an extra $1,000 a week.

Then there’s all the goodwill that is built up by giving away birthday dinners or movie tickets and so forth. It’s hard to put a price on customer loyalty but it definitely means more positive reviews online, more customer visits and so forth.

And remember, the business can now SMS the customers throughout the rest of the year as well with special offers.

Mark charges a fee up front to set up the business with SMS and train the staff to capture emails. As you can imagine, this takes him very little time.

Then he handles the SMS messaging for the businesses so they don’t have to deal with it. Usually, he’ll create an SMS calendar with the business so that everything is set up in advance. For example, the first Tuesday of the month is a buy one, get one half off coupon. The second Friday is a TGIF special deal. St. Patrick’s day is a coupon for half off of green beer, and so forth.

The businesses love that all they have to do is capture phone numbers and Mark handles everything else. Mark loves that he gets money up front and a steady stream of monthly income from each business. And he offloads all of his work on an assistant which enables him to focus on getting new businesses.

And that is all that Mark would tell me. I pressed him for more details, financial numbers and so forth, but he didn’t want to share anything more. Perhaps I should have paid for more drinks to loosen his tongue, but here’s the deal:

You already have everything you need to get started. Choose an SMS service, create a little website and start talking to restaurant owners. This is such a drop-dead simple method of helping businesses that I think getting your first client is going to be fairly easy. You can explain the benefits in about one minute.

And once you have a couple of clients, showing new prospects how much revenue this birthday SMS system is bringing to your current clients is going to make this service super easy to sell.