Becoming a full-stack creator, 10x-ing your email list, building an idea factory
Growth Currency ⚡ 0️⃣2️⃣5️⃣
Welcome to the 25th edition of Growth Currency ⚡
👋 A warm hello to 29 new subscribers this week—including Treyton, Rob, Deepti, Matthew, Natalie, Fardeen, Joyce, Joe, and Ryan!
Did you know: I’m building this newsletter in public? Here’s the thread of the progress!
I set out on this newsletter journey with a goal of writing 100 weekly newsletters in a row—and now I’m 1/4 of the way there 🥳 Stoked to have you here on the journey.
Now let’s get into it.
BECOMING A FULL-STACK… CREATOR?
Have you ever heard a description of something that stopped you dead in your tracks?
I first heard the term ‘full-stack creator’ back in April—and I was smitten.
A few months since, it’s still heavy on my mind—but what does it even mean?
And why does it interest me? And why might it interest you?
WHAT IS A FULL-STACK CREATOR?’
The obvious comparison is a “full-stack developer”:
an engineer who can handle all the work of databases, servers, systems engineering, and clients. - Hackernoon.com
So… a developer “generalist” (to a degree).
In parallel: a full-stack creator = a marketing generalist? Not quite.
You’ve heard of content marketers. A full-stack creator is similar, but doing it (often) solo and for their own content: they’re creating it, editing it, publishing it, and promoting it.
It's a bootstrapped content marketing agency of one. Sounds exhausting, challenging—but… also kind of awesome!
I love to do all of those things. I’m a generalist by nature. We’ve been over this.
So the thought of creating written content that influences the audio content that influences the video content that helps create course content is… 😍
BUT WHO DOES THIS EVEN?
Think back to the early days of content marketing. Who’s the first name that comes to mind?
Gary Vee. He’s the OG. The content marketing master.
He paved the way for creators & entrepreneurs like Noah Kagan, Jay Clouse, Codie Sanchez, Jay Acunzo, Corey Haines, and on and on.
More creators than ever are bootstrapping their content flywheels, creating podcasts, video, Twitter threads, newsletters, cohort-based courses, communities, and—lemme catch my breath—no code websites & apps. All in the name of content. And all as full-stack creators.
And sure, many creators have teams behind them. But the point holds: becoming a full-stack creator is going to be a necessity.
The barriers to entry for content creation are lower than ever, so if you’re not playing with a full stack, you'll risk having to fold every hand.
CREATOR HIGHLIGHTS 🔦
Brice Trophardy || Brice is a friend and a fabulous writer. He’s now building an evergreen system to get endless ideas and sharpen your writing: the Snowball Writing Course ❄
Atul Anand || At 14 years old, Atul is crushing it. He’s created several tools & templates, including a Ship30For30 Notion Template, to name one of many! Really impressed by his skillset.
Samantha Postman || Samantha’s sharing authentic 🤯 lessons on life, business & culture—and just launched her new podcast Bold PerSPectives! 🎧
TWEET OF THE WEEK 🐦
The more people I talk to about this—the more it’s validated.
Share 👏 your 👏 knowledge 👏!
THIS WEEK’S GROWTH CURRENCY ⚡
📈 MARKETING
How to 10x Your Email List by Blake Emal
This video was so inspirational I finished my eBook and built a landing page 👀
One Momentum Trick to Grow Your Audience by Justin Welsh
This strategy works particularly well if you’ve already established some momentum on another platform (ie. LinkedIn) and want to build on that momentum on Twitter.
🛠 TOOLS
AppSumo’s Freebies1 — The AppSumo team keep putting out great products, and their ‘Freebies’ section is perfect for bootstrappers like you and me! Get FREE tools, courses, and eBooks galore.
✍ WRITING
Building an Idea Factory with Ali Abdaal & David Perrell
Not sure I need to waste your time with a preamble here. Just watch it and take copious notes 📝
💰 BUSINESS & MONETIZATION
“We went to buy a newsletter... And THIS happened; the why and how of buying newsletters” by Grow Getters
If growing your own successful newsletter feels like a lot of work, why not try and buy one? Well, for one—it can cost you a lot, as the Grow Getter crew discovered. This is a great case study in how to determine value of your newsletter and determine the value of one you may want to purchase. Great read here by Codie Sanchez & team.
🎧 PODCASTS
The Habits & Routines Behind Great Artists w/ Austin Kleon EP 1123 - School of Greatness Podcast
Austin Kleon has written not one but a trilogy of NY Times Bestsellers. His chat with Lewis Howes was really interesting and inspiring as a creator:
IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:
The routines to get out of a creative block in order to put out meaningful work.
The key habits of successful creatives.
How to get over the fear of being embarrassed by negativity.
Why Austin thinks making a full-time living with art is a terrible way to make a living.
How to steal like an artist to create your own work.
🏘 COMMUNITIES & NEWSLETTERS
Trends.vc Newsletter by Dru Riley — Dru puts out bombs every week as he analyzes new market opportunities & ideas. This week’s topic on Agencies was eye-opening
💲👀
That’s it for this week! Thank you so much for reading to the end 🙏
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