Nat Eliason grew his TikTok account from 400 to 55,900 in just six weeks.

The key to his growth? Well, there wasn’t one—you can't easily "game" TikTok.

Instead, here are seven of Nat’s findings that’ll raise your chances of success.

🎯 Choose a niche where you have an "unfair advantage." Think hard about what would make your content hard to replicate. Nat chose non-fiction books since he has detailed notes about 300+ books.

Ali Abdaal's unfair advantage for his "how to get into medical school" YouTube channel was that he was already in medical school.

🧠 Take a SEO-inspired approach to content ideation. First look through the top 5-10 accounts in your niche and see what topics have done well. Then type those topics into the search bar—you’ll see variations appear below, just like Google’s related keywords. Also look at the search results’ “Others searched for” section for ideas.

🐑 Don’t prioritize making videos for the latest trends. Yes, creating for the latest viral trend can help get more views, but these trend-inspired videos often don’t explain why your account is worth following. They often get lots of engagement—but few followers.

Make these vids only if a trend fits your content, topic, and style.

🖥️ Edit your footage on a computer, not your phone. It’s a lot more efficient and powerful. Nat recommends using Final Cut Pro or Adobe Premiere. But use TikTok to add captions.

🚀 Your videos need strong hooks to actually take off. The first 2-3 seconds are the most important. We talked about hooks last week.

🪝 Also include a hook in the description. It’ll give people another reason to watch in case they read the description first. Example: The description for a video giving three tips on something could say, “The 3rd helped me the most.”

💬 Commenting on other videos won’t help your own account performance. It’s helpful, however, for connecting with other creators. Just focus on making really good videos.

In a previous newsletter, we shared an AI tool that maintains eye contact in videos.

But eye contact isn't always the best option.

Studies show that ads using averted gazes lead to more attention toward the product, and more memorable ads.

We're hardwired to notice faces. And when you see eyes looking over at something else, you're naturally drawn to look, too. 

See for yourself 👀

This same tactic can be used on landing pages and product photos. Use your models' eyes to make people look where you want them to—your product, your CTA, or where you want them to go next.

This can also apply to social media profile photos. The direction your profile photo faces can make it either feel like you've got your back to your post, or like you're facing it.

Which of these looks better? I bet you it's the first one.

‍

"It’s easier to be a critic than a creative." – marketing researcher Flint McGlaughlin 

ChatGPT can’t do all the legwork of content creation. It's still not that good at writing, for example:

So bad.

But it can be great for inspiration and relieving blank-page syndrome.

See for yourself by experimenting with these seven prompts:

1. “Write 5 headlines for [Company] based on the facts below.” Be sure to list at least three of your company’s strongest value props or credentials. They’ll help guide ChatGPT toward better results.
2. “Write 5 more headlines stressing the exclusiveness of [Company]’s services.” Rather than simply using the first few headlines generated, ask ChatGPT to refine them according to new specifications. You can change these new instructions to whatever you’re looking for.
3. “Write 5 more headlines that begin with the word ‘get.’” Continue refining. You can replace “get” with any other word of your choosing.
4. “What do customers want to achieve with [Company]’s services?” Use this prompt to get ideas for reframing your company’s biggest value props—and to clarify whether ChatGPT understands your company. This is a prereq for the next prompt.
5. “Write a headline that emphasizes how customers can get what they want through [Company].” Assuming ChatGPT correctly understands your company’s offerings and your customers’ goals, use this prompt to uncover more copywriting ideas.
6. “Add a sense of urgency to headlines 1 and 2.” If there are any specific headlines you like, ask ChatGPT to hone in on them and make adjustments.
7. “Give me 10 examples of X.” Coming up with examples can be time consuming.

For example, I asked: "What are 20 tactical copywriting tips with before-and-after examples?"

I then chose my favourites, remixed them, and created this design. Check out tips 4 and 5:

MrBeast won't even make a video unless he has the perfect thumbnail and title in mind. 

For written content, we call these "hooks." They:

1. Stop people scrolling (aka thumb-stopping).

2. Intrigue them.

3. Get them to either keep reading or click to see more.

Without a good hook, your otherwise amazing content just won't get seen. 

Shaan Puri lists six emotional reactions you want to evoke in your hooks: 

1. LOL (humour)
2. WTF (surprise/outrage)
3. That's crazy! (surprise/delight)
4. Ohhh, I get it now
5. FINALLY! Someone said it
6. Yay! (celebration—like if someone got a new job)

I'd also add:

1. Uh-oh (fear): "I hope I'm not doing it wrong."
2. Damn, I want that (inspiration)
3. Then what happened? (curiosity)
4. Daaaamn (credibility): "This person knows what they're talking about."

Tap into these emotions, and you'll stop the scroll and get them invested in reading more.

Here's how Wes Kao taps into "Uh oh":

LinkedIn is getting hotter and hotter each year.

And one of the great things about LinkedIn (unlike other social platform) is that you can bootstrap your first followers by sending connection requests.

Databox’s Nikos Ntirlis shares how:

#1) Make a list of the people you want to connect with—potential customers, influencers, partners, affiliates, etc.

Pro tip: Choose people with a similar audience size as you. If you have 1,000 followers, someone with 3,000 is way more likely to accept than someone with 300,000.

#2) Read their posts and check out their website. The goal is to identify the topics that interest them and their communities.

#3) Thoughtfully engage with them. That includes commenting on their posts, responding to their comments on someone else’s, and quoting and tagging them in your own posts.

Do this several times over the course of a few days or weeks.

Pro tip: Prioritize commenting on viral posts. You'll get more organic followers.

#4) Send a connection request after your targets respond.

They'll be way more likely to accept than if you did it cold. Why?

Because they recognize your name, have started to develop a relationship with you, and want you to keep engaging with their posts (so you help amplify their reach).

Note: you can also comment on people commenting on their posts, and send connection requests to them. Just be careful to only send up to about 20 per day to avoid being suspended by LinkedIn. 

And even if your targets don’t accept your connection request, interacting with their content can get you exposure to their audience.

Want more insights about growing your LinkedIn presence organically? Check out our comprehensive playbook.

Good copywriting isn’t about glorifying your product or exaggerating its features.

It’s about getting people to understand your product's core benefit. Only then can they consider becoming a customer.

You can reach that core benefit through dimensionalization. That involves identifying a key feature and then asking, “So what?” not just once, but again and again.

Keep asking, “So what?” until you reach one of these desires:

1. Physical: Food, drink, warmth, and shelter
2. Safety: Security and safety
3. Belonging and love: Companionship and intimacy
4. Esteem: Feelings of success and superiority
5. Self-actualization: Achieving one’s full potential

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs describes our fundamental needs as humans.

Dimensionalizing helps connect the dots between a product feature and at least one of these underlying desires.

Here’s an example of dimensionalizing:

Product feature: A fine art print that comes in extra large dimensions

• So what? The XL sizing makes the print the focal point of any room in your home.
• So what? The print commands everyone’s attention.
• So what? It becomes a conversation piece whenever guests are over.
• So what? You can show off your knowledge about the artwork.
• So what? You’ll impress your guests—earning you esteem from their social approval as well as your own feelings of success.

Figma has quickly become one of top design tools. Partly because it was the first Sketch-like design tool to double-down on web.

And it's inherently viral. I send you a link to our Figma file, we start collaborating immediately.

Figma makes this process even smoother with their permissions and billing.

#1. Editors (basic users) can add new editors to their team at any time and at no upfront cost. This allows folks to share designs, get feedback and move quickly without admin approval.

#2. If the number of editors exceeds the current plan, admins get an email a few days before the next bill is due, and highlights any new editors that joined.

#3. The admin can then decide to remove these new editors before the next billing cycle. BUT they're way less likely to now for two reasons:

1. Loss aversion: It's psychologically harder for them to remove access from someone than to say no in the first place. 
2. Effort: It requires the admin to actively remove someone. Often, people are busy and don't get to it—or don't bother since it's only $12/mo.

This makes it:

• Easier for users. They can invite folks without waiting for admins.
• Easier for admins. They don't have to invite everyone. They can batch remove people as needed each month. And they get a free month for each user.
• More revenue for Figma.

On Sunday, thousands of people scrambled for their remotes.

During the final quarter of the Superbowl match, Tubi, the streaming service, created an ad that looked like someone was changing the channel to watch Mr and Mrs Smith.

It was an incredibly clever way to get people's attention—and perfectly demonstrate exactly what Tubi is. It shows rather than tells.

It reminded me a lot of a classic prank:

Change a coworker's desktop background to be a screenshot of their desktop or currently open windows. Then close everything and hide the files on the desktop.

When they return to their computer, they'll desperately click around trying to get their computer to respond. Office pranking at its finest. 

A similar thing could be done in a YouTube video if coordinated with the creator. Or in an Instagram story/reel or TikTok video.

Entrepreneurs fail when they focus on businesses that don't provide value to people.

That's why nailing your value props is critical.

If you can tell a well-formed value prop story, it's a sign you’re creating something valuable.

Here’s the template. 

Example: Relationship Hero (relationship coaching SaaS)

• Describe a specific person with a specific problem: A 23-year-old male who can’t get a date.
• Describe their current best effort to solve their problem: He gets a Tinder account and does his best to convert matches into dates.
• Describe why it’s still a problem: His matches barely respond, and when they do, the conversation feels boring and forced. He uses it for one hour every day but only gets one date every two months.
• Describe how their life gets better thanks to you: Once Relationship Hero coaches guide him through writing his texts, he suddenly has much better conversations that result in a date each week.

This simple framework helps you validate a plausible business/product idea without having any market research or empirical evidence to show. (Although we recommend those for deeper analysis—talking to customers is incredibly important.)

You can then use that story on your website and marketing copy.

The vast majority of cold emails are ignored.

In the worst case, people flag your emails as spam (causing future emails to end up in spam), and have a negative impression of both you and your brand.

That's why Lemlist, a tool for automating email outreach, warns against doing "cold emails." Instead, they should be warm 🔥

What does that mean?‍

That means only reaching out to people who already have some idea of who you are, and have a positive association with you and your brand already.

For example, if you got a personalized message from your favorite influencer or celebrity, you'd welcome it, and not just flag it as spam. You'd happily respond.

To do that, sadly it's not a quick fix. Which is why most people don't do it. 

You have to:

1. Produce a lot of free content, say on LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, podcast, etc.
2. Then engage with people who engage with you. And engage with others writing and commenting on relevant posts in your niche.
3. And then eventually DMing them a personalized message either to get to know each other, give them a free resource, or pitch an offer.

If you do this, your response rates will go from single digit to double digits.

Lemlist believes this so strongly that they encourage their entire team to be active on social media and build their own personal brands.

What motivates people to buy? Look to the psychology of spy recruitment for answers. 

Intelligence officers use an acronym to size up potential recruits’ motives:

• M = money
• I = ideology
• C = coercion
• E = ego

These also align pretty directly with the emotional triggers behind purchasing decisions.

Money

Emotional triggers this motive aligns with: greed and lust

Sadly, greed drives human behavior. Wealth, power, and social currency—all things people instinctively want.

Appeal to prospects' aspirations. Like this copy from Horst Studios: “Where the women you hate have their hair done.”

Ideology

Aligned with hope and a sense of belonging

Two thirds of Gen Zers will stop using—or even boycott—brands that clash with their values.

Speak to the values that matter to your audience.

Talk about values a lot. Two brands that do an A+ job with this: Ben & Jerry’s and Patagonia.

Coercion

Aligned with guilt and fear

We don't actually recommend this one. Don't guilt people into buying your products. 

A better approach: Reveal how your product is the guilt-free alternative to the others that are out there. Especially if that benefit ties into your value props.

Ego

Aligned with vanity

A little flattery goes a long way.

Which one stands out the most?

We’ll bet it was the Pringles. Unlike the other two brands (and dozens of other chip brands that come in crinkly rectangular bags), Pringles come in a tube.

This is a pattern interrupt—something that breaks the norm.

Pattern interrupts grab attention.

They draw your eye even if they're inherently LESS noticeable than the competition:

🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🦾🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈

And in a crowded market, they make your business stand out.

To get in front of more leads, try incorporating pattern interrupts. Some ideas:

1) Like the Pringles example, give your product distinctive packaging.

2) If most companies in your industry have a certain aesthetic, make yours the complete opposite.  

Think of how Liquid Death embraced hardcore branding in the minimalist world of bottled water.

3) Use unusual imagery in your ads.

Ever seen Squatty Potty’s pooping unicorn commercial? Or Poo-Pourri’s “Girls Don’t Poop” ad? These videos got a lot of attention because of their weird visuals. (The bathroom humor just happens to be a coincidence—but we’re not not saying it’s worth a shot.)

4) Along the same lines, use contrasting colors in your ads.

The agency Biddyco used neon colors in its Facebook ads for the cereal brand Magic Spoon. Compared to everyday photos from friends and family in your feed, these bright shades were a total scroll-stopper.

5) Plan a different kind of event.

Instead of organizing a generic marketing conference, the SaaS brand SparkToro hosted an event where each speaker told a story they'd never shared before. Sessions were short—30 minutes max—and nothing was recorded. This made speakers more comfortable with being vulnerable and incentivized people to tune in live.

Good copywriters know the power of future pacing. That's a technique that encourages readers to visualize the positive results your product will help them achieve.

Example: A coding bootcamp can say, "Learn to become a programmer so you can earn a 6-figure tech salary and work from home."

That paints a picture of a big win after completing the bootcamp. It's easy to visualize.

Just one problem with future pacing: It doesn’t work well on skeptical buyers. Their objections cancel out the rosy picture.

To win over skeptics, give instant gratification in your copy. Highlight the good things that are just around the corner. 

Disney does this by making its vacation-booking process just as appealing as the trip that’s months away.

A few examples:

• "Disney Cruise Line gives families dreams to wake up excited about." → Become your family's hero.
  
• Page headings like "Discover Value in Vacation Packages," "Trip Planning Made Easy," and "Book with Confidence" → Enjoy the trip-planning experience.
  
• "With over 50 different hotels to choose from, you're sure to find one that fits your family’s travel style, size, and budget!" → Easily find a place that fits your needs.

As a result, skeptical prospects perceive an immediate reward from booking.

To deliver instant gratification in your copy, frame the purchase itself—and not just the product—as a win. For instance:

• “Order X now, and you’ll feel relief knowing you made the right decision.”
  
• “By saying yes to X, you’ll be one step closer to achieving your big goal.”
  
• “Buy X now, and you’ll wake up tomorrow knowing you finally did something about it!”

Your prospects may still have reservations about your product. But they’ll be more likely to act when you sell them immediate confidence and relief.

Duolingo has one of the best viral growth loops.

And it has nothing to do with the gamification they're known for.

What is it?

👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿👇🏿
👉🏿👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾👇🏾👈🏿
👉🏿👉🏾👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽👈🏾👈🏿
👉🏿👉🏾👉🏽👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👈🏽👈🏾👈🏿
👉🏿👉🏾 👉🏽 weirdness👈🏽👈🏾👈🏿
👉🏿👉🏾👉🏽👆🏼👆🏼👆🏼👆🏼👆🏼👈🏽👈🏾👈🏿
👉🏿👉🏾👆🏽👆🏽👆🏽👆🏽👆🏽👆🏽👆🏽👈🏾👈🏿
👉🏿👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👈🏿
👉🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👈🏿 

They purposely make people translate really bizarre sentences.

I have an entire album of them on my phone. I send them to people all the time.

And I'm not the only one. People share them on Twitter constantly.

There's even a Twitter account with 100,000 followers called "Shit Duolingo Says."

Weird sentences delight users. They keep you asking, "What's gonna come next?" Which is critical for an app that does one of the hardest things: teach people a new language.

And they cause people to talk organically about the app with others.

Be weird to stand out, delight people, and get them talking.

Each year Google kills tons of its own products.

Why?

Because a company like Google needs each product to generate hundreds of millions in revenue (or be strategically relevant) to justify relative to their other products.

It doesn't mean they're bad ideas, they're just too small for Google.

Killed by Google shares every project sent to the graveyard by Google. It's worth going through it regularly to see if there are any ideas worth replicating.

Often these have many thousands or millions of users who suddenly need a new alternative—making them an attractive market to target if you can act fast.

Imagine this: You’re not an expert in SEO, and are rather mystified by it, so you decide to hire an SEO consultant. You find an expert on Upwork (for example).

They seem confident, so you decide to work with them. Because you're inexperienced, you're totally unaware that there are gaps in their SEO knowledge.

Later, when someone else offers sound SEO advice that contradicts to what your Upwork consultant told you, you’re more likely to take it with a grain of salt.

This is caused by "the anchoring bias." 

We trust the first piece of info we’re given more than newer information.

That first piece of info (Upwork SEO consultant) acts as our reference point—we judge new data against it, letting it skew our opinions on quality. 

We naturally lay the burden of proof with the new information, even if we never validated the old information.

Oh humans.

Applied to creative work, the anchoring bias can make us complacent. We get stuck on the same process, messaging, and copy we’ve used for years—unaware that switching things up could lead to better results.

To avoid a stagnant marketing strategy, run interesting experiments. Or try a new SEO consultant, different freelancers, or an AI copywriting software. 

We’re not suggesting that you fire any loyal employees or partners—only that you try something new on occasion. See if your marketing efforts benefit from a fresh spin.

As you've probably noticed, at the top of every newsletter edition, we tell people how to break up with us... err I mean unsubscribe from the newsletter.

Seems counterproductive, right?.

We tell people how to leave after we fought so hard to convert them to a subscriber. 

So why do we do it?

It's one of the many things we do to make sure our emails keep ending up in people's inboxes. And that they have a positive impression of our brand.

So first, it builds trust—we’re not here to hold your inbox hostage.

And if someone doesn't want to receive our emails, we don't want to keep hammering them until they're so upset that they mark our emails as spam.

Spam complaints hurt your emails’ future deliverability. That is, they increase the chances of your future emails landing in people’s spam folders.

So make it easy for people to unsubscribe. You’ll be doing both readers and yourself a favor.

The entire point of a free trial is to prove value and convert leads into customers ASAP.

So how long should your trial be to maximize conversions?

Most companies offer free trials of 7-30 days, though some run as long as 90 days.

You can justify both ends of the spectrum.

1. Longer trials mean users have more time to get familiar with a product.
2. Shorter trials create a sense of urgency.

So which leads to more customers?

In a study of 7-, 14-, and 30-day trials for a SaaS product, the shortest length (7-day) did best at increasing subscriptions, retention, and revenue.

Meanwhile, there was little difference between the 14- and 30-day trial results.

According to researchers, urgency explains why. With a short trial, we use a product more intensively because we want to maximize its use in the limited time frame.

But with a longer trial, we tend to use the product much less per day. And as a result, we forget about it in the trial’s last days—the most important period because that’s when we decide whether or not to become a customer.

Experiment with short trials to boost conversion. Let us know how it pans out.

Creator Sara Renae Clark offers a lot of freebies to her audience.

It's a really effective strategy. In fact, it's our entire ethos at DC.

Provide a ton of free value. Slowly build people's trust over time. Eventually, they'll trust you enough to buy one of your paid products.

But instead of only offering her freebies as instant downloads or newsletter rewards, she places some as products in her online shop.

To get them, users have to go through the normal purchasing process: create an account, add the item to their cart, and check out.

But they don’t have to pay, of course.

According to Sarah, offering her freebies this way “warms up” leads into becoming paying customers. It’s a practice run that builds her credibility.

The idea is that by going through the motion of buying something without actually spending money, leads will feel more comfortable making a real purchase later on.

And they'll already have an account. Making checkout even smoother.

Other creators, such as Jack Butcher (Visualize Value), offer both a free and a $1 product.

Eye contact is one of the most powerful persuasive tools on the planet.

But staring down the lens of a video camera is an insanely intimidating and challenging task.

Seriously. It's really difficult. 

Despite that, maintaining eye contact can:

1. Make you more persuasive.
2. Make your words more memorable.
3. Make YOU more memorable.
4. Make people more honest (and they'll also think you're more honest).
5. Create and deepen attraction.

In short: making eye contact in your videos by staring at the camera is hugely beneficial.

Here's the great news:

AI can now make you maintain eye contact even if you spend the whole time staring at your speaking notes. 

Or awkwardly darting your eyes around the room desperately waiting for it to be over.

For example:

Windows 11 already offered this. But honestly, it looked creepy.

NVIDIA took a step out of Uncanny Valley. It's basically impossible to tell that it's fake.

This will likely become the norm. Try it out before everyone else is doing it.