Learn how to brainstorm brilliant ads and copy | You’ll get one practical recipe every two weeks | Free bonus: get 25 creative marketing cheatsheets when you sign up.
Behind my $34k course launch
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Hey! Today, instead of our usual creative techniques, I'm taking you behind the scenes of my new course. I’ll share my: Let’s dive in. Leaving my jobUntil February, I had the perfect part-time job at a VC firm. I worked with awesome people, made good money, and still had plenty of free time to create content. Paul Graham says there are two forms of procrastination: Per-day procrastination and per-project procrastination. "Per-project procrastination is far more dangerous," Paul explains. "You keep postponing that ambitious project year after year, waiting for the perfect moment… and you're too busy to even notice." The project I had been putting off was my longtime dream—creating an online course. 1. ValidationI called the course Writing with Robots: Using AI as a creative partner. But The Lean Startup taught me that nothing’s more unproductive than productively building a product no one needs. So I had to validate my idea: • Poll This LinkedIn poll showed that people didn’t want another AI course. It was time for plan B. • Post So I shared a beta version of Boring Products, Fun Ads. It performed well and opened new doors for me. The most important one was a talk at a B2B marketing conference in Tel Aviv. • Talk At the end of the talk, 30 out of 150 people signed up for the waitlist. And more importantly, another speaker, a CMO, offered me a collab: He’ll let me record the course at his company's studio for free, and in exchange, I'll give his team free access to the course. That was the final reassurance I needed—people actually wanted the course! 2. Curation1 month | Feb – March, 2024 I collected and reverse-engineered thousands of ads, looking for the recipe behind them. I also re-read my notes from Miami Ad School and many of my favorite marketing books.
3. Creation3 months | March – June, 2024 • Ads I spent a month trying my new recipes on some of my favorite B2B brands.
• Skeleton and learning outcomes I organized my new ads, their recipes, and other techniques I wanted to teach into 11 chapters. • Presentation I designed the slides in Figma and hired a proofreader to review them. • Anecdotes Tahl Raz, the ghostwriter behind 'Never Split the Difference,' agrees to ghostwrite a book only if the client has: B) Fascinating anecdotes So I added personal stories to each chapter to make the material more memorable. 4. Recording1 month | June – July, 2024 This was the most difficult part by far. Watching hours of myself on camera made me face all my insecurities: my accent, my nose, my hand movements. Every day I returned home drained, wanting to quit. Here's an email I wrote to my friend Dan Nelken on a particularly tough night: One thing that did help was my strict routine:
🧰 Gear and software:
5. Editing (Rough cut)1.5 months | July – August, 2024 When I finished recording, I had about 30 hours of raw footage. I cut out 90% of it in Tella. Their transcript video editor feature (edit the text instead of the video) was a lifesaver. Then I used CapCut to finish the rest—it’s free, easy to use, and comes with simple transitions and animations. 6. Hosting• Course host: EzyCourse Their video player and overall student experience are better than on Kajabi and Teachable. But the backend operation—dealing with affiliates, coupons, etc.—sucks. • Payment Processor: Paddle It's like Stripe, but they also handle international taxes. I embedded the handbook into my course platform to put it behind a paywall and improve the learning experience. 7. Testing 3 weeks | August – September, 2024 • Workshops • Beta-testers I asked 12 beta testers for feedback. I sent them these guidelines, asking them to focus on the following feedback: 👎 What Didn’t Work: • Flaky beta testers: 20% canceled last minute. Next time, I’ll reach out to a larger group. 👍 What Worked: • Testimonials – I used my testers' positive feedback as social proof. 8. Editing (Final Cut)3 weeks | September, 2024 Once I had all the feedback in one doc, I sat down to create the final version. I: • Added music from Epidemic Sound • Shortened it more • Fixed errors 9. Launch Campaign I sketched the design in Figma and sent it to my newsletter readers. It served two purposes:
"If you want advice, ask for money. If you want money, ask for advice." – Unknown
Finally, I hired this UI designer to finalize it and this WordPress developer to build it. Waitlist & Email Campaign On launch week, I sent four emails, each with a different purpose: Email #1: Nurture Email #2: Launch In the next emails, I avoided salesy phrases like "limited time" or "buy now" or used visuals for those instead of text. It worked. Email #3: Sneak Peek LinkedIn posts Then, I turned the emails into LinkedIn posts: Affiliates 👎 Bad: Initially, I offered a 50% affiliate commission, but I didn’t think of the 20% VAT in most countries and the 5% transaction fee. I ended up keeping only about 25% per sale. Now, I offer a 40% commission. 10. Retention and GrowthTwo weeks after the launch, a student asked for a refund. I checked and saw that he hadn't even watched the first video. I refunded him right away, knowing that he probably wouldn't have returned the course if he had actually watched the first chapter. RevenueMy goal was to sell 100 copies, but I sold over 120 in the first week. Thank you SO MUCH, guys. I'm really grateful. *wipes tear* Launch week stats: Internet money is so weird. At first, it almost felt like I was stealing and should refund everyone. But once I started getting positive feedback and speaking with students, I relaxed and let myself enjoy it. Since the launch, private students have slowed down. Now most of the buyers are companies that want several copies and workshops. ExpensesNot on the list:
SummaryYou made it! 🎉Thanks for reading. Reply to this email if you enjoyed it, I'll write back. Pinky swear. ;) Talk soon, |
The Creative Marketer
Learn how to brainstorm brilliant ads and copy | You’ll get one practical recipe every two weeks | Free bonus: get 25 creative marketing cheatsheets when you sign up.
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