As you may know, a couple of months ago, I was hacked and all my servers were infested with malware. At first, I thought this is something that happens to everyone… Until I was hacked last month in my GetResponse account. Someone actually went as far as to delete all my lists. So I was left with nothing: no lists, no subscribers, nothing. This cost me a lot of money – money that I couldn’t make because I was unable to drive traffic to anything.
Thankfully, I have been able to restore some of my lists, but not all, as GetResponse did not help me at all unfortunately. As I hadn’t emailed my subscribers for over a month while trying to pick up the pieces, when I emailed them recently, I had little to no response. They basically forgot who I am.
So I have decided to start over and start building my list from scratch. This is why i created this challenge today.
Today is May 10th and what I decided to do is to start as if I had nothing (which is the case somehow) and build my audience all the way from the ground up. This is going to be a case study for anyone who is interested to know how to build their list from scratch and without having to spend much money in the process.
So here are the steps that I am going to follow starting today:
- Create an irresistible lead magnet. This will be either a short report, a cheat sheet, or a content-rich video with good value and information.
- Create a highly converting squeeze page.
- Create an irresistible one-time offer to be able to monetize the list right off the bat. This will be either one of my own products or a related high quality affiliate offer.
- Create a 15-day follow up sequence that the new subscribers will be receiving once they sign up to my list.
- Once everything is done, I will start driving traffic to my squeeze page.
So basically, I will start working backwards. Here’s how:
- First, I will find an offer to promote. This will be either my own product or an affiliate offer.
- Then I will create a short report that has value information and that is related to the offer.
- Once that’s done, I will start working on my pages: starting with the thank you page first, then the squeeze page.
- Last and most important step: driving traffic.
Creating my lead magnet and squeeze page to set up my little funnel will take me 24 to 48 hours max. Once done, I will start driving traffic to it.
I will use a combination of both free and paid traffic for this case study, and I will track everything in order to see what traffic source brings more traffic, subscribers and sales.
I will not discuss the traffic methods as of now, but I will reveal everything in the upcoming updates.
If you sign up above, you will be the first to know about my progress in this case study. I will post updates on a weekly basis to inform my readers, and to also keep myself accountable.
I’m really excited to see how this is going to turn out!
Make sure you come back to see what’s up!
Hi Hooda, great post…
I found it because Andy Brocklehurst dropped a link. I have met you but we didn’t talk to each other on Andy’s Blab the night you talked about getting hacked.
I’m currently new to IM and rebuilding my WP blog from a long career in Real Estate business to serve people like me who are interested in IM.
I also saw you when Dr kook… the guy who claims to be a psychic on another of Andy’s Blabs was trying to read your mind and drop his links to get coaching students or something.
At any rate I like your writing style and just signed up to follow your challenge. I want to model what you do to rebuild your following and apply that to help me build my tribe.
Thank you for what you do! – Fred
Hi Fred! Thanks for stopping by my blog and for your kind comments. I am so happy that you’re finding this helpful. I really appreciate it!
Yes, that doctor was creepy wasn’t he! Hahaha.
Good luck on this Hooda. I know you can do it as I know you are very skilled and a good and honest worker.
Anyone who sees this should subscriber to Hooda too. She knows her stuff.
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Hey Adam! Thank you so much for the encouragement! It really means a lot coming from you!
Hi Hooda
Great post and I wish you all the best with the challenge.
I will be following along and also going to take the challenge myself.
I read about you being hacked when it happened and just couldn’t believe someone/s would be so cruel as to do that to another persons business.
This space can suck sometimes…
I’ve shared this post as I think it’s awesome
Leah
Hey Leah! Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment. This is starting to build momentum now and I can’t wait to see how it’s going to unveil.
Great challenge – and a fantastic response to the adversity you have faced in the last few months.
That’s what champions are made of!
I will be joining you on your challenge .. now to find an offer ..
.. oh you are also the first person I have ever signed up to accept push notifications from .. so I am interested in finding out how they work too ..
(.. in advance of running this myself on my blog later in the month)
Glad to be joining you on your challenge .. I will do my best to spread the word ….
Thank you so much Ant! I am loving the response so far! And good luck with the challenge too!
Go, Hooda!
I wish you all the best with your 30 day challenge…
Will this be a case study product afterwards? If so, report on your progress but make sure you save the fine detail for a course or report.
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Hi Barry! Thanks for your comments. Yes, I am actually thinking of making it a product now after talking to a couple of people today!
Thanks for the encouragement!
Hey Hooda ,
This looks a solid plan 🙂
Best of luck with your 30 day challenge and I you can share a case study of your 30 day challenge later then it would be awesome..
Thanks
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Thank you so much!
Hooda,
Thank you for your article, and also for the challenge (and thanks to Leah for telling us about it). I will be following along with you, and also taking this challenge.
Hi Jan!
Thanks for stopping by my blog and leaving a comment. I wish you all the best in the challenge!
Hi Hooda.
Excellent post and I will certainly be following your progress.
Good luck
Rich
Hi Rich!
Thank you! Be sure to come back and see what’s up!
Hey Hooda!!
Losing everything is a good point at your business, because you test how much you know what you do and how you can start over..
Many people talk about starting over..
But You have the chance to actually do it and document what you end up with 🙂
Good Luck Hooda 🙂
– Alaa Khassa.
Hi Alaa! Yes, exactly! I want to prove that it is still possible to build a proper list nowadays from scratch and WITHOUT product launch 🙂
Thanks for the encouragement!
Pleased to be joining you on your epic journey. Will be really interested to see the outcome, also the obstacles you face along the way. Good luck always.
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Hi John! Thanks for your comments. I will be updating this as I go along, so please keep a look out for the news!
Sounds very exciting!
Can’t wait for the updates. 🙂
Thanks Hamza!
Love this post Hooda. You gave me ideas on how to proceed with my own list building. Can’t wait for the Results!
Thanks Demetris! Glad it inspired you!
First I like to say your method is so awesome you really gave me insight about how to do it, creating a report is one of great method it didn’t come to my mind before thanks to your post now I filled up. Now I’m going to try it out.
Second I’m so sorry to hear your terrible moment I personally know how hard to build a quality email list good luck with your process and I wish you and bless you to have a great quality list as soon as possible. Is getresponse don’t have a backup I mean on their server when I saw you said I didn’t recover all it made me shock really it is not good when they don’t have a backup of existing customers email list however it’s their technical problem lol
finally i like to say thank you for your awesome idea and good luck with your work. As a help I’ll share this post on my Twitter account cheers
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Hi Hooda,
I just stumbled across your blog. And I’m so sorry to hear about what has happened! 🙁
I’ve been hacked before, and I feel you.
It’s definitely a mixture of shock, “I can’t believe this happened”, and everything else. All put together into a hot steaming pot and mixed with some acidic liquids.
Wishing you good luck on your list building challenge and all the best!
Looks like you have a solid plan and are on the right track. 🙂
Will check out the rest of your updates now…
Sincerely,
Leonardo “List Legend” LaVito
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