The Weekly Grind (40th Edition)
Every week, I send a newsletter with useful resources and strategies for growing a business. For the first time, I’m publishing one of those newsletters online. If you like it, subscribe here 🙂
Hey!
Here’s what I’ve got for you this week…
📈 How to Design a Product that can Grow Itself 10x in Year 📈
I found another gem of a Twitter thread, this time from the founder of Unsplash, and it’s really a masterclass in simplicity.
My favorite part of this idea:
“The first version of @unsplash was made in 3 hours with $38, @dropbox, & @tumblr.”
Starting a business can be way simpler than you think.
Read the whole Twitter thread.
🚀 How We Grew from 0 to 50,000 Users in a Few Months with no Marking Budget and no Growth Experience 🚀
I love seeing the creativity entrepreneurs use to grow their businesses and this example from the team at VEED is a gold.
The main takeaway I had?
Create landing pages optimized for the niche searches your customers would make, then send traffic through answering questions on Quora, getting on Product Hunt, promoting through social media — all while you’re landing pages accumulate traffic through organic search.
The whole article was really insightful, read it all here.
😎 4 Cool Companies I’ve Recently Discovered 😎
Stackin’ — Texts that send personalized money advice. (Money tips you’ll actually understand)
Lunch Club — Smart introductions to relevant people . Curated 1:1 professional connections.
Supercast — As someone who is interested in podcast monetization, hearing about Supercast, a way to get paid to podcast, was exciting to me. They’re essentially trying to make it easy for podcasters to use a subscription model with their show. I’ll be looking into the company more, but it’s intriguing to say the least.
Dope Coffee — “We came here to show the world that premium coffee and Black culture go hand in hand.” There are so many incredible companies built by minority founders — this is one that’s doing some great things in the coffee biz.
💻 2 Useful Ecommerce Websites 💻
UnicornAds — Spy the top 1% of ecommerce ads . View the FB/IG ads from the top 1,000 Shopify Stores (that run online ads) 🦄
eCommerceRanker — View the top 100 shopify stores with 23+ relevant ecommerce data points.
🎤 New Just Go Grind Podcast Episode 🎤
Chris and Nicholas are the founders of www.WithClutch.com. The two met at Stanford Business School in 2011 and started their first company, Carlypso, in 2013. After going through YCombinator and raising $10M in venture funding, Chris and Nicholas sold Carlypso to Carvana in 2017. Their new business, WithClutch, allows car owners to calculate savings and refinance their loans from the comfort of their home.
Chris is a huge car enthusiast. He went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for undergrad, joined McKinsey & Company out of college and worked at McLaren in the UK before graduating from Stanford.
Nicholas used to be an avid golfer, playing on Germany’s national team for four years. After finishing his master’s degree in Germany, he worked at Bain & Company and Merrill Lynch before he moved to the U.S. in 2011.
📚 Stuff Worth Reading 📚
How to Land a Job During COVID-19: A Handbook
50+ Black-Owned Fashion Brands and Stores to Support Now and Always
30 Black-Owned Food and Drink Businesses to Support Now, and Always
❓ A Big Ask ❓
I’m looking to feature founders of venture-backed companies on the Just Go Grind Podcast — Could you recommend someone to me?
Have a great weekend and stay safe!
Best,
Justin Gordon
P.S. Who am I? I’m the founder of Just Go Grind, host of the Just Go Grind Podcast, Platform Lead at CoEfficient Labs, and want to help a billion people in my lifetime.
Connect with me on LinkedIn, Instagram or Twitter.
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