Hey! So during my Summer break, I was catching up with a dear student and friend, Janice CK. You might have come across her work around Notion.

We were chatting about our travel, business direction, bla bla bla and then one topic came up:

We both wanted to expand to new audiences.

Why? Because that's what you do when you feel like you've exhausted the reach of your current channel.

A few years ago, X (aka Twitter) was a thriving place. Lots of new people were getting on all eager to learn, interact, and buy. Lately, it can feel like it is always the same people (though this is not 100% true).

When things slow, you go look for a new way.

But here comes the problem. A big problem. Most people say:

"Oh yes, X is not working for me now, I'll try Threads."

"Yeah, X is not working for me, I'm exploring LinkedIn."

I noticed the discussion around expanding to new audiences is always centered around which social media platform to try next.

Damn. Everyone is sucked into this social media game and cannot think of anything else.

Well, a big part of my growth in the last few years was definitely related to the community I've built on Twitter, but it wasn't the only thing that worked.

Then a recent memory hit me.

Just a week before the call with Janice, I met up in-person with a friend who is the CEO of a content x AI company with about 80 employees. I went to him to chat about being a dad (ha!) but of course, we ended up also talking about business.

This is what he said about how they do new projects:

"We don't do organic content. We don't build a personality. These things take too long. We have a team here, so we prototype, find ways to shoot traffic there (e.g. our existing traffic or ads) and test."

"If it works, we double down!"

Boom ... right there. I saw the dots connecting! Are you seeing it too?

Let me give you a few more seconds to digest this.

Okay, first thing first, as creators, you and I cannot just copy and paste an 80-pax company's approach. We don't have the resources!

But there is a key message hidden inside what this CEO said.

Let's rewind a little.

99% of creators, when they want to reach new audiences, they would choose to explore a new social media platform. They create a bunch more content and then wait. And wait. And wait for people to come in.

The 1% of creators who are adopting a CEO mindset would be proactive. They package up their best expertise as assets. They go to where "new audiences" hang out. They let people discover their assets and learn about their work. They measure if it is working well or not.

In simple terms, they are finding traffic. They don't wait for traffic.

Now you might wonder — what kind of assets?

I actually tried a few different ways in the past:

1. I started my creator journey with a free Build in Public guide. When I wanted to meet more creator-educators, I joined the Maven Course Accelerator. I didn't pitch them to read my guide (very important). Instead, I made a short video (asset) sharing with these Maven instructors how they could attract students by building the course in public.
2. Last month, I wanted to test out my local market. I found a local community and cohosted a creator dinner. It was a blast and I met so so many creators in one night. Some of them are interested in my journey so I shared my $100k case study with them (asset).
3. Here's my favorite and most scalable way: I created a free email course (asset) with a narrow problem but a mass appeal. Since it is free, it is a no-brainer heck yes for so many people once they see it. I can then go to other digital communities and creators and gently share it with them. I can also do cross-promo and grow my email list.

An awesome free email course is almost like your business card. You can go around and find opportunities to give it out to reach new audiences.

The crazy thing is that a lot of people only see it as a "freebie" or "lead magnet" so they slap together an opt-in page which obviously feels like they just want the email addresses. Of course the opt-in rate is low. What a missing opportunity!

Another big part of my growth came from me approaching this differently. My free email course looks like a product of its own, and people want to tell their friends after taking it, creating organic growth (or you can say virality).

Reader, would you want to create this business card-like asset so you can use it to reach new audiences and grow your email list quickly?

​If it is a yes, click here.​

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Cheers,
Kevon

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