{"id":4283,"date":"2015-03-06T10:43:33","date_gmt":"2015-03-06T16:43:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/blog\/?p=4283"},"modified":"2015-03-06T11:06:29","modified_gmt":"2015-03-06T17:06:29","slug":"150000-email-subscribers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/?p=4283","title":{"rendered":"Over 150,000 New Email Subscribers in 30 Days  (List Goal Update)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" data-src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/listgoal-ui_key_1A02E51C.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"395\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/listgoal-ui_key_1A02E51C.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"395\" \/><\/noscript><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s been 90 days since the last update on <a href=\"https:\/\/listgoal.com\" target=\"_blank\">List Goal<\/a>&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&#8230; and a lot has happened.<\/p>\n<p><strong>1.<\/strong> The\u00a0minimal viable version was completed.<\/p>\n<p><strong>2.<\/strong> \u00a0Three different developers were hired (and then fired).<\/p>\n<p><strong>3.<\/strong> The app completely crashed.<\/p>\n<p><strong>4.<\/strong> Then we found a good developer, fixed the app and did a soft launch to 100 beta users.<\/p>\n<p><strong>5.<\/strong> Over 150,000 new email subscribers have been added by the beta group.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s been a grind.<\/p>\n<p>But to see people actively growing their list as a result of using List Goal\u00a0has been incredibly fulfilling.<\/p>\n<p>Today I&#8217;m going to give you an in-depth look at the entire process, what I learned and how you can download a copy ASAP.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Note<\/strong>: Don&#8217;t worry if you&#8217;re late to the party and have no idea what List Goal is. I&#8217;ll get you up to speed.<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 612px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" data-src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/blog-graphs_key_1AA9FD41.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"612\" height=\"335\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/blog-graphs_key_1AA9FD41.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"612\" height=\"335\" \/><\/noscript><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The List Goal development process in one cute pic<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">What is List Goal and why should I care?<\/h2>\n<p>List Goal is an application that <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/blog\/have-more-fun\/\" target=\"_blank\">we started building<\/a> (as a community) in October of 2014.<\/p>\n<p>It helps you build your email list by focusing on list growth\u00a0and giving you a personal\u00a0road map on how to reach it.<\/p>\n<p>After 18 months of experimentation, I discovered that building a list was the most important thing\u00a0to growing my business.<\/p>\n<p>More so than traffic, Facebook likes, Twitter followers or comments on blog posts.<\/p>\n<p>Simply put&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Email\u00a0= Revenue.<\/p>\n<p>This is my revenue (by sales channel) breakdown for 2014.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" data-src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/blog-graphs_key_1AA9FCCE.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"719\" height=\"509\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/blog-graphs_key_1AA9FCCE.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"719\" height=\"509\" \/><\/noscript><\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s not that simple though.<\/p>\n<p>Recognizing that building a list is important and ACTUALLY building a list are two very different things.<\/p>\n<p>Growing a list is freaking hard. Especially when there are so many other things vying for your attention.<\/p>\n<p>Then last summer I found the solution.<\/p>\n<p>I took\u00a0a trip to Austin to visit\u00a0my friend Noah. He runs two successful companies (<a href=\"https:\/\/sumome.com\" target=\"_blank\">SumoMe<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/appsumo.com\" target=\"_blank\">AppSumo<\/a>) and he taught me the value of <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.kissmetrics.com\/how-dashboards-can-help\/\" target=\"_blank\">One Single Metric<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>He\u00a0used to have fancy dashboard that showed minute-by-minute progress of\u00a0\u00a0all of the companies&#8217; numbers (revenue, traffic, churn etc.). Then he realized\u00a0that by focusing on all of those numbers, they never made true meaningful progress towards any of their goals.<\/p>\n<p>So he simplified.<\/p>\n<p>He\u00a0blew up their fancy dashboard and created this&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" data-src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/Pasted_Image_3_6_15__9_33_AM_1AAA007A.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"520\" height=\"269\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/Pasted_Image_3_6_15__9_33_AM_1AAA007A.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"520\" height=\"269\" \/><\/noscript><\/p>\n<p>One number.<\/p>\n<p>3,333 customers.<\/p>\n<p>Every day they worked towards that goal.<\/p>\n<p>If a potential business opportunity came along, they all asked the same question&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Will this get us towards 3,333?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>If not, they ignored the opportunity.<\/p>\n<p>The result?<\/p>\n<p>They hit their goal in record time.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">List Goal is the accountability partner you always wish you had<\/h2>\n<p>List Goal will do for you what Noah&#8217;s simple dashboard did for AppSumo&#8217;s revenue growth.<\/p>\n<p>Once you install List Goal, every time you open a new tab in your browser you see this&#8230;<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 700px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" data-src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/New_Tab_1AAA019F.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"421\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/Skitch\/New_Tab_1AAA019F.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"700\" height=\"421\" \/><\/noscript><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">List Goal = Your Accountability Partner<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>This extremely simple dashboard keeps you focused by showing you your daily goal and your progress towards that goal.<\/p>\n<p>You also get coaching tips and gentle nudges sent to you that will guide you through HOW to grow your list.<\/p>\n<p>List Goal = Focus.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">What went wrong?<\/h2>\n<p>Now that we&#8217;re all caught up, let&#8217;s dive into what&#8217;s been going on over the past 90 days.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/blog\/list-goal-redesign\/\" target=\"_blank\">Last time we talked<\/a> about List Goal, I showed you a redesigned dashboard.<\/p>\n<p>Good news! That is live and working well.<\/p>\n<p>But plenty of stuff went wrong&#8230;<\/p>\n<h3>1. Three different developers were hired and fired.<\/h3>\n<p>This was by far the biggest headache of the entire process.<\/p>\n<p>I went through an extensive vetting process in the beginning and felt very confident in my choice.<\/p>\n<p>However, I should have taken even more time. There were red flags that I ignored in the hiring process that came back to bite me.<\/p>\n<p>The first developer finished the minimal viable version but was not a good personality fit. We just didn&#8217;t get along<\/p>\n<p>The second developer had worked for me previously. He had done a great job. Then he did a terrible job on this project. He missed the first 5 deadlines. I should have pulled the plug on him then. But I was patient. That was dumb.<\/p>\n<p>It cost me 45 days of development time. I knew better.<\/p>\n<p>However, by the third developer I had learned my lesson. I was very clear upfront about my expectations. Two days in, he missed his first deadline without communicating to me BEFORE the deadline.<\/p>\n<p>He was fired immediately.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Takeaway<\/strong>: Don&#8217;t get in a hurry when hiring. Unless you have to. In that case, fire quickly.<\/p>\n<h3>2. The entire app crashed.<\/h3>\n<p>One of the side effects of going through three different developers is\u00a0deciphering the work of the previous guy. Turns out that is hard.<\/p>\n<p>One unintended side effect of that is stuff breaks when you can&#8217;t quite make out what the previous guy did.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, this happened while 50 people were using the app. It was a beta version and people expect problems with an app at that stage, but it still sucks to ship broken stuff.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Takeaway<\/strong>: Communicate immediately when stuff breaks. Don&#8217;t let the posibility\u00a0of your crappy product breaking keep you from shipping. The only way to get from crappy to awesome is to break it more.<\/p>\n<h3>3. \u00a0It went way over budget.<\/h3>\n<p>My initial budget for the app was $500.<\/p>\n<p>We hit that. But then I wanted more.<\/p>\n<p>As the app evolved, I added features. I don&#8217;t regret that at all.<\/p>\n<p>However, I&#8217;ve spent considerably more on the app now than I ever anticipated.<\/p>\n<p>Total spent = $3,200. Still relatively cheap in the grand scheme of things. But 6x my original.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Takeaway<\/strong>: Know where to stop. Feature creep can easily eat into the budget of any project. Know your limit.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><\/h2>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">What went right?<\/h2>\n<p>Stuff goes wrong. That&#8217;s life.<\/p>\n<p>Focusing on that is annoying. I&#8217;ve always been an optimist. It just makes life better.<\/p>\n<p>So, let&#8217;s talk about what went well.<\/p>\n<h3>1. 120 people are using List Goal every day.<\/h3>\n<p>There is nothing quite like inventing something and then having real live humans using it.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m grateful that even one person has found value in it. But 120 people!? That&#8217;s fun. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<h3>2. 152,340 new subscribers have been added with List Goal.<\/h3>\n<p>My internal success metric for the app is how many new subscribers users are getting. At the end of the day, that is all that matters. That&#8217;s the true gauge of its effectiveness.<\/p>\n<p>And the initial results have been awesome!<\/p>\n<p>152,340 new subscribers have been added by 120 users of the app.<\/p>\n<h3>3. The app is ready for prime time.<\/h3>\n<p>I&#8217;m extremely happy with the app itself. I&#8217;ve tested\u00a0it extensively.<\/p>\n<p>Certainly, things will break as we add more users, but I&#8217;m proud of where it is right now.<\/p>\n<p>New features are being added every day.<\/p>\n<p>In fact, the entire <a href=\"https:\/\/trello.com\/b\/imfLm39o\/list-goal\" target=\"_blank\">Trello development board<\/a> is public.<\/p>\n<p>Go check it\u00a0out.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\">A look inside the app<\/h2>\n<p>Want to take a look inside the app?<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve recorded a sneak peak of the app just for you guys.<\/p>\n<p>At the end of the video is information on how you can download it before it&#8217;s released publicly.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/fast.wistia.net\/embed\/iframe\/ymbg3yrb1d?videoFoam=true\" allowtransparency=\"true\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" class=\"wistia_embed\" name=\"wistia_embed\" allowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen webkitallowfullscreen oallowfullscreen msallowfullscreen width=\"700\" height=\"394\"><\/iframe><script src=\"\/\/fast.wistia.net\/assets\/external\/E-v1.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s been 90 days since the last update on List Goal&#8230; &#8230; and a lot has happened. 1. The\u00a0minimal viable&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4283\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.growthtools.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}