Today our guests are Benji Hyam and Devesh Khanal from Grow & Convert. Grow & Convert documents the journey of Benji and Devesh taking the site from 0 to 40,000 unique visitors a month using content marketing. The plan is to accomplish this in six months.

They met at a Growth Chat dinner put on by Sujan Patel in San Francisco. They both arrived early and started talking about content marketing. Devesh challenged Benji to build a blog with his content marketing methods instead of writing or talking about it. They decided to share the journey, and Grow & Convert was born.

Benji thinks their blog and the growth has been so successful because they have different skill sets that complement each other. When they were choosing their goal they wanted an impressive number, and that is how they decided on the 40,000 unique visitors. Showing actual growth through content marketing with a content marketing blog seemed like a great way to showcase their skills.

Because the site is on a brand new domain, they don’t have a lot of domain authority, so instead of relying on SEO they rely on each of them and a guest to post on the site each week. That’s three posts a week. They also hope to use the power of social media and giveaways to attract visitors. They are also hoping a free software product they have been working on will go viral.

What They Have Done So Far

  • An initial opinion post by Benji
  • Focussing on really in-depth studies and case studies
  • 2000-3000 word step-by-step articles
  • Tapping into communities that already exist (Facebook, LinkedIn, GrowthHackers, Inbound.org, etc.)
  • Built their own email list
  • Networked with influencers
  • Guesting on podcasts for extra exposure
  • They feel that there content is the key – very specific case study content
  • They are also always on the lookout for places marketers are not already on
  • Sharing case-study content where your target audience hangs out
  • They have gotten links and traffic from their hiring content writers series

Systems and Processes for Content Planning

  • Many ideas come from pain points that Benji has already experienced
  • His experience at Thinkapps helped him know and understand content marketing challenges
  • Devesh writes an outline
  • Then he talks about each bullet point in Evernote
  • By talking he doesn’t get bogged down with grammar etc. more topics and bullet points also emerge during this process
  • Benji just starts because most of his content is from experience and doesn’t require a lot of research
  • They write about the experience of their tests and readers pain points
  • Time is always a problem, but they are motivated by the challenge they have made

Devesh feels focusing on one goal is what makes the difference. Their singular focus has been extremely helpful. If what they are doing doesn’t help them meet their goal, they don’t do it.

Benji also spends a lot of time promoting the content he has written. He has a network of marketers that he shares and promotes content with. He tries to be helpful and build relationships to help with the promotion process. When it comes to outreach, personalization goes a long way.

Our Takeaways

  • Build an audience and a way to serve and the money can come later
  • Having one goal and a singular focus on traffic is interesting
  • They are super self-aware that building the audience is their goal

Resources Mentioned:

Stay Connected:

  • If you’d like to take your entrepreneurial journey to a whole new level, join fellow “scalers” on the inside by joining the Zero to Scale Insiders program. For just $19/mo you get access to Justin and Greg and several other like-minded entrepreneurs who want to help you succeed in your journey!
  • Be sure to join our free Facebook group for continuous discussion and let us know your thoughts on today’s podcast.  
  • We’d love to get a 5 star rating on iTunes from you. We don’t plan on asking for this in the episodes themselves since most people are doing other things when they’re listening, but we’d love if you left one for us. :)