Guides on Content Marketing, SEO, & Agency Growth
SaaS Content Marketing
Driving traffic and sign-ups for SaaS companies with content and SEO.
How Intercom Built a $50MM ARR Empire Using Strategic Content Marketing and SEO
When it comes to building a startup, growth is king. Close second? Recurring revenue. Especially in the world of SaaS companies, having a steady stream of monthly and annual revenue is the hallmark of success. So, imagine building a business and scaling it to $50MM...
Content Marketing Secrets from Buffer’s Rise to 4 Million Users (And Beyond)
If you’ve been on Twitter at all in the last half decade, then you’ve likely heard of Buffer. The social media sharing and scheduling app has been a catalyst for a new paradigm in social media marketing. It allows users to find content or schedule messages to be...
Startup Content Marketing
Building a sustainable growth engine for bootstrapped and venture-backed startups.
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B2B Content Marketing
Using content marketing and SEO to drive demand and generate leads.
Content Marketing Secrets from Buffer’s Rise to 4 Million Users (And Beyond)
If you’ve been on Twitter at all in the last half decade, then you’ve likely heard of Buffer. The social media sharing and scheduling app has been a catalyst for a new paradigm in social media marketing. It allows users to find content or schedule messages to be...
Content & SEO
Articles, lessons, and takeaways on content marketing and SEO.
Strategic Content Marketing: A Recipe for Growth
Content marketing without a strategy is a lot like throwing spaghetti at a wall. (Stay with me here.) When you're cooking spaghetti, one way to tell if it's done is--supposedly--to simply fling the noodles at the wall. If the pasta doesn’t stick, it's said to need...
Content Marketing in 2021: The Low-Hanging Fruit Checklist
I’m going to pretend that I found myself running a SaaS company when I woke up this morning. Our goal in 2021 is to grow, hit slightly-ambitious targets, and put the wrecking ball that was 2020 far behind me. My constraints are that I have: A small budget. Maybe 1-2...
How Intercom Built a $50MM ARR Empire Using Strategic Content Marketing and SEO
When it comes to building a startup, growth is king. Close second? Recurring revenue. Especially in the world of SaaS companies, having a steady stream of monthly and annual revenue is the hallmark of success. So, imagine building a business and scaling it to $50MM...
The No-BS Guide to Crushing it at Search
Fair warning. This post is probably going to piss some people off. Here's why: SEO can be complicated as hell. There are a billion on-page and off-page factors. The algorithm is constantly changing. And everyone is jockeying for a little leg-up over their...
Let’s Talk About “Growth Hacking”
“Grow or die.” “Growth is all that matters.” “Growth, growth, growth, growth.” Everyone loves growth. I get it. But most people seem confused about how growth actually works. When you’re building a company, it can feel like you’re just one brilliant idea away from...
Content Marketing Strategy
Content marketing is tough. Often, companies think that it seems like the easiest strategy for growth. After all, all you have to do is write stuff and post it on your website--right? Of course, that’s an incredible simplification. Much, much more work and thought...
Agency Journal
Stories from our journey building a multi-million dollar content marketing agency from scratch.
Our Agency Sales Process is Broken (And How We’re Fixing It)
Every time I sit down to write one of these, it’s like a wrestling match with myself. How much should I include? Should I try to hide the ugly bits? Obviously, I want things to seem as great as possible. Anyone writing about the progress of their company wants to...
The Framework We Used to Generate $1.5MM in Sales Opportunities in Our First Year
One year ago, we launched Optimist. The vision was pretty straight-forward: A full-service content marketing agency that works with clients on a monthly retainer. Our goal is to grow it to $1.5 million annual run rate in 2018. In our first year, we made a pretty big...
How Intercom Built a $50MM ARR Empire Using Strategic Content Marketing and SEO
When it comes to building a startup, growth is king. Close second? Recurring revenue. Especially in the world of SaaS companies, having a steady stream of monthly and annual revenue is the hallmark of success. So, imagine building a business and scaling it to $50MM...
The No-BS Guide to Crushing it at Search
Fair warning. This post is probably going to piss some people off. Here's why: SEO can be complicated as hell. There are a billion on-page and off-page factors. The algorithm is constantly changing. And everyone is jockeying for a little leg-up over their...
Lessons Learned: Growing an Agency to Half a Million ARR in 1 Year
Wow. It’s been an entire year since we first launched Optimist and set out to build a million-dollar agency. We aren't quite there yet, but I'll be damned if we didn't have a great run in 2017. Back in December 2016, this thing was mostly a pipe dream. We had a bunch...
The Ups and Downs of Growing a Content Marketing Agency (Agency Journal, October 2017)
I almost didn't write this. Looking at our numbers, I wanted to wait until we hit our goals--or at least had a clear trajectory--before I published another article revealing what was happening behind the scenes. On top of that, I never felt like I had the time to...