🚀 This Week's Growth Hack:

What’s Your ‘Dark Social’ Strategy?

First a story, then the Growth Hack…

In 2019, I took a shot on a $200/month SEO service for my ad agency. It seemed too good to be true: multiple long blog articles a week + backlinks completely, hands off for $200/mo, amazing! But… no testimonials on their site, no social proof. I gave them a shot anyway, and guess what? In just 60 days, they had me ranking on the first page of Google for keywords other agencies said would take me a year to crack.

Turns out they have been using AI to cut the cost of SEO services by a mile since before any of us knew the word ChatGPT.

So naturally, I told everyone I knew about ranked, and they started getting crazy results too. Even my bookkeeper (who’s still my bookkeeper to this day) saw a meaningful amount of new client requests from their SEO work and still wears by them to this day! But when I sold the agency, the new owner let them go to cut costs. I moved on, forgot about them, and focused on other things.

Fast forward to ~nine months ago, when one of my Fractional CMO clients needed an affordable SEO service. I immediately remembered ranked, and once again, they delivered great results.

So, I reached out and asked if they wanted to sponsor my newsletter. They said yes, and in the 30 days of running ads for them in my newsletter, 100 of you signed up with them. Week after week, we ran more ads for them, but then something interesting happened… I started getting emails asking: “Are these guys legit? Their site has almost no case studies!”

Every time, I’d reply, “Yes! I’ve been a customer since 2019. They’re legit!” and then I would share this photo, which I recently started tweeting. So…

… after two months of repeating myself, I reached out to the owner and practically begged him to add testimonials to his website. Solely because I didn’t wanna respond to all these people, his website should be taking care of that.

Then, he told me he’d been too busy growing to bother with that. I guess he didn't need to add proof, but imagine how many more customers he’d have if he just posted a bunch more success stories!

💡 My Point: A simple afternoon project could be adding tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of dollars in revenue. Since our convo, he now has 6 on there… but come on! For any business, but especially one that sounds too good to be true, you need to back it up with PROOF.

So, this week’s Growth Hack is simple:

Collect & add MORE testimonials and case studies to your website.

Why? Because of something called dark social… those private Facebook groups, Slack communities, and closed-door conversations where people ask, “Has anyone used this company? Are they legit?” That’s what everyone is doing me asking if ranked is legit.

You can’t track dark social directly, but you can control how you’re perceived when people are talking about you. The best way to beat the skepticism of dark social?

👉🏼 Overwhelm them with proof. It’s why I tell everyone starting a new agency to work for free at first if they have to, just to get those case studies, testimonials, and proof of success. Because when someone sees 10 glowing testimonials about how you crushed it, they’re a lot less likely to ask “Are these guys legit?” and a lot more likely to hit “Buy Now.”

Take it from me: Proof always beats a catchy tagline!

So this week, ask yourself:

👉 Do you have enough proof on your site?
👉 Are you making it easy for people to find the proof?
👉 If someone posted in a Slack group asking if your company’s the real deal, what would people say?

Go build that mountain of proof. Your future customers will thank you for it.

& yes, ranked is legit!

Till next time, my fellow Growth Hacker ✌🏼

-Max

💕 Looking for more?

1. 🙏🏼 Need more leads? I’m currently helping 40+ B2B brands generate dozens of qualified leads a week thanks to my unique lead gen funnel that writes you a weekly newsletter, grows your list, & uses my secret sauces to turn your new subscribers into leads/customers. See if you are a fit here →

2. Easily search & filter all 100+ Growth Marketing Hacks ever shared in this newsletter, get access to my 6-hour crash course on Growth Marketing, leverage my viral TikTok & Twitter hooks, and so much more, with a 5-Day Free Trial of Growth Hacks University here

   ​

3. Get In Front Of My Audience - With more than 100,000+ newsletter subscribers, 75k+ Tik Tok followers, & 55k+ Twitter followers, my team & I work with dozens of partners in unique ways to help them grow! Interested in a partnership, tap here.

4. Want to find the best marketing agency for your brand and budget, in 60 seconds? Look no further than my new site agencyreviews.io 

That’s it for this week!

Talk soon,
Marketing Max
​Find me on Twitter​
​Find me on Tik Tok​
​Find me on Instagram​

Thanks for being a part of my journey :)

*Most links above are either a paid promo or Growth Daily LLC owns a % of the advertising company or Growth Daily LLC gets a commission if you sign up for their product or service. You can read our privacy policy at any time here. That’s how we keep this newsletter free 🙂 

(Do not click this link, it’s to catch bot clicks here)