Early stage founders usually think marketing in binary. They do an activity and expect 100 signups.

When they don’t get expected results, they feel bad. They even go to an extent of doubting their product.

So how do you solve for user growth?

TL;DR

It’s not a single strategy that gets you everything, it is a set of strategies.

Identify different ways to impress different set of people. Identify where they hang out. Chalk multiple strategies. Implement them.

In this article, I’m going to reveal Tamilpreneur’s growth plan that got us 3500 users.

But before that, let’s take a look at what we discussed in the previous article ‘Building your MVP’,

• How to figure out your core offering
• How to build a Minimum Viable product with minimum expenses
• How to test & get the product off ground.

Incase you missed, please read it here.

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Do you know your customers well?

Bottomline for your strategy is ‘get users’.

You can't decide anything for users without talking to them. I have spoken to more than 300+ users in just the first year of launching Club (2022).

The most important thing for any early-stage startup is to continuously be in touch with users.

Tamilpreneur hit 1000 paid users with Tamilpreneur Club within one year of launch. Today its 3500 plus. So, I’ll be providing a step by step guide while revealing the entire strategy of Tamilpreneur.

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For the uninitiated, Tamilpreneur Club is a networking platform for Tamil speaking entrepreneurs across the world.

Entrepreneurs can learn, build, and scale their startup while they network with fellow entrepreneurs in the Club.

We charge a yearly subscription fee of INR 999 and provide access to

• App based digital community to network

• Startup masterclasses to learn

• Fireside chats to interact with high profile entrepreneurs

Now, you know our core offering. Let’s find out the strategies we did to get to our people (target audience).

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GTM

A Go-to-market (GTM) strategy is a growth plan for you to get customers at scale.

In order for you to come up with a strategy, there needs to be learning.

Learning from interacting with users.

My article will go like this - A series of 8 points covering

• What did we learn?
• What did we implement
• The results

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Here you go,

Learning: Budding entrepreneurs look up to seasoned entrepreneurs.

GTM

• Onboarded 50+ high profile entrepreneurs to Tamilpreneur Club.
• Brought them for fireside chats.
• Enabled budding entrepreneurs to interact with them.
• Catch: Exclusive for Club members. So people signed up for Club.
• Results: 100+ signups.

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Learning: There's always a lot of doubt around VC, Funding, Pitch deck.

GTM

• Brought in VCs, Partners and initiated Startup Masterclass on these topics.
• Catch: One needs to be a club member to be a part of these discussions.
• Results: 100+ signups

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Learning: Content has been our strength since the inception.

GTM

• Event posters of our masterclass and fireside chat would have deeply researched and engaging content.
• Towards the end of the post, we would keep a CTA to join Tamilpreneur Club.
• Results: 100+ signups

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Learning: Early stage Entrepreneurs unwillingly spend a good chunk of money on tech tools/automation.

GTM

• We partnered with Zoho. AWS and offered startup credits.
• Total credits amount to INR 10 Lacs.
• People got a 1000x return on the INR 999 they invested.
• Results: 50+ signups
  
• (Earlier the credits were part of Club, but now part of club+)

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Learning: People consume content about startups, and entrepreneurship on Youtube/Instagram in Tamil.

GTM

• We partnered with 2-3 influencers on Youtube or Instagram that talks about entrepreneurship/startup in Tamil.
• Results: 50+ signups
  

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Learning: An online Community grows when there is word of mouth.

GTM

• A referral program that provides INR 100 off on Club Subscription when you ask your friends to join.
• Also, you get INR 100 back once your friend joins Tamilpreneur Club.
• Approx signups: 100+

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Learning: It's difficult to meet and network with fellow entrepreneurs.

GTM

• Organized offline networking events.
• Club members get the tickets for INR 99 whereas non-club member pay INR 299. Club is priced at INR 999.
• People bought Club Subscription to save money.
• Approx signups: 200+

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Learning: Focus is necessary right from the early stages of the startup journey.

There's no use in doing 10 different things for 10 different segments.

We tried our hands at services like pitch deck, and came across multiple ideas that sounded interesting.

But our North star metric was clear - Club subscriptions.

I shared 5+ learnings and how we implemented the strategies. So if you look at the pie chart now, it looks something like this.

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Finally,

Here’s the playbook

• Get the pain point of users by continuously interacting with them.
• Enable users to become a better version of themselves.
• Find out where your customers are hanging out. Position yourself there.
• Word of mouth will work if you give the best experience to users.
• Give users 1000x value for the amount they pay.
• Focus on doing one thing for a minimum of 6 months.

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Recommendation for GTM Channels

a. Influencer marketing: < 10 %
b. Content marketing: 20-30 %
c. Word of mouth / Referral: 30 %
d. Online / Offline Events: 20-30%
e. Meta / Google ads: < 10%

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This is what Tamilpreneur did that helped us to scale to 3500+ paid users. More about Tamilpreneur here.

Importantly, once users join your platform, ask them why they signed up and how did they hear about you?

Else you won’t be able to write a substack article like this 3 years later.

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