How Chenell Got 11k Subs in 6 Months

Summary

Podcast Summary: Growth In Reverse — How Chenell Got 11k Subs in 6 Months

Hosts: Chenell Basilio & Dylan Redekop
Date: August 20, 2025
Episode Theme: Chenell reverse engineers the exact strategies, habits, and mindsets she used to grow her newsletter from 0 to 11,000 subscribers in just six months—revealing valuable, replicable tactics for any newsletter creator.

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Episode Overview

This episode is a deep-dive case study into the precise steps Chenell took to achieve rapid newsletter growth. The conversation candidly breaks down her early experiments, wins, missteps, and steady building of momentum—primarily via Twitter (now X)—while underscoring the importance of consistency, community engagement, and building valuable relationships. Along the way, practical frameworks and actionable social growth strategies unfold, all contextualized with honest stories and plenty of real numbers.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Rewinding the Journey: How It Started

• Chenell confesses she barely remembered how her newsletter grew so quickly, so she "reverse-engineered her own growth" by tracing back stats and anecdotes. (00:00, 00:40)
• Launch: First newsletter sent December 4, 2022.
• She emphasizes that her journey, using Twitter as the main case study, is replicable across social platforms.

Notable quote:

"People always say, 'I just started, I can't get traction.' So I'm just going to give you what I did, and you can follow the same playbook."
— Chenell, [01:15]

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2. Early Self-Doubt, Persistence & First Small Wins

• First Three Subscribers (04:35): Got by commenting informatively on a tweet from Codie Sanchez. Jay Clouse noticed and subscribed—first proof that considered engagement works.
  • Chenell revamped her Twitter profile entirely around her newsletter, Growth In Reverse, before engaging, to ensure curiosity led to conversions.
• Audience Building Starts Before Launch (05:25): First email went to 3 people—but it was enough to get hooked.
• Learning Curve: Initial thread about Mario Gabrielli got 42 likes, but follow-up threads tanked (2 likes, etc.). She shares candidly about her emotional swings and doubts in the early days.

Notable quote:

"That first email, my first deep-dive, went out to three people... But from there, I just started following what I was seeing creators do."
— Chenell, [05:35]

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3. Execution Tactics: Engagement, Threads & Hooks

• Platform Focus: Twitter was chosen for its creator community, but tactics work elsewhere. (03:09)
• Content Focus: She mimicked how popular creators (e.g., Mario Gabrielli) promoted through threads, and worked hard on “hooks”—the first two lines of any post or email. (06:06)
• Engagement Routine: Heavy daily commenting (10–20+ replies/day), particularly on posts from other creators. This embedded her in relevant circles and attracted organic interest. (16:55–17:17)
• Admits “replying was a huge part of [her] growth,” even if she now chuckles at how much time it took.
• Visibility Tactics: Used teaser posts the day before newsletter release, modeled directly on Justin Welsh’s approach. (11:10)

Notable quote:

"I was such a degenerate back then… 10 to 20+ replies a day."
— Chenell, [16:37]

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4. Momentum via Community & Social Proof

• Key Early Boost: Jay Clouse shared Growth In Reverse in his newsletter, doubling Chenell’s list (from ~27 to 60+ subs, [09:16–10:28]).
  • She joined Jay’s paid community first—relationships came before any ask.
• External Endorsements:
  • Ann Lore (first interviewee) amplified her reach with a quote post.
  • Ethan Brooks (of The Hustle) retweeted her thread and gave her a serendipitous podcast shoutout, which sent more traffic.

Notable quote:

"It started with one Twitter comment... That was where he noticed I was writing this."
— Chenell, [10:28]

Notable quote:

"I stumbled across this woman, Chenell. She's so cool. What she's been doing is these really deep breakdowns on creators..."
— Sam, quoting Ethan Brooks, [14:05]

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5. The Inflection Point & The Grind

• Slow Start, Then Spike: Meaningful acceleration happened after roughly two months: hit 1,000 “real” subscribers by early February 2023.
• Persistence Despite Low Numbers: For weeks, tweets got 1–2 likes; replies got almost nothing. But she was consistent and leveraged every bit of positive feedback.
• Relationship-First Growth: Being an active, genuine presence led to shares, introductions, and gradual compounding.
• Track & Thank Referral Traffic: Used Sparkloop’s UTM codes to see where subs came from, then individually thanked everyone who mentioned her newsletter, lending further goodwill.

Notable quote:

"You can’t post and ghost."
— Chenell, [20:46]

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6. Social vs. Non-Social Growth Paths

• They explicitly acknowledge that social is NOT the only way—offline outreach, cross-promotions, and partnerships work too.
  • Social is just faster, thanks to algorithms and the visibility flywheel.
• Caveat: If you dislike social media, non-social growth is valid, but will typically “take longer.” (25:53)
• Paid Ads Warning: Paid ads are not a shortcut; need audience-content fit first.

Notable quote:

"None of these strategies are plug and play... you have to do the work, engage, and grow."
— Sam, [24:34]

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7. Actionable Wrap-Up: Tips & Mindset

• Key Takeaways:
  • Build relationships and be social on social media.
  • Engage before launching—not after.
  • Structure profile & banners for conversion.
  • Consistency > short-term hacks: “You have to start somewhere, and you’ll never know if you could be that case study in six months.” (36:35)
• Social Growth Challenge: The hosts announced a 30-day open challenge to help people kickstart similar growth, regardless of platform (LinkedIn, Twitter, Substack, etc.), favoring support, accountability, and “roast my post” live feedback (27:49–30:48).
• Tools: New "Hook Helper" GPT tool to help with writing better hooks, free to challenge participants. (37:21)
• Prizes: Leaderboards and incentives to keep motivation high.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Relentless Early Engagement:

  "I was such a degenerate back then. 10–20+ replies a day..."
  — Chenell ([16:37])

• On Social Proof from Creators:

  "Jay Clouse shared it in his newsletter... I just doubled my list."
  — Chenell ([10:26])

• On Persistence Despite Flops:

  "I just want to share these examples to let people know it's okay, you're going to have very low engagement in the beginning."
  — Chenell ([08:35])

• On Relationships:

  "The value of being social on social media—it's not just about follower count or email subscribers... It's also finding people you like and building those relationships."
  — Chenell ([23:43])

• On Mindset:

  "Consistency over short-term hacks: you have to start somewhere—and you’ll never know if you could be that case study in six months."
  — Sam ([36:35])

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Timestamps of Major Segments

• 00:00–03:51: Introduction, setting context, launching Growth In Reverse
• 03:51–06:16: Early wins, building relationships, first threads & comments
• 08:16–11:22: Experimenting, emotional ups and downs, teaser posts, refining approach
• 12:12–15:43: Leveraging Jay Clouse’s community, the compounding effect of authentic engagement
• 17:17–19:26: Daily engagement routines, automation, and inflection point analytics
• 20:46–24:34: Post-and-ghost vs. authentic participation; long-term mindset
• 25:53–27:07: The social/non-social growth debate, paid ads, foundational skills
• 27:49–34:57: Announcement of the Growth In Reverse 30-Day Social Growth Challenge
• 35:26–38:10: Challenge logistics, the Hook Helper, encouraging new growth stories

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Takeaways for Newsletter Creators

• Newsletter traction often begins with persistent engagement before you have any measurable “traction.”
• Social growth is a compounding function of:
  • Meaningful comments and replies in your niche
  • Memorable content hooks
  • Community building and active relationships
  • Proactive gratitude for every share and referral
• Consistency and resilience in the face of silence or low engagement are non-negotiable.
• Social isn’t the only path—but it’s a force multiplier if done with authenticity and patience.
• Growth is slower without a social strategy, but possible; choose the route for your strengths, but expect to do the work.

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Whether you’re launching your first newsletter or refining your growth flywheel, Chenell’s story offers a replicable playbook—layering content quality, social capital, and relentless relationship-building to achieve standout growth.

For those looking to apply these strategies in real time, the hosts actively encourage joining their September Social Growth Challenge—to build “your foundation” the same way Chenell did.

Transcript

[Chanel]

I actually grew my newsletter to 11,000 subscribers in six months. And so I was like, okay, let me reverse engineer how I did that, because I don't even remember anymore.

[Sam]

You're growth and reversing yourself.

[Chanel]

I think there is a strategy in a world where you could post one time a week and just comment every other day and like, still grow your.

[Sam]

Following, engage with people, answer questions, reply to posts, be helpful. If you're not a really social person and you don't want to engage with people on social media, then there's ways to grow your newsletter without it.

[Chanel]

But it's going to take longer.

[Sam]

Yes, yes. Let's find out what Chanel did to go from 0 to 11,000 subscribers in six months.

[Chanel]

People always ask about how to kickstart a newsletter, get to a thousand subscribers, ten thousand subscribers. And so recently I was kind of digging back into my stats and looking at, like, my growth and just kind of seeing what the journey looked like because it's been three years now almost. I was curious and I realized that I actually grew my newsletter to 11,000 subscribers in six months. And so I was like, okay, let me remember reverse engineer how I did that, because I don't even remember anymore. So today we're going to kind of share some behind the scenes, going back into the data and seeing what worked and how you can do the same.

[Sam]

Your growth and reversing yourself is basically what you're. You're doing here, at least the first.

[Chanel]

Six months, which is like the most fun part anyway, because people always say, like, oh, I just started. Like, I can't, you know, I can't get traction. I can't figure out how to grow. And so I'm just going to give you kind of what I did, and you can follow the same things, same playbook.

[Sam]

And should we caveat this by saying, like, you're publishing really great content. People know that by now.

[Chanel]

Yeah, we'll share that too.

[Sam]

But it wasn't just by virtue of you just hitting publish on a quality deep dive that you grew. It helped. But there's other aspects which we'll dive into.

[Chanel]

Yes, totally. So, of course, as with, everything starts with insanely valuable content. And then you can go ahead and use some of these tactics as well. But I do think along, like, in the beginning, you don't know what that content's going to look like, what your readers enjoy. So sometimes you just kind of have to play and see what happens. Play around, see what people enjoy reading, what's working for you. But over time, you should Be aiming towards narrowing that content format and everything for your audience.

[Sam]

And did you, when you first started, not to make this about. What was it like when you started, but did you know this was like, as soon as you hit publish on that first edition, you're like, I'm going to do more of these. Or was it like, I'm just going to see how this one lands? Or what was your. Like when you were playing around with how you were structuring your newsletter? What was your initial idea?

[Chanel]

Yeah, I think the first one, when I was writing it, I was like, I don't know if I'm ever doing this again, because I spent. I think I spent, like, a good 55, 60 hours on that. And I only started, like, capturing the time. I was the time that it was taking, like, a little bit into the process because I was like, I should probably keep track of this. But. So it was very long. And I was like, there's no way I could do this every week. Whatever. But after I got, like, my first three subscribers and, like, sent that first email, I was hooked. I was like, I'm totally doing this again. Let's go. This is fun. So for context, just to give people dates. So I published and sent my first email on December 4th. So summer 4th, 2022.

[Sam]

Okay.

[Chanel]

Um, I kind of like. So we're going to talk about Twitter, necessarily, because this is where I started growing. However, before you click away, this is replicable on any social platform, I believe today. Similar tactics, similar ways you can do things. The underlying strategy still works. I think we're going to test it out. But so, yeah, so I think that this is just like we're using Twitter as the example, but you could replicate this on other places.

[Sam]

Yeah, we're going to dive through what you did on, specifically on Twitter that grew your newsletter. So I think we should dive in. Let's. Let's. Let's find out what Chanel did to go from 0 to 11,000 subscribers in six months. Dun, dun, dun.

[Chanel]

Oh, my gosh. Okay. The way I got my first three subscribers was I commented on Cody Sanchez's tweet, and she had said something to the effect of, like, who runs the best community out there? And I was in JCLASS's community, so I naturally commented, and I was like, jay Claus, this is awesome. Here's why. Gave a couple reasons. It wasn't just like a short comment. It was, like, informative. Right before I had started commenting on these people's tweets, I changed my Twitter profile to only be About Growth in Reverse. I removed everything else. Um, Twitter was not something that, like, my personal friends or, like, people knew about that I had, like, that account, so it was fine to, like, keep it on the DL. Like, nobody had to know.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Chanel]

Uh, as an introvert, I am not someone who likes to talk about things I'm doing. So I changed, like, my profile picture. I changed the link to go directly to Growth in Reverse dot com. I made the. The profile banner, like, about growing a newsletter. Everything was all growth in reverse. So Jay clicked over, and he's like, growth in reverse. He's like, I didn't know you were doing that. And he subscribed, and he was my first subscriber. And I was like, whoa, okay, this works, like, because at the time, I had, like, notifications turned on where you get an email when you get a subscriber. And so I saw three come in that day, and I was like, oh, my gosh. I think I showed my wife, and I was like, look at this. I have three subscribers. And she was like, cool. Like, what does that mean? So that kind of got me hooked. That was in. I think that was, like, November 30th. I didn't pull that one up. I was just looking at my own posts. But.

[Sam]

So you got three subscribers before you had published your first edition kind of thing.

[Chanel]

Yeah.

[Sam]

And Jay was one of them.

[Chanel]

Jay was one of them. Then I think it was. Was it Paul?

[Sam]

Okay. Yeah.

[Chanel]

I don't know. I'd have to go back.

[Sam]

He's that a guy.

[Chanel]

And so I was like, oh, man, this is so cool. So that first email, my first deep dive, went out to three people, which, like, cool. That's, like, super small audience. But from there, I just started finding following kind of what I was seeing creators do. So I wrote that deep dive on Mario Gabrielli, and he was writing threads. So I was like, okay, I'm gonna write a thread. So I wrote a thread on December 6th. So this is two days after I sent the first email. At the time, I was like, following how people were writing hooks. Like, I think this was my. My leverage here was, like, getting really good at figuring out, like, the first and second line of a social post and pretty much any content. You need a hook to keep people reading. Right. So it says, like, over $300,000 from 60K subscribers, question mark. And then I said, that's what Mario Gabrielli built with the generalist. And I said, and those are conservative numbers. Here's how he did it. And then the next tweet Was like the thread, Right. So that first one, which was pretty good hook, although I made some mistakes, but it was pretty good for my first one, it got 42 likes. Now, I'm going to just stop here because this number is not representative of my Twitter engagement. This is, like, outsized returns, and I have to wonder if people have gone back over time and liked it. Post me sharing it initially, because I don't remember getting this much.

[Sam]

I was gonna say, do you remember how many followers you had at that time?

[Chanel]

Well, so that's interesting too, because I think so. I. I had this Twitter profile since, like, 20 2009, but I. I was just doing like. Like back in the day, you would put. Put, like, your content into buffer and it would automatically, like, just share articles and you never engaged. You never did anything. And then I was playing like the follow for follow game way back in the day. So I think I had like 8,000 followers, but none of them were real. Like, maybe 100 were. Were real.

[Sam]

Okay.

[Chanel]

So if you go to, like, any of the Twitter stat tools, you can see, like, my follower account just, like, kept going down because people would, like, it was bots or whatever.

[Sam]

They're getting deleted. The accounts were. Yeah, yeah.

[Chanel]

So I don't know how many followers I had. That's a good question. It's. I would estimate very, very low. Real people. And so I. I remember publishing this and nothing happened. And I was like, oh, no. And I went. And I, like, walked around and I like, I was like, I have to come back later. And then I like, keep checking my phone. Nothing, nothing, nothing. I was like, I don't think this is going to work for me. Like, I'm just not good at this stuff. But then I remember, like, three or four hours later, like, Mario liked it. Or maybe did he comment? He might have commented. He did not comment. He just liked it. And I was like, okay, well, that's a signal. That's pretty cool. Like, it didn't really do anything for engagement, but the fact that the creator saw it is awesome.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Chanel]

So I was like, okay, maybe I'll just keep going. So I would reply a lot on Twitter. That was like, my strategy. But the next post I did was December 16th, so that's like 10 days later.

[Sam]

Right.

[Chanel]

And it was another thread about the next deep dive I had done on Nathan Baugh. That one got two likes was even worse.

[Sam]

This is not the right direction.

[Chanel]

This is not the right direction. But I just want to share, like, these examples to like, let people know it's okay, like, you're going. You're going to have very low engagement in the beginning.

[Sam]

And so if you had just called it quits after the nathan baugh post, 2 likes. It's kind of, you know, wah, wah, wah, wah, not very great. Then there would be no growth in reverse. There would have been two articles ever. But you persisted. And what kept you going? Like, why after those two posts? What did. Where did we go from there? What kept you going?

[Chanel]

I think I joined a course about Twitter from. Wait, I'm gonna have to go back and find this receipt. Hold on. I forgot about this until this exact moment. It was like a hundred dollar course. Maybe Dagober. What was his name?

[Sam]

Oh, yeah, Dagobert Renouf.

[Chanel]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So I bought his course. Like, I think it was. I think it was in December of 2022. I think it was the first month I started. Cause I was like, clearly I don't understand Twitter. What am I doing? Um, so I started going through that. And so seeing someone else explain how to do these things or just like being in, like, the room with other people doing this, I was like, okay, I can test this, play around, see what happens. So I think that's why I kept going. Okay, okay, so December 17th. Yeah, I had. I'm trying to go back to my subscriber count just so I could give you, like, context. I had 27 subscribers, so that's pretty good, actually. I think that people were sharing it. And I didn't realize this. I was like, oh. Because every day I'm like, one subscriber, two subscribers. And then after that, Jay Clouse shared it in his newsletter. I think Jay shared it, like, December 20th or 21st, because he had seen. He had subscribed, and he had gotten two posts. And he was like, this is really good. You're writing really good stuff. And he's like, a nice guy. So he shared, you know, a call out, like, hey, check out this new newsletter. I think it got me like 40 extra subscribers. And I was like, this is awesome. This is crazy. I just, like doubled my list.

[Sam]

The addiction has begun.

[Chanel]

Yes, the addiction has begun. But it started with one Twitter comment. Like, that's where he noticed that I was. Because I didn't tell him I was writing this. I didn't want to tell anyone, right? So I was scared.

[Sam]

Not even anyone in the lab. Community. Jay's community?

[Chanel]

No, no. December 16th, I wrote the Nathan Baugh. December 17th, I wrote my first ever teaser post. Now, if you don't know what a teaser Post is, I totally stole this from Justin Welsh. He was essentially, the day before his newsletter went out, he would write on Twitter and say something, some hooky phrase, and then be like, I'm explaining why or how or whatever. The thing is, tomorrow, my newsletter. So for this one, I wrote 6,000 email subscribers in just a hundred days. Question mark tomorrow, my subscribers are getting the roadmap about a creator that did exactly that. If you want me to send it to you, sign [e-mail] and that got seven likes.

[Sam]

Okay. How many subscribers? I guess you don't know.

[Chanel]

Eh, I don't know.

[Sam]

Okay.

[Chanel]

But I wasn't really growing too fast at that point.

[Sam]

So I think what I'm seeing here is like, you believed in the content you were getting in front of the right people. Like, Jay Close is the right kind of person to get your content in front of. And you didn't do it in like a. You didn't like, ask his, ask him to share it. He just. You were in his lab, you had the foundation in place where you had created your profile to all point towards your newsletter so any traffic that came to you would realize it and go subscribe. And despite your numbers, I think it's so far, it was like your first thread was the best one, and then it kind of went downhill from there for a bit, but you kept with it, you stuck with it because I think you just knew that this was like going to pay off at some point. Right?

[Chanel]

Yeah. I think something to call out here is like, it wasn't just that Jay randomly found my post, like I had joined his community. So he was probably, he probably felt indebted in a way of like, hey, she's in my community. I want her to succeed. Let me see what she's doing.

[Sam]

Well, would you do that for your own community members? I think you, I think that's totally exactly right. So you, you can relate to that.

[Chanel]

Yeah. And so I just want to call that out because I think we kind of glossed over the fact of like, I always talk about relationships and community, but this is like a clear way that this is an impactful, not for growth, but just like, I don't know, start getting yourself in front of people and like sharing your work and like getting feedback and that kind of thing. So I just wanted to double tap on that one.

[Sam]

Yeah, that's a very good point.

[Chanel]

So that was December 17th, was my first teaser. I don't think I wrote a thread that week. I did not write a thread that week. That's fun. What I did do instead was I made a post from one of Ann Lore Lacombe. So she was my third deep dive, who we've interviewed on this podcast. And Lore, Yes. So I made a quote image. It was just like a white background with black text that says, you can't become a better writer by thinking or reading about writing. Embrace the cringe. It's a sign of personal growth. And then I tagged her in that image, and that tweet got 24 likes. I actually had stolen that from a guy named Danny Miranda was on Twitter at the time, and I loved his podcast. And I was like, oh, cool. So I made this and then I sent it to him because I was like, taking quick action or whatever because he had done the same thing. And I was like, I'm just gonna try this. So he commented and said, oh, this is cool. Um, and then. So we're still within a month. So December 26th of 2022 was when Ethan Brooks tweeted at me. Actually, I don't even think he tagged me. Oh, he reposted. This is why my Mario Gabrielli thread got 46. Like, he reposted that thread that was like 20 days old at this point and said, wow, just came across Chanel's work and it's so good. And then he linked to it and.

[Sam]

Then he shouted, you out on his podcast with Tim Stoddart. And I was listening to that and I remember thinking, damn, Chanel's getting shouted out by Ethan. On the podcast. I stumbled across this woman, Chanel. She's so cool.

[Chanel]

She.

[Sam]

What she's been doing is these really deep breakdowns on creators. Specifically, she takes some of the best known people in the creator space and then like reverse engineers their growth and shows how they went from 0 to 50k subscribers. What a great tagline. Let me just read this. I reverse engineer how top creators get to 50k plus subscribers. That's so good. And then I do recall, I don't know if I. You might have been aware of it or not, but I was like, hey, you should see this or you should listen to this. And I think I tweeted at you saying, like, you're getting shoutouts on podcasts now, so.

[Chanel]

Yes.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Chanel]

And I didn't know that, so I think you were the one that told me about that. That's funny. Thank you.

[Sam]

Full circle moment.

[Chanel]

And just for context, even Brooks used to work for the Hustle. Like, he's worked closely with Sam Parr. Like, so this was a huge deal for Me, I was like, oh, my.

[Sam]

God, Ethan, he was like, original, like, writing about newsletter guys. Newsletter writer. Newsletter guys.

[Chanel]

Yeah. And if he hears his name in this, he's going to cringe because he hates being called out publicly. But he's awesome.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Chanel]

And I thought this was so cool because I was like, oh, my God, it's Ethan. So that was super cool. So it was 22 days after I sent my first edition.

[Sam]

Okay, do you have your fault. Your subscriber count at this point?

[Chanel]

26. Now here's where it gets a little muddy. So I have a thousand subscribers now.

[Sam]

Okay, 26, three weeks.

[Chanel]

But here's. Here's where it gets money. Because I had an old website called Hustle, the startup, and I think I imported like 800 email subscribers that I don't think I messaged before. So this is like horrible email, like, etiquette. Like, you're not supposed to do this. I did that. So I had a thousand something.

[Sam]

Okay, so maybe realistically it was closer to 200. Ish.

[Chanel]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So from here on out, let's just remove 800 from any number that I tell you.

[Sam]

Okay? 200 subs in the first three weeks. Three and a half weeks isn't. Isn't that bad at all. I know. It took me a hundred days to get my first 100 subscribers.

[Chanel]

It's very, like, round numbers there. I like it.

[Sam]

I set the goal. I was like. I was at like 90, and it was like four days before the hundredth day, and I'm like, I gotta get a hundred. So I made a push to get it to 100 just for that reason, but yes.

[Chanel]

Nice.

[Sam]

Okay, so where are we at? How are you? Are you. What else are you doing on Twitter at this point? And, like, has anything changed for you?

[Chanel]

Yeah. And so this view that I'm looking at is probably not a good one because I took out all of the replies, which was like a huge part of my growth. So let me go back.

[Sam]

I think you. You even. We recently reviewed some of your Twitter behavior and you were just like, wow. I did not remember replying so much. Like, you were. You were in there.

[Chanel]

I was such a degenerate back then. Yes.

[Sam]

But it. Again, this was like, I don't know, you're bullish on your newsletter and really, really psyched to grow it, so you're taking the time to do it right. And I think that a lot of people kind of expect, like, recommendation engines to fuel their growth or, like, I don't know, it does take the work.

[Chanel]

So I'm looking back. Yeah, wow. I was very much commenting like multiples, 10 plus replies a day or just like random comments to people. Erica Schneider. Oh, this is fun. Yeah, I was commenting on a lot of stuff, so, yeah, so I would say 10 to 20 plus a day replies on other people's posts.

[Sam]

How much time do you think that you were spending replying?

[Chanel]

A lot. Well, and part of it is like the deep dives themselves are me going through tweets and like going into the past, like Twitter archives. So like I was on Twitter, which I'm sure helped with engagement because these social platforms love for you to be on them, be engaged, be like sharing stuff. And so, um, I think that definitely probably made a big difference.

[Sam]

When did things like really start to hit that escape velocity?

[Chanel]

Things really, really took off probably late January, early February. So I hit, I was like February 6th or 5th, I hit a thousand subscribers, like minus the 800 that I imported. So that's like what, two months? And then, yeah, it kind of like kicked off really hard. And so in those early days, like the replies, the comments, me just sharing stuff, like, I'm looking at my tweets right now. Two likes, 10 likes, one got 30. And I was like, oh, this is awesome. One like, so it's just all over the place. But I just kept going and I'm, I'm looking back at my past self and I'm like, good job. Like, I'm proud of you because I today I'd probably be like, I'm not going to keep going if it's only one.

[Sam]

Like, I mean, Chanel, you already like, oh, this LinkedIn post flopped. So totally.

[Chanel]

Yeah, see, Exactly. So I am envious of my past self for being this determined, persistent.

[Sam]

So I think that calls to again. I'm going to keep going back to. You're playing a long term game back then and I mean, you still are now, but you had this long term mindset of, I believe in the content. I'm getting the signals from people like Jay Klaus, who I didn't even ask to share my content in his newsletter, but he did. He share featured it. I'm getting shout outs on podcasts from people who know the newsletter industry, like, like Ethan Brooks. And so like the signals were there that you were doing the right thing. And I would imagine that in the back of your mind you just kind of knew like, okay, this is going to pay off. Like, my time I'm spending on these algorithms, the time I'm spending on these deep dives will pay off if I stick with it and just keep going. And you will be that jack butcher, you know, visual where eventually things just kind of go. And sure enough they do.

[Chanel]

And I think honestly it comes back to like I was heavily building in public. Like I'm sharing analytics, screenshots, screenshots of my subscriber counts, reposting. Like this one guy. So Matt McGarry was nice enough to. Back in the early days. Like he and I started around the same time. So his newsletter was very small at this time too. And he had shared one of my. I think it was my Paki McCormick deep dive in his email and somebody reposted that and said this is such a valuable post. Just read this awesome piece by Matt McGarry on Paki Building. Not boring. And I retweeted it and I said thanks so much. Glad you liked it. He has a pretty wild story. Thanks to Matt McGarry for sharing my post in his newsletter. Just cause I was like, I'm not letting you get credit for this. Like I'm not letting you share the credit with somebody else. Like I spent so much time on this thing. Yeah, that's fair. So I. That it was gutsy, I think to do something like that. But yeah. And then I'm just like reposting people saying like really enjoyed this piece. And like I don't know, I was just like part of the community and I think that's a huge piece of. This is like so many folks look at social media these days and they're like, I'm just gonna post every day and just like bounce. Like that's it. I'm just gonna post. But you had to really like lean in and try and like be part of that group, support other people's stuff, comment on other people's posts. And I think that's such a big missed opportunity.

[Sam]

You can't post and ghost.

[Chanel]

Yeah. And they look at social and they're like, oh, it. It doesn't do anything. I'm not getting any engagement. I'm like, well, are you eng. Like there's. It goes two ways. So I think there's a lot to be learned in this sense. And like I'm learning this going back through my story right now. Like this is actually super fun. So I'm glad we're doing this.

[Sam]

And we were talking earlier about that post that I shared today and how I said it was from a long time ago, like four years ago almost.

[Chanel]

Yeah.

[Sam]

And it's like kind of the eye rolly kind of content which I Realize now when I look at it, but at the same time, there's some truth to it. Cause I'm like, there's no growth hack. And I published this in 2021. There's no growth hack. You have to like, actually engage with people, answer questions, reply to posts, be helpful, show up. That's. It was true four years ago and it's true now. Like, probably even in a lot of ways more than ever. Especially with like the rise of AI just in the last few years. So you being your real person, replying genuinely, not with like an AI response every time, that's going to go so much further. So I think it's important people don't just ghost or post and ghost and are actually spending time. And maybe LinkedIn's not the place for you, maybe Twitter's not the place for you, but you find that place where your people, so to speak, are, and you feel comfortable and engage and become part of that fabric.

[Chanel]

Definitely. And I think it's easy to look at someone with a huge following and be like, well, they never comment, they're never there. And it's like they already have that following. If you go back and if they're not a celebrity from TV or a TV show or something like that, and you go back and you look at their first thing that they did online, I'm sure that they were engaging and doing kinds, like all kinds of stuff in the comments. It's just you don't see it anymore because it was so long ago.

[Sam]

Yeah. There's also outlier cases and people who have good connections and are in engagement pods that don't necessarily need maybe as much. So there's other things happening behind the scenes that can explain some of that too.

[Chanel]

Now, the other thing that I did pretty regularly was, and this is related to social, because a lot of them were happening on social. But I would go to Spark Loops subscriber list, used to show like a UTM source for your subscriber.

[Sam]

Isn't that awesome?

[Chanel]

It wasn't. It's the best. And now they did away with it. Come on, man. So I would just. I would constantly be refreshing that page, refreshing that page. And I'd be like, oh, wait, there's five subscribers from. It says ConvertKit. And I'm like, who sent an email? Who shared my link? So then I'd like, go research and like, go through my inbox and see if I was subscribed. And if I saw it and it was just like, if I found it, I would immediately message that person and Be like, thank you so much for sharing. That was huge. Like, I really appreciate it. Even if they sent me one subscriber, I was doing that. And I think people think that's cool. Like, they recognize that. Like, oh, hey, like you're a human and you care about other people. So I think that went a long way.

[Sam]

I remember you sending me thank you. When I'd share a post of yours, you'd reply saying thanks for sharing. And it didn't have to be like this whole like, long thing. Just like, just a shout in the inbox. Hey, thanks for sharing. Appreciate it. It goes a long way.

[Chanel]

Yeah. And now we have a podcast.

[Sam]

That's right. Yeah.

[Chanel]

But I think, okay, so going back to like, this isn't just about like the Chanel growth story. I think the, the thing that people get wrong about social media is like, it is such a key piece of like and an easy way to build relationships over time. Like, you're, you're finding new people, you're finding content, you're learning how people think and you're like, hey, I actually resonate with that. Like, we should chat. I can't tell you how many times I sent someone a calendly link and I was like, let's jump on a call. Like, had 30 minute calls with like random people on the Internet. And it's so fun. Like, so fun. Some of those people, I've now written deep dives on some of those people. Like, I just collaborate with. Maybe we did a cross promotion. So I just, I think that can't be overstated. Like the, the value of being social on social media is like, it's not just about follower count or email subscribers that you get. It's also like finding people you like and, and building those relationships.

[Sam]

Finding your tribe as, as much as that word has probably been overused, but that totally is the case. And I think it's funny because I think about an episode we published probably in the springtime, where we're talking about growth without social and how you don't need social media to grow. And that's also true. All of these things can coexist. You just have to play a different game, if you will, and use a different strategy and we can link to that episode if you're curious what that even means and how you can go about that. But that also takes effort. None of these, none of these strategies are just like plug and play. It's like you have to actually come in, do the work, engage and grow. And if you're doing it the other Way you have to do the other things like reaching out to people, doing cross promotions, collaborations, getting in front of other people's audiences. Like that also takes a lot of work. But yeah, you'll avoid the algorithms, but you'll still be in inboxes and connecting and doing all that stuff too. So these strategies can both work. They just, I just don't want people to think we're like disregarding all the advice we gave, you know, six months ago. Um, totally great call out. Both of these things can happen and can coexist. Depends on you and your preference and what, where you feel your strong suit lies. If you're not a really social person and you don't want to engage with people on social media, then there's ways to grow your newsletter without it.

[Chanel]

But it's going to take longer.

[Sam]

Yes, yes.

[Chanel]

If you like, definitely will take longer.

[Sam]

If you like getting in the algorithm and hamming it up and being social, this can be a, a lot more so than the other way.

[Chanel]

And I'm sure someone out there is like, oh, I'm just gonna use paid ads. I'm like, all right, cool. But if you use paid ads before you have like that content audience fit, I really think you're kind of wasting your money. So I, I, I really do feel like po, like learning how to write a good social post is such a life skill. Like, and I'm not even the, like, great at it. Like, I'm, I'm okay at it, but I still think it's a great life skill just to know, like, what are people resonating with? Are the topics I'm writing about interesting to other people? How can I make them more interesting? Copywriting frameworks and all that stuff. I think it's, it's such a good life skill that you should at least give it like a few months and try it out and see what you gain from it.

[Sam]

And it'll help with your writing, your newsletter writing too. It's just all these, all these skills cross pollinate. They'll help you in other areas.

[Chanel]

Yeah, and oftentimes I would take my teaser posts, copy paste it into the beginning of my newsletter because I knew it resonated and so it would get people reading to the next few lines and I'm like, okay, now we're in the story. Now you're invested. Let's keep going from here.

[Sam]

It's going to help you with YouTube packaging. If you want to get into video, it's going to help you with scripting, short form video. It can, it can go a long way. So. So I think that's good advice.

[Chanel]

And like, again, like relationships, collaborations, cross promotions, these things all become easier. When you're out there, you're on social media, you're commenting on people's stuff.

[Sam]

When they know who you are, it helps.

[Chanel]

Yeah, I think there is a strategy in a world where you could post one time a week and just comment every other day and like still grow your following and your, your newsletter. You don't have to be posting daily, you don't have to be posting multiple times a day or even like four or five times a week. Like you could still, you know, do the bare minimum but just like be social and still meet people and grow your newsletter.

[Sam]

And what if I wanted to do that? Say like next month?

[Chanel]

Oh, you do? Well, that's fun. So in January we actually January of this year we kicked off a LinkedIn challenge inside the Growth and Reverse Pro community and did super well. It was so fun. We had a leaderboard, we had prizes, we had a winner. And this time around I was like, you know what, there's a lot of FOMO with that. And I kind of felt bad that people couldn't like join that weren't in the Growth and Reverse Pro community because the community is not for everyone and that's fair. But I think having a challenge like this and like a 30 day timeframe and like accountability is kind of important at least to like re kickstart or reignite your growth. So we're doing this, we're actually opening it up to the Growth in Reverse audience as a whole instead of just the community members. So you can go to growth in reverse.com social and learn how to sign up. There is going to be a small fee just because I want to make sure people are actually like trying and engaging and I'm putting so much work into this. Dylan is too. We're going to have live calls, roast my post calls, which are the most fun where you know, you can bring a post that you've done that maybe didn't get as much traction as you wanted. And we will roast it live and tell you how maybe you can do it better next time. Improve the hook with you. I'm, I'm so excited.

[Sam]

Yeah. It's amazing how an extra set of eyes can just like show you things that you just did not realize with anything. Not just, not just post. But it's really helpful in this case too. Cause you can get like, I don't know, live feedback on why this post may have flopped. So yeah, yeah, they're really helpful. Back in January when we had those two.

[Chanel]

Yeah, I remember the. The one from inside the community. My friend Becky actually posted something and I was like, ooh, the hook's not so good. And she's like, what do you mean? And I rewrote it for her and she updated it like an hour after posting it. Before she updated it, she had like three likes. After she updated it, it went to like 30 or something. So like not a huge viral post, but like, that's big deal for like a piece of content you spend a bunch of time on. Like, all she changed was the first sentence.

[Sam]

Yeah, yeah, that's huge. And if you didn't mention it, it's going to be open not just to LinkedIn, you can grow on platform of choice. So whether it's LinkedIn, Twitter threads, substack notes, substack. I think we're going to focus more on written platforms. It's going to be fun. 30 day challenge to. I know I need the motivation to kick my butt back into year to posting relatively often. Somewhat more than I am right now.

[Chanel]

Me too. I am so excited. We're going to have separate spaces for each of these and so you can jump into the substack space and be like, hey, I just posted this. It didn't do super well or it did great. Here's what I'm learning and just like kind of share these learnings with each other and you get a taste of the Growth Rivers Pro community. Like get to see how supportive we are. Like, it's not a place to tear people down. It's just like honestly a place to grow your newsletter. And in this case we're going to do it via growing on social.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Chanel]

The fun thing is we're going to have a full leaderboard. We're going have grand prizes winners. So the last winner got to be in the sponsorship spot in the Growth Reverse newsletter, which was super fun. She gained a bunch of followers from that, so that was cool. So we're going to have some other prizes too, but we'll keep those under wraps until we kick things off. So if you are interested in joining us, I would love to have you growth in reverse.com social if you want to join the challenge.

[Sam]

And so just to call out why people might be like, well, why isn't this a grow your newsletter challenge? Let's speak to that a little bit.

[Chanel]

Totally. So it is a grow your newsletter challenge with social media. But as like someone who can't see behind the scenes into everyone's newsletter account. I can't see how many subscribers you have. So the best metric I can use is a public facing one, which is a follower count. But we are not just going to say like, okay, this person grew to 11,000 followers, they win. No, no, because that's not the fair. So we're going to do it based on growth percentage. So if you start with a hundred followers and you grow to a thousand followers, you could potentially beat someone who has a much larger audience just because your rate of growth was faster. So that is kind of like how we're playing it. There's also going to be prizes for like most subscribers gained, but I can't keep up with those numbers every week because, you know, it's like a, a manual thing. So I'm trying not to ruin my life for September. So, so I'm trying to keep it easy, keep it straigh. Just going to focus on follower growth for those prizes.

[Sam]

Very cool. And we'll also, we're also having some co working calls as well where we can kind of work on our LinkedIn posts at the same time, but at the same time. Right. Um, just hop on a call, on a zoom call, work away kind of in sort of like as if you're working with friends but on your own time. And then we'll rehash at the end how everyone did with their posts and if they feel accomplished and that sort of thing.

[Chanel]

Yes. And so we'll also have a couple of like office hours calls as well just to kind of, you know, if you have questions or you want help with something, an extra pair of eyes, that kind of thing. And I'm probably gonna just like take some of the calls that we've had in Pro that are around LinkedIn or a specific platform and dump them into there so you can kind of watch those and see how some of the bigger names are growing too. I think that'll be helpful.

[Sam]

That will be helpful.

[Chanel]

I have to add that to my list. Just, just figured we should do that. Um, but yeah, this is gonna be fun. Even prizes aside, like the leaderboard sounds confusing to you? It's okay. We're all just gonna go in there and like help each other figure this stuff out, grow, support each other's content. This is not like a pod or anything, but we're trying to just like showcase other people who are writing great stuff. I'm excited and it went over really well last year and I don't want you to have FOMO come like September 5th when you can. No longer join. So make sure you get in before then.

[Sam]

Yeah. And I think it's important to put to say like, we're not doing this as like an engagement pod type of thing because a cynic might be like, oh, that's just all you're doing here. There is no pressure to comment or like, or follow, even follow people in this challenge. It's strictly for a motivation for you to post and grow and just some accountability to do that. So I just want to make sure that's clear. And what about people? So people obviously who are in Growth Reverse Pro already, they can opt into the challenge if they want, if they don't have to, if they don't want to without having to pay anything extra. But what about people who have said you just released the Growth Vault as well?

[Chanel]

Yes.

[Sam]

Do you want to share what you want to do there?

[Chanel]

Yeah. So if anyone has bought the Growth Vault and a lot of you have, I will be emailing you a link to join this for free as well. So you get that as a bonus just because you signed up. So if you buy the Growth vault, which is 200 bucks, you get this for free. So it's kind of like half price and you get a challenge. But honestly I would buy it either. Either option. You don't have to buy the Growth Vault. That's fine. It has like more video lessons and ways to like optimize your onboarding and growth and that kind of thing. You don't have to do that, but just get in. I would say like probably the 26, because we're going to have content and we're going to have, you know, but like we're going to have content and like things for you to do and like get yourself level set before we start publishing on the 1st.

[Sam]

Yeah, absolutely. That was one of the things that I talked to you about this too. When I took chip 30 for 30 all those years ago, that was the part I was just most. One of the most blown away by was the onboarding before we even started publishing was the on ramp to that. And we want to not copy that, but we want to replicate that energy of like the ramp up and like feeling pumped to start this challenge, making sure you're prepped and you've got all the, the tools you need or your questions are answered so that you can really hit the ground running on September 1st when we, when we go live, if you will.

[Chanel]

And I feel like it's just such a good time, like it's back to school time. Like people are starting to Realize, like, oh, shoot, like Q4 is coming up. Like, I should, you know, kind of get focused here before the new year. So I'm excited to kind of kick this off in September.

[Sam]

I mean, it's pumpkin spice latte time. Right. I think that is what we're flipping the calendar to. Right. So we're going summer to fall. Starbucks is our signal. So we know, we know it's time. Time for a challenge. Time for some PSLs.

[Chanel]

I did not know Canadians liked pumpkin spice lattes too.

[Sam]

I mean, I don't, but it is a thing. It is a thing.

[Chanel]

People are like crazy about them here.

[Sam]

I. I'm not going to say I don't like them. I just don't buy them and they're very sweet. So I don't know, it's like, it would be like, I feel like my.

[Chanel]

Whole day is ruined when I have one of those because I'm just like shaking from the sugar.

[Sam]

Yeah, Sugar, caffeine, like combo, just buzzing.

[Chanel]

Yes.

[Sam]

Yep. Yeah, no, it's a thing here.

[Chanel]

Yeah. Interesting. I didn't realize that. That's good to know. But yeah, I think, I think going through the social growth I had was pretty cool. Like, I didn't realize the impact that 30 days had. No, I didn't get to 10, 11,000 in 30 days. It was six months. But the first month was pretty crazy.

[Sam]

Well, that's not your foundation, I think. Right. To get you to that 10,000, 11,000 subscribers in six months. So if you hadn't started commenting and posting and posting threads and trying things and seeing what worked and seeing what didn't and getting discovered, so to speak, by people like Jay and people like Ethan, then you wouldn't have probably got to that point. So it all has to start somewhere. And people might roll their eyes and be like, oh, sure, yeah, right. You know, just start. Hahaha. But it really, I mean, it does. You have to, you have to start somewhere and you never know if you could be in that spot in six months time. So we'd love to have some success stories come out of this challenge too. Just to like, I don't know, cheer you on and, and celebrate with you as well.

[Chanel]

Yeah. And I already have a couple of growth Reverse Pro members who are pumped to like, help and like, be kind of like evangelists of like, certain platforms. So I'm super excited to get them because they're just like, you know, they've been doing this a little bit longer than some other people might have and so they're going to be able to help you if you get lost or stuck or. I'm actually. I actually created my first ever custom GPT yesterday, calling it the Hook Helper. Essentially, it's going to help you rewrite your hook because this is honestly, like, one of the biggest pieces of this stuff. And so when you join, you get that for free, too. It's not perfect. I'm still tweaking it, but it's close.

[Sam]

You send it to me now.

[Chanel]

Totally.

[Sam]

I need help with my hooks.

[Chanel]

I, like, went through LinkedIn yesterday and I was just like, scrolling until I found, like, posts that were like, not great, but, like, the content was good, but the hook was bad.

[Sam]

Yeah.

[Chanel]

And I copy and pasted it in there. I'm like, that's a banger. You should change your hook.

[Sam]

Really?

[Chanel]

So it's working pretty well. Yeah.

[Sam]

So you took other people's content, put it in the Hook Helper, and then got a better hook out of it and then did you send it to them?

[Chanel]

I need to start doing it. I was just like flying through this and I was like, oh, this is really good. Like, it just pulls out different angles you didn't think about. So I'm excited for it.

[Sam]

That's fun. Okay. Very cool. Looking forward to the Hook Helper.

[Chanel]

Yeah, so that's one of the other bonuses you'll get and then a bunch of other things that me and Dylan are working on for you as well.

[Sam]

Yes, yes, yes, yes. Looking forward to it. All right, so right now we're recording this. This is the middle of August. By the time this comes out, you'll have only 5,6ish days to sign up. So, yeah, reach out to us if you have any questions. Growthinverse.com Social and we hope to see you in the September Social Growth Challenge.

[Chanel]

Yes. All right. Can't wait to see you, Sam.