Three years ago, one cold evening, I began to think that just programming and occasionally writing about it was not enough for me. I wanted to find an idea for a new project that would combine my two main passions: programming and writing about programming. I've been working as a programmer on a daily basis for sixteen years.

So I wanted something new. But it's hard to find anything new to do. Lots of people run programming blogs, write articles, create courses, write books. I only knew one thing. If I'm going to do something, it has to be unique and give a new perspective on writing applications. Something that builds fascination for programming and attracts people who don't necessarily think about it, but have features that are able to introduce new value to a very square industry. Something like flashcards.

I know what you thought. It is better to write applications on a piece of whitespace in a jute sweatshirt than to use flashcards. This is how I came up with the craziest idea in my life and decided to commercialize it.

This is the story of how I managed the product and optimized the customer experience to occupy the niche of post-apocalyptic sci-fi flashcards for developers that are also a game. A niche that I have occupied before everyone else!

Growth Marketing Tip 1: Find a niche

Don't get me wrong, it's great that there are so many ways to learn programming. However, many people get lost in all this. Should I learn through a course, go to a bootcamp or buy a book? What language to learn? Everyone responds differently. If you add to this the authors of texts and courses who pour water instead of writing specifically and clearly, entering the world of programming seems very chaotic and difficult.

That's why I found flashcards attractive, as opposed to the trend that discourages programming. You can fit very little information on a flashcard. However, this is still not interesting enough to reach for the flashcards. That's why I enriched them with sci-fi fantasy illustrations. In this way, they are beautiful and evoke Stoneheart or Magic The Gathering. Just look at this beautiful card:

I also enriched the cards with a game mode. The game mode is tricky because anyone can play Summon The JSON. Up to four players can play with one deck. So you can play with people and trick them into programming. Which, you have to admit, is a great career path.

This is how the idea for Summon The JSON was born, which I have been implementing for four years. I have flashcards for C#, C++, Python, Java, JavaScript, Git, React, PHP, TypeScript and HTML. Take a look at this mashup, aren’t they lovely?

You can of course buy them now on my Shopify store available here: Programming Flashcards.

However, I encourage you to read on because I'm here to tell you how I analyze project data and make decisions. Because you probably also have a cool idea for a project and need help with growth hacking.

Growth Marketing Tip 2: Gather feedback

Gathering information about your prospects is probably the most important thing if you want to sell stuff and make money. Over these three years I have learned that I don’t know anything about my customers often.

But I think that's great, because that's what this community listening thing is all about. At every stage, starting from the idea, I ask the community of developers for their opinions and ideas.

Very often what I think in my head differs from what others think. Let me give you an example:

Growth Marketing Tip 3: Share and improve

Each deck contains five cards that are blank. I wanted customers to be able to supplement them with their own functions and even points and superpowers. However, it turned out that customers did not understand this. Once a customer even wanted to return the cards because she thought there had been an error in the printing house.

I often observe programmers and designers that they treat such cases with pity. Which is completely wrong, because it is the user who knows best how he perceives and experiences the application. Same as flashcards and anything else.

That's why I added a clear description to the cards that explains their meaning. What we imagine about people in our heads has nothing to do with reality. Only feedback verifies it. That's why I love asking for opinions. This is not only a way to improve the product, but also growth marketing. Because people can see that you really care about their opinion. Here is an example of such a card:

Growth Marketing Tip 4: Use Technology To Assist You

Now I'm going to write something controversial. This may prevent me from winning the competition for an article on growth marketing, for which I submitted this article. But I want to be honest with you. I don't think it's a good idea to use stats from the start.

My shop on Shopify gives me information about how many people visited the website, how many added the product to the cart, how many people bought the product. Google Analytics will tell you where your customers come from in aggregate, whether they come back.

The mParticle service, which sponsors this competition, combines data from various sources and, thanks to AI, extracts information from the data that will allow you to improve the customer experience. However, I believe that you should base your decisions on direct input from users in the beginning.

This is especially important when you have a lot of work ahead of you and little motivation. Setting up Shopify, preparing the products took three years in my case. Feedback from live users was something that allowed me to continue working on this project.

I started using statistics and analytics only on the way to verify my hypotheses and check whether the sales process was going well.

For example, thanks to this I know that it is better to offer free shipping instead of having to pay for it directly. Or that it's good to have a lot of payment methods and delivery and production.

What I like about mParticle is that it can tell you what promotion or coupon to create. He can also estimate how much it will increase profits.

An open secret that I discovered not so long ago is that people love promotions and coupons. Professional stores offer them non-stop. Thanks to this, their offer looks fresh, even if they offer the same thing all the time.

Growth Marketing Tip 5: Allocate Time Wisely

For years, I loved looking at all kinds of statistics. I still like it. However, it seems to me that the most important thing in selling is the product.

It is worth improving it, adding new products. Campaigns, analytics, store optimization are the things that draw me in as a programmer. However, sometimes it is worth going back to the products and improving them as well.

If you develop the product yourself after hours, I can tell you right away that you will not be able to deal with everything at once. For example, I spent the last 3 years developing products, learning Blender to create product renders, and creating a shop on Shopify. While supporting sales.

I've only recently started working on analytics, ad campaigns and experience optimization. This is a separate job that will consume my time for the next few months. In such a situation, you want to choose solutions that will save you problems and time. That's why, for example, I chose Shopify, Google Analytics, and other apps. I don't write everything from scratch, although I could.

Summary

For growth marketing I recommend you to:

1. find a niche
2. gather feedback
3. share and improve your offering
4. use technology
5. allocate time wisely

The final tip is to share your story. I just gave this advice by example, because the beginning of the article shows just that. If you've read this far, it means it worked :)

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