REDDIT: THE MOST UNDERUTILISED MARKETING CHANNEL

Morning!

It’s 09:44 PM, Saturday night. I just spent the evening at a wine tasting (as a guy who doesn’t drink alcohol). I’m one block of dark chocolate in. Far from optimal writing conditions. But having my back against the wall often brings out my best work… so let’s get after it!

Today, we’re going to take a break from marketers of the past and take a look at one of the most interesting marketing strategies I’ve seen in a while.

I think you’re going to enjoy this one! :)

Breaking Down The Strategy

When someone mentions social media marketing everyone thinks:

• Facebook

• Instagram

• TikTok

• Twitter

Maybe even LinkedIn at a push.

But there’s one platform that no one seems to be talking about and no businesses seem to be utilising – Reddit.

If you had asked me 6 months ago what Reddit was I would have had no clue.

A forum thing? That nerds use? Is it not for hackers?

I’d only ever heard my nerdy gamer friends talk about going on Xbox forums there.

Then a few months ago, my opinion completely changed when I came across Eric Lam on Twitter.

The guy was raving about how people are sleeping on Reddit and that he was acquiring thousands of subscribers for $0.

At first, I thought he was lying, or maybe at best exaggerating. “Who actually uses Reddit?”, I thought. “There’s no chance it’s actually a solid marketing channel”.

But curiosity got the best of me and I just had to try it out for myself.

So, I did some research, whipped up a post and threw it in the forum r/entrepreneur.

Then I went back to my work.

1 hour later… nothing.

But then my phone pinged. Then it pinged again. People were “upvoting” my post.

I wasn’t quite sure what was happening. Little did I know, this would be my first successful Reddit post.

• 295 Upvotes

• 121 Comments

• 103K views

But even crazier than the stats, the post was leading to a flock of new subscribers to my newsletter.

I was surprised, shocked even. But more than anything, I realised that Reddit was probably the most underutilised marketing channel right now.

Since then, I’ve racked up another 300k views across my posts on Reddit. Yet still, I’m not even scratching the surface of what’s possible there.

A man who is? Eric Lam.

I’ve been studying his Reddit strategy for the last 5 months.

Today, I’m going to break down the genius ways he’s:

• Drove millions of views

• 7000+ newsletter subscribers

• And even powered his website's SEO

…all through Reddit:

Step 1) Find the right subreddit

For anyone who doesn’t use Reddit, a “subreddit” is essentially a forum - like a glorified Facebook group.

Rather than having a curated feed like Instagram or TikTok, on Reddit you go and scroll through a specific subreddit depending on what you want to read.

And if you want to have success on Reddit, it’s vital you pick the right one to post in.

You want a subreddit that:

1. Contains people within your target audience

2. Has 50k+ members

3. Is highly engaged

4. And rapidly growing

If you have all 4 of those things, you’ve essentially found a spot where the exact people you want to talk to hang out.

However, finding it won’t be as easy as you’d think… well, on your own at least.

But don’t worry, Eric has a strategy for it. All you have to do is:

1. Go to subredditstats.com

2. Scroll down to the highest Growth (Year)

3. Click a high-growth subreddit that contains your target audience

Voila! You’ve found their hangout spot.

Now, it’s time to get their attention.

Step 2) The Bait & Switch

Finding where your target audience hangs out is one thing, getting their attention is another.

This is where most people fall short by opting to talk about themselves.

They post about how great they are or how great their business is doing.

Unfortunately, this is going to leave you wasting your time with only crickets to listen to.

Again, this is where Eric’s genius comes in.

Rather than opting to force his business down the throats of members, he uses what I would call a “Bait & Switch” approach.

• He baits them in with something they want

• Then gives them his newsletter

For example:

Eric noticed that people in the subreddit r/ArtificialInteligence (a subreddit about AI) were in his target audience.

So, he created a reactive post about this new “LocalGPT” that lets you use a local version of AI to chat while keeping your data private (something he knew members would enjoy).

He then cleverly plugged his newsletter – Exploding Ideas – at the start and end of the post.

At the start:

At the end:

It’s important to notice that in the post, Eric talks about the newsletter in this third-person-like tone.

He doesn’t say “Go subscribe to my newsletter”, he says “There’s more in this free newsletter”.

This seems like he’s sharing a valuable resource with people rather than just plugging his work - which allows him to A) not get removed for self-promotion and B) drive more newsletter sign-ups.

The result of the post?

• 360+ people upvoted it

• 100,000s of people saw it

• 100’s checked out his newsletter

He got their attention, hooked them in with a post about something he knew they’d enjoy, and then pushed them to sign up for his newsletter.

It’s so simple, yet so effective.

But this isn’t the end of Eric’s Reddit strategy - it’s just the start.

Step 3) Piggyback Off The Search Demand

Eric’s Reddit strategy began with him just posting in subreddits and acquiring subscribers that way.

But then he realised that people on Reddit weren’t just clicking on the links to his newsletter, they were searching for it on Google too.

So, to piggyback off the new search demand he began working on his site’s SEO.

Now, I don’t want to dive too deep into this as there are 1 million and 1 ways that you can improve your site SEO. But there was one nifty little tactic Eric was using that I found pretty cool.

He simply…

1. Googled "write for us" + his niche
2. Emailed everyone in the top 10
3. Checked the interested people’s site stats
4. Made sure they get organic traffic
5. Then checked that they ranked for his keywords

I’m sure some SEO experts would roll their eyes at this, but I think it’s a simple way to improve his SEO to make sure he’s capturing as much of the search demand as possible.

Step 4) Attention Jacking

Although his posting strategy is my favourite aspect of Eric’s approach to Reddit, he claims that he gets more subscribers through his comment strategy.

Here’s how it works:

1. Again, he finds a subreddit his target audience hangs out in

2. Looks for a post where someone is asking for help

3. Offers detailed advice on the question

4. Plugs his newsletter as a resource

Here’s how it looks in action:

1. Eric goes to the subreddit r/entrepreneur (a forum for to help entrepreneurs solve problems)

2. Finds a post about a CEO asking for help with productivity

3. Adds an insightful comment as a reply

4. Recommends them checking out… you guessed it - his own newsletter.

The best part about this is that, unlike the posting strategy, Eric no longer has to rely on people actually liking the content he puts out.

As long as he picks posts that already have some traction, his comment will get eyes on it.

At first glance, this strategy may look like it only applies to one-man-band businesses that have time to do this. But Eric is currently training VAs to run this strategy for him.

Which begs the question… just how scalable is it? And how much demand can be generated with this strategy on Reddit?

I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see.

A little bit of a different breakdown to the ones of late.

Did you enjoy it?

Right, it’s 1 am time for me to get to bed.

Until next Sunday.

— Niall

This has been a breakdown of Eric Lam’s Reddit strategy. I hope you have learned something and can implement a similar strategy in your business!

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