Happy Sunday, creators!

We have a value-packed newsletter for you today.

We're going to cover:

Blake Emal's framework for product launches
Direct bank transfers to more EU countries
How to optimize your affiliate program
How to build an audience with Danny Thompson

Let's dive in.

How Blake Emal Launches Products...Fast

Blake Emal is a well-oiled machine that can think of an idea and launch it the same day. But, this took years of developing and launching products to get here.

Through this, he’s developed a framework that helps him trash bad ideas and launch the good ones.

Alex Garcia spoke to Blake, who gave us a breakdown of how this framework works.

The Home Of His Ideas

Nearly 70% of Blake’s process for launching a product runs through Notion. And for Blake, it starts in his capture gallery. Here, Blake lays out all of his ideas in one place. When he gets a new idea, he adds it to the gallery.

But here’s where the magic happens.

Instead of letting his emotions take over and going all-in on the idea at that moment, Blake will add the idea to his gallery and let it sit. Sometimes even for a few days.

Blake does this so that he can later revisit the idea with a clear head.

Here he will determine if he still likes the idea, is willing to come back to it, and if it’s still a good idea.

If it checks those boxes, then he moves onto the ideation phase.

Ideation

Some ideas are just that, ideas. And nothing more.

They made it to the capture gallery but never made it out.

The ones that made it out answered two questions correctly.

It starts with these two core questions:

1. Is this going to be helpful to the people that I serve?

2. If it didn’t exist, would I be willing to pay money for this solution?

This is what he uses to validate the idea himself. Then, Blake takes this to the next level and heads over to Twitter.

He uses Twitter as a breeding ground for validation and ideas.

Blake follows a simple process to use Twitter for validation:

He tweets about the idea from a general perspective
He’ll analyze the engagement and see if the demand is there
If the demand is there, he starts doing more targeted research
He’ll go to potential customers and start asking deeper questions

Blake takes this information and uses it to inform how he’s going to deliver his product.

That takes us to the next phase.

Development

It’s not just the idea that makes the product successful.

A great idea needs to be packaged correctly. If not, the potential for your product to be successful decreases.

For Blake, he analyzes what kind of products his audience already purchases and how those products are delivered.

This will give Blake insight into how to:

Format his product
Deliver his product
Make it available to people

With this, Blake is able to not only create a product that his audience will value but package it in a way that the value is easy to consume.

Through this process, Blake is able to launch products at a rapid pace.

And now he’s going to teach others how to do the same this September.

Blake is launching his “Launchables September Cohort” where he will help creators monetize a digital product in 15 days.

You can sign up here.

What We Shipped For Gumroad Creators

We now support direct bank transfers to 19 more EU countries. You can read the full post here.

We've added an optional note to invoices.

What’s Happening In The Creator Economy

Don’t learn, then start. Do this instead
How to earn your first dollar online via your skills through Gumroad
This is the best marketing strategy
Here’s how to work for yourself according to Daniel Vassallo
102 different creators gave the best advice they ever received

Your Affiliate Program Just Got Better

This past year, we’ve released a handful of features to help Gumroad creators and their affiliates make more money.

Because of this, we created a specific post to introduce the new features, how to get started with an affiliate program, how to optimize your affiliate program, and how to succeed with your affiliate program.

You’ll learn:

How to start an effective affiliate program
How to find reliable affiliates
Benefits of affiliate marketing
How to manage your affiliate program

You can read the entire post here.

How To Build An Audience With Danny Thompson

Danny Thompson is no stranger to building an audience.

He’s built an audience of over 130,000 followers collectively on Twitter and LinkedIn and has leveraged this to build his public speaking career.

And it worked.

Danny is booked through all of 2021 and credits his success to building an audience online.

Last week he spoke with Kyle Prinsloo and broke down:

How to leverage an online audience to fuel your passions
How to use social platforms as a tool to become an authority figure
How to make your brand speak louder for you than you ever could
How every piece of content you create is a free billboard

You can watch it here.

Next week, we’ve got some awesome news to share with you!

Keep creating,

The Gumroad Team

UPDATED: OSS Hackathon extended to Sept 15 + $100k grand prize! 🚀

🚀 Gumroad April Recap: What We've Shipped

LifeMathMoney: How I launched my product and grew a following

Small Bets is joining Gumroad 🎉

Creator Spotlight: Kyle T Webster | How selling brushes on Gumroad led to partnerships with Pixar, Disney, and eventually Adobe

See all posts from Gumroad