"Owning" A Keyword

Hey there,

It is Matthew Larsen, back with my newsletter.

The best situation you could possibly be in is to "own" a keyword that is closely related to your service. 

You do this primarily through content, and by creating a binge-able series of content solving every possible problem your ICP could face. You want people in your ICP to have a problem and instantly think "well I better go to X's YouTube channel." 

You do this with your original ideas, and by making sure every single piece of content you produce is an improvement on the last. Eventually, YOU will become the hook and thumbnail. If you can achieve this, you will make insane sums of money.

Hybrid Service/Education Business With A Full Marketing & Offer Ecosystem

To make the maximum possible profit, we want to build our agency or service-business towards a hybrid service + education model with a full marketing & offer ecosystem.

This is the ideal model because the following things are true:

This model will allow us to scale bigger, faster, and easier in comparison to relying solely on services being sold through referrals, networking, or a single marketing channel. It works for any B2B service-based business.

Owning a keyword is a significant “part” of this process.

The 7/11/4 Rule

The 7/11/4 Rule is based on a Google Study called ZMOT or Zero Moment of Truth. Someone also wrote a book based on this much later.

The 7/11/4 says that on average, if you want someone to buy from you, they need to spend 7 hours with you across 11 different touchpoints and 4 different channels.

This is an interesting rule. I find it hard to believe that you could simplify it down this much, but then again, if anyone knows, it would be Google. They probably have more behavioral data than any other thing or entity in history.

This rule reminds me of the super normie NPC thing marketing agencies tell boomers “oh, the ads aren’t working cuz people need to see them 7 times on average.”

I do like this 7/11/4 Rule much better than that though.

Regardless, whether you can actually measure this kind of thing or not, it is logically and directionally correct. It makes sense. And as such, we should build our entire marketing strategy around this.

Let’s break it down:

7 Hours: This will by far be the hardest for most people. Although not in the original study, I kind of feel that in-person time with someone is worth double or triple, as in one hour in-person is worth 2 or three hours here. That is why events, masterminds, or just meeting in person seem to close people that much faster.

It will be extremely difficult, if not impossible to systematically get people to spend 7 hours with you without a long of long-form content such as:

And so on.

To see why this is true, let’s just look at the opposite.

Let’s say one post whether it is short form video or just a normal written post that you could read represents 60 seconds of time spent. Obviously, 60 seconds equals one minute so the math is simple.

7 hours is 420 minutes.

That means that in order to spend seven hours with you, they would have to literally consume 420 short form posts from you.

Not only will almost no one have that many posts to begin with, it would also count on them actually seeing all of them via the social media algorithms, stopping and actually taking the time to consume them.

Not likely.

If you compare this to the options we listed above:

This could be:

A combination of these plus the short form posts (they have their place) will be much more likely to systematically get them to the 7 hours and it is really important we use a combination of all of them above.

11 Touchpoints: This should be relatively straightforward (as should the four platforms).

You can get this one through a combination of being consistent with your content on every platform, and by getting them on your email list to where they receive your daily newsletter.

On top of this, you can run retargeting ads on every platform, and you should be all set.

4 Platforms: This should be relatively straightforward as well.

You should get them very easily on:

Then the final one is up to you. A lot of people will get them in their community, or on LinkedIn, or on Twitter, and so on.

What can be good in this stage is once someone follows you, DM them or follow them on every platform so they see you wherever they go.

Problems & Circumstances Of Your ICP

The primary factor in your mission to own a keyword is how well you know the different problems, circumstances and desired outcomes of your ICP.

This is because the idea or topic of the content is primarily what determines the targeting and who the content is delivered to, and then who it resonates with.

Remember, we are not some prank YouTuber or trying to build a media company here. We are trying to use content to get high-ticket B2B clients, so it becomes more about how well we resonate with our ICP rather than how many raw views or traffic we get.

The thing we REALLY need to understand (and we will talk more about this throughout) is that the higher-level our ICP is, the less views we will get.

Just mathematically, if all of our content is made for businesses doing at least $1m per year, statistically, 9% of Americans are business owners and only 4% of those 9% get to $1 million per year or more.

What is the math on that?

0.09 x 0.04 = 0.0036

Our content is “for” 0.36% of total people. We should obviously expect it to (and be okay with) getting less views.

If we go even higher and make content for an ICP doing $10m+, then again, it is estimated that about 0.4% of business owners get to that level.

0.09x0.004 = 0.00036

Our content is “for” 0.036% of total people.

This math is important to understand and be okay with. 

As to why this is important if it isn’t obvious is that different levels of people, even within the same industry, face different problems.

An agency owner doing $5 mil per year would have different problems than an agency owner trying to make their first $10k per month.

You can apply this to any industry, any level, etc. 

That is super important to understand and keep in mind because the concept of “owning” a keyword also matters in the context of the ICP.

Someone could own the keyword of “agency” for agencies doing $5m per year but be basically anonymous to agencies doing $10k per month.

When you think of owning a keyword, think of owning the mindshare of your ICP in that market, not literally owning the entire possible keyword.

When we do this correctly, we should be able to come up with a literal list of the different problems our ICP faces, and then that is the basis of our content strategy. That is how we eventually will come to “own” the keyword. If we don’t have this list and we don’t make content around the problems our exact ICP faces, then we will never successfully “own” the keyword for that ICP.

Binge-able Series Of Content

What owning a keyword looks like in practice is when you create a “binge-able” series of content that offers solutions, advice, tips and tactics for EVERY single problem that your ICP faces, and does so better than any of your competitors.

Remember, the hardest part is getting them to consume 7+ hours of our stuff.

Especially with YouTube, we need to create high-quality stuff.

The thing we want to create is they watch YouTube video number one solving a problem, they love it, then they subscribe and look on our channel for their next problem. Boom, they find it. Video number two completely solves another problem. They search further and find video number three which is also great, and so on. They tell their friends about us.

They come back the next day and watch video number four and so on. They see the link for our lead magnet and webinar in our bio and sign up for both. They spend 90+ minutes with us on the webinar and consume hours of our lead magnet over the course of weeks.

This is the process we are trying to create.

A few things need to happen for this to take place:

If the binging is broken, then it will be exponentially harder for us to systematically get them to spend 7+ hours with us. It is really annoying and “high pressure” but everything we do has to be on point if we want this to happen at scale. We can never “have a bad day.”

Fans, Not Followers & Value, Not Views

So, the next question naturally becomes “how do we make this shit binge-able?”

The first step to doing so is to have the right frame of mind.

We are making these videos to create FANS. Not to get followers or subscribers.

We do this by focusing on VALUE (as it relates to our ICP), not by chasing views.

Once we have this mindset in place, it actually becomes quite clear what we need to do to make our shit binge-able.

The main difference is that followers click a button to see your content or updates if and when it is convenient for them, while fans feel a deep emotional connection and actively invest their time, money, and loyalty into you. 

“Value” is such an annoying term these days. “Just provide value,” “just add value, bro.” 

We will define “value” as the tangible business impact driven by your video, particularly how well you perform at solving their specific industry pain points.

The way you create fans and provide value is by making videos with actionable advice, strategy and tactics to help them solve their specific problems, then they try it out (for free) and have success with it.

That is what we are trying to do here.

A great and simple framework for content is: 

Theory > Example(s) > Implementation

You will want (and need) to get them to truly understand, because only then do they really “buy in.” I ignored this fact for a long time in my content and once I finally realized it, everything improved. 

Then, you will want to give them examples, because that is usually how people will learn the best.

Then, you will want to give them a very high-level action plan to implement it in their business. You don’t have to go crazy with it, but it should clearly be there.

If you were making videos for example focused around one point, we could just do Theory > Example(s) > Implementation as the format for the entire video. If you were making videos focused around a top 5 list, or step-by-step system, you would do Theory > Example(s) > Implementation for each point, albeit on a smaller scale than you would for an entire video.

Your Face Is The Hook/Thumbnail

Ultimately, when you do this right, you will achieve the ultimate version of owning your keyword where just your face or name will get them to click. Simply put, YOU become the title/hook/thumbnail. They just click because it is YOU. That is how you know you have done a good job of creating actual fans (and not just followers). 

When you are playing the same game as everyone else and creating followers, you have to spend so much time worrying about and optimizing your title, hook, thumbnail, etc. because there is nothing to separate you from someone else.

When you focus on value, and solving their problems and getting them to try your advice for free and have success with it, you are playing a different game now. You don’t have to be as sharp and “optimized” (although you certainly still can be). YOU are the product.

A good metric to try and gauge this is your “monthly audience” on YouTube and the equivalent on other platforms. If your monthly audience goes up slowly and steadily (not counting times where you may go viral), then you are doing this successfully.

This is also why it can be dangerous to some degree to simply copy the titles, hooks and ideas of other people. If they just have a ton of fans, it is not a great indicator that what they are doing is “good” per se. Their fans are just clicking because it is them. Their fans would click on anything.

The VAR Test + The “Useful Test”

These are more like two quick “quality assurance tests” for every piece of content you make rather than a full fledged piece of theory.

Let’s actually explain The Useful Test first because it is so simple, yet so important.

For every single piece of content you make, whether it is a 280 character tweet or a full-on multi-hour course, you need to ask yourself before you post, “is this actually useful?”

Every single thing you ever post should be useful to your ICP. I really would not deviate from this at all. Useful is somewhat subjective, but you will see a lot of people (let’s call them idiots) post things doing a variety of things such as:

Shit-posting and/or posting funny stuff is hit-or-miss. It is actually really “useful” if you are actually funny, but most people simply aren’t, and it becomes a real negative to see this kind of thing.

Realistically, you should ask yourself “how is this useful?” before you hit publish on every piece of content. If you cannot immediately answer this question (to yourself) in like 0.1 seconds, then it probably shouldn’t be posted. It should be obvious. You should not need to think about or try to justify why it is useful. It should be self-evident.

The next test is more of a test to gauge quality and “value.” It is called the VAR Test.

VAR stands for:

“Value” is quite subjective, so in this formula we ask a simple question, and this is usually done on a “sliding scale” based on how long the content is.

Valuable: Would you pay $50 to watch this YouTube video?

Essentially, even though it is free and publicly posted on YouTube, would you pay $50 to watch it? If the answer is no, then it probably isn’t valuable enough.

We can slide this scale based on the length of the content because in a very real way, people are paying. They are just paying with their time instead of money.

For something like an Instagram Reel, it may be "would you pay $5 to watch this?” to reflect the shorter time.

The next is Actionable, and we have talked about this before. We ultimately Own A Keyword by giving out free advice, then using the advice, getting a result (for free), and then wanting more (and ultimately paying us).

Actionable: Is there a clear plan or series of action steps they can take in the next 24 hours?

We want them to get results for free. We don’t want to hide this or make it difficult for them to understand what to do. That would be super counterproductive to our goals. 

In each piece of content, especially longer pieces like YouTube, we should seriously lay out what they should do after each step or video. Make it super obvious. Create lead magnets or checklists for each video helping them do so. You will get them on your email list in exchange for these too.

The final piece is the content should be readable or easy to consume if it is a video. This basically means that you want to have one idea and/or image per slide. You also want to make use of checklists and bullet points, etc. Everything you can do to make it easier to read without diluting the message.

Readable: Is there one image or idea per headline?

This applies both in terms of video and written content. Written content I think is very easy to understand, but for video, you should either create your underlying asset (that you are reading via screenshare) or edit the video to where the same end-effect is reached.

The VAR Test is a high-level rule that will ensure all of your content helps you Own A Keyword. The Useful Test will be that final check to see if you should post the content at all.

Making Your Own Philosophy

By far the best way to achieve everything we talked about so far is to “make your own philosophy.” This is one of the core pieces of this overall business philosophy (haha, proof of concept), and will have an extremely in-depth process on its own, but it is hard to do everything we talked about up to this point without having this.

You become a minnow in an ocean. You don’t stand out. There is nothing cool or interesting or enlightening about you. You just become a “copy and paste” personal brand. Not a great place to be.

Let’s look at how “making your own philosophy” would impact each step:

For the 7/11/4 Rule, it sounds fairly logical that if you had your own philosophy for how a business in your ICP should run or what someone should do that the average person would spend more time watching your videos (fulfilling seven hours) and that you would basically have endless things to talk and post about (11 touchpoints and four platforms).

For the Problems & Circumstances Of Your ICP, it sounds fairly logical that this philosophy or system would be specifically designed to solve as many of those problems as possible in a way that is seamless and efficient.

For Fans, Not Followers & Value, Not Views it sounds fairly logical that having a philosophy or system that people “buy into” is the ultimate form of creating fans and providing value to your ICP.

For A Binge-able Series Of Content, it sounds very logical that having a philosophy with every video built around is the ultimate way to get people to binge. I can think of nothing better to be honest.

For Your Face Being The Hook/Thumbnail, it sounds very logical that if they really love you and your philosophy, they will click on basically anything.

So, it basically maximizes your chance of achieving every single point here.

Without having a philosophy, I think it is extremely difficult to achieve any of them, let alone all of them because the opposite would be true for all of the points above.

In addition to that, having your own philosophy for how things should be done in your ICP protects you from AI, competitors and copycats. It will make you a “one-of-one” and that is great in 2026, 2027 and beyond where competition online is more fierce than it has ever been.

We will talk about creating your own philosophy in its own complete section, but this serves as a preview above.

Hope this email was worth your time,

Matthew Larsen

PS. Work with me in my Skool group at https://skool.com/leadgenerationacademy