Marketing <for> Programmers
Marketing <for> Programmers
Primer on SEO, Conversion Rate Optimization, Paid Adverts (Adwords, Facebook Ads), Google Analytics, and Copywriting
About the Book
Six years ago, I programmed a web app, but it didn’t get much traffic, so I started researching everything on online marketing. I thought the best way to learn would be from other marketers, so I started a private Berlin-based marketing group with consultants and company owners. Through these sessions, I was privy to tactics from marketers working with companies like Goldman Sachs, Amazon Audible, Delivery Hero, Research Gate, etc. To balance things off, I also conferred with peeps active in the darker side of internet marketing, like shady coupon website owners and fitness ebook sellers.
The book, which is the product of these sessions and my own experiments in applying the ideas, outlines a multi-modal system for growing a website. It dips into SEO, Google AdWords/Facebook Ads, Conversion Optimisation, Copywriting/Classic Persuasion/Behavioural Psychology, Google Analytics, Statistical Significance, Email Marketing, and Remarketing.
I relegate the explanation of implementation details to footnoted links and instead focus on explaining the overarching principles and mental models needed to start dabbling in each area. I hope to get you 80% of the way there, leaving the rest to specialised texts on each topic.
My book has a special focus that will appeal to the programmer crowd in that it goes into detail on the issues that websites face when implementing online marketing strategies, like domain names choice pitfalls, internationalisation woes, and potential for keyword cannibalisation through URL structures.
Table of Contents
Part A: Search Engine Optimisation
- Intro to SEO
- SEO: First Steps
- SEO on Each Individual Page
- Ensure You Can Satisfy a Visitor’s Searching Intention
- Research What Currently Ranks
- Place Your Keyword in the URLs
- Place Your Keywords in the Title Tag
- Include Your Keyword Early in the HTML
- Carefully Craft a Unique Meta Description
- Ensure Your Website Makes Sense to Googlebot
- Include Rich Snippets and Structured Data
- Every Page Should Include a Picture
- Write Longer Pages
- SEO at the Whole-Website Level
- SEO by Mitigating Duplicate Content Issues
- SEO in Image Search
- SEO Through Backlinks
- SEO Vis-à-Vis Social Media
- SEO and Internationalisation
Part B: Copywriting
- Copywriting
- Emphasise Benefits Over Features
- Convincingly Demonstrate Credibility
- Give Reasons to Act Now as Opposed to Later
- Prefer Concrete, Visual, Specific Copy
- Ensure Scannability, Readability, and Responsiveness
- Signal with Indirect or Unworded Messages
- Explicitly Point Out Qualities, Lest They Go Unnoticed
- Compare Yourself to the Competition
- Anticipate and Counter Objections
- Associate Yourself with Desirable Connotations
- Repeat Yourself
- Don’t Talk Yourself out of Markets
- Keep the Scent
- Arouse Curiosity
- Play on Negativity
- Anchor Numbers
- Give Detailed Information
- Depict Yourself as Someone Similar to Your Readers
Part C: Analytics
- Google Analytics
- Why Bother with Analytics?
- Workflow Tips
- Connect to Other Google Products
- Location of Snippet in HTML
- Cross-Browser and Cross-Device Tracking (Used ID)
- Subdomain Blues
- Cleanup Noise, Chaff, and Distortion
- Analytics and Social Media
- Illuminating Analytics Blind Spots
- Collect Your On-Site Search Queries
- Measuring Success
- Precautions
- Be Disciplined in Making Annotations
- Send Alerts
- Analytics Blocking
Part D: Conversion Optimisation
Part E: Statistical Significance
Part F: Email Marketing
Part G: Paid Advertising
- Introduction to Paid Advertising
- Paid Advertising: First Steps
- Paid Advertising: Staying Organised
- Paid Advertising: Targeting
- Paid Advertising: Ad Creatives
- Paid Advertising: Strategic Principles
- Paid Advertising: Debugging and Optimisation
- What Advertising Platforms Want
- Stay Empirical
- How Much Should I Start Off Bidding With?
- What’s the Most I Should Ever Bid?
- When Metrics Mislead You
- Overcoming Low Reach
- Overcoming Low CTR
- Overcoming Low Quality Score (Google-Specific)
- Overcoming Low Relevance Score (Facebook-Specific)
- Overcoming High CPC
- Overcoming High CPA
- The End
Causes Supported

The Innocence Project
Help Free the Innocent
http://www.innocenceproject.orgThe Innocence Project provides pro-bono post conviction legal assistance to individuals who are seeking to prove their innocence with DNA testing and works to enact the reforms needed to prevent wrongful conviction and incarceration.
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