Well, here we are.
As I write this, it’s April 1st, and the only fool I can see is me 9 months ago, sitting on my hands not sure what direction to take.
Luckily, I’ve left that guy in the rearview mirror (hopefully for good), and it’s been an epic 6 months of planning, executing, and moving the needle.
I never got around to rolling out a 2024 Q1 Goals post because:
- I was a bit overwhelmed with how to proceed.
- I just didn’t get around to it.
Which isn’t to say that I didn’t have plans and ambitions, I just didn’t bother to write them down and instead decided to work on acting on them!
WooHoo!
That being said, it’s time to go over a recap of what I’ve accomplished since January 1st and let you know what’s in store for Q2. I’ve got a lot of plans in the pipeline, and I’m really excited to share them with you.
First up….a Q1 recap!
While I accomplished a lot in Q1, I’m going to focus on updates around:
- The Ground Control Launch
- Social Media Engagement & Growth
- Learning & Education
- Building & Launching Ground Control
As many of you know, I’ve spent a lot of time launching and growing my new venture Ground Control, and I’m incredibly proud of what I’ve accomplished up to this point.
If you’re interested in taking a peek back through the first, do so here, and if you’d like to make sure you’re on the receiving end of all future editions, you can sign up for my weekly newsletter here.
Ultimately, Ground Control is a place for me to publish my writing, thoughts, and perspectives on Entrepreneurship, Community Building & Self-awareness. The thesis driving this mission is that in going through the process of writing and sharing my ideas, I’ll begin to chip away at what comes next in my entrepreneurial endeavors.
I’m thrilled to say, as you’ll find in the Q2 section, that my thesis is so far proving out and that between my owned email list and the LinkedIn edition of the weekly Ground Control newsletter, we’ve grown to just shy of 500 readers in the first three months.
While I hadn’t set specific goals for list & readership growth, I’m pretty thrilled with what I’ve accomplished thus far.
In Q2, I plan to deploy a more deliberate effort at growing my email list via outreach to new connections that share my interests, challenges, and POV as well as connecting with my network of colleagues, friends, and supporters.
I intentionally didn’t give a full-court press to engage too many people with an outbound strategy because I wanted to see what my writing and content could produce on its own. Now that I have a baseline, I can start to turn up the acquisition efforts.
Onward!
Awareness Efforts on Radar
As much as it would be wonderful to only need to write a weekly newsletter, press publish and let it work its magic, the reality is actually quite different.
While I know that my subscriber count will only increase, the way that happens is through active engagement measures in the public space; i.e., Social Media.
The real lever of my Q1 success has actually been via LinkedIn & X (formerly Twitter) engagement. In fact, most common wisdom would tell you I’ve been wasting my time publishing long form on my platforms at all.
While I don’t agree that my publishing of newsletters and blogs has been a waste of time, I can 100% confirm that the most important aspect of generating feedback and dialogue has happened via LinkedIn.
Before people know to come looking for you and your ideas, you first need to show up where they already are and prove you have something to contribute that’s worthwhile. LinkedIn has so far been my place for that!
In Q2, I’ll be aiming to do three specific things in my LinkedIn engagement efforts:
- Continue to connect with new readers by contributing to threads, articles, and other people's content with thoughtful and valuable contributions.
- Design a strategy to more closely align my LinkedIn content writing with my weekly newsletter. Towards the end of March, I started to test the coming week’s newsletter topics in LinkedIn posts to gauge interest. So far, that’s provided great insight so I’m going to create a system that more easily allows me to write, deploy, and measure social posts so I can improve the newsletter value bit by bit.
- Begin to test the waters for a Q3 project via DM outreach to a specific cohort of entrepreneurs. While I’ll stay mum on it further at the moment, if it shows me what I expect, you’ll be hearing more about it in July.
Onward!
What I Learned
I would be remiss to not mention all of the incredible things I’ve learned over the last 3 months.
When I started this new journey, I knew that learning new things would be critical in helping me rapidly evolve my perspective and insights.
From social media engagement to copywriting to community building, I’ve been extremely active in soaking up every last bit of content and inspiration I can get my hands on.
Suffice it to say, the volume of communities, newsletters, and people out there who are willing to sincerely connect, share what they know and point you in the right direction is inspiring.
The three places that I found the most inspiration and learned the most applicable knowledge were in a Skool group dedicated to entrepreneurs building communities online, countless newsletters about copywriting, entrepreneurship, and growing from zero-1 and a plethora of podcasts that powered my workouts and morning runs with ambitious dreams and schemes.
I can’t recommend highly enough how important it is to FILL YOUR BRAIN with new ideas. Not to an unhealthy degree, and you can definitely do too much learning and not enough action but…if you’re in a rut, education, exercise, and sleep are your lifesavers in waiting.
So take advantage of them!
Onward!
Q2 the Horizon Beckons
Now that we’ve covered all that I accomplished in Q1 it’s time to move on to what I see as the most exciting plans on the immediate horizon that will allow me to continue building on what I’ve started, add some exciting new projects into the mix and lay the foundation for Q3 &Q4.
Back in December when I was preparing to launch Ground Control, I didn’t bother to set out goals or projections so it feels like a win to be able to forecast far enough into the future and make plans accordingly.
And so…here's what I'm planning.
- Refine the Ground Control mission statement, and earn my first $1. I know it seems small but $1 comes before $100, comes before $1,000,000.
The last three months have been about writing my ideas down, getting them out there, and seeing who they resonate with. Now it's time to start rounding my offerings into form! - Launch Baltimore Creators, an online community for creators, entrepreneurs, and founders I've been planning! Ever since I founded Startup Soiree, I've been scheming on how I can build something with greater purpose and impact that serves the entrepreneurial landscape here in Baltimore.
Baltimore Creators is going to do just that! I've got crazy ideas for this one! If this sounds like something for you, you can get on the list to be notified when it launches here. - Record and launch a course that will power affiliate and partner sales for Pixilated. While we've had an affiliate program in place for a few years, we're overhauling it and doing something brand new.
This next venture will target #sidehustle entrepreneurs and help us build a massive network of partners across the U.S.A all while helping college students, moms & #eventprofs add incremental side income to their daily life. - Relaunch Startup Soirée as a monthly Town Hall-style IRL gathering for entrepreneurs. The focus here won't be on networking so much as on connecting so we can determine what our ecosystem needs most and plan to accomplish that together.
Again, if you’re an entrepreneur or creator here in Baltimore I would be delighted to have you in our community. To stay informed about our first event, you can sign up here.
Conclusion
Honestly, I've got more plans in the hopper than what I've shared but these are the major projects I'm focused on for this quarter.
Ultimately, I am thrilled about what’s in store and really honored and grateful that all of you have decided to come along for this journey.
My greatest hope is that my writing and the projects I’m building will serve you in finding your path forward on your next pursuit.
If there’s something in this email that resonates with you or that you’re trying to accomplish yourself, please let me know how I can help. We all do best when we lift each other up; and that’s something I’m 100% here for.
That being said
What do you have planned? I'd love to hear what's on deck for your Q2 and beyond.
Until next time.
This is Ground Control
- Patrick
