As a content creator, most of what I've done on the web isn't all that great.
But I can point to a few places on the web that have it going on, and it puts a smile on my face.
One such place is my Cool Serial Facebook group, and I'll explain how it got up to 21,763 members from a single blog post.
I wrote a blog post
In my travels around the Web, I happened on a currency-collecting topic called fancy serial numbers. When I read about it, I was surprised I hadn't heard about it before as much as I like numbers and money.
Currency collectors will pay a premium for bills with certain kinds of serial numbers, like ladders (12345678), repeaters (24682468), low serials (00000007), solids (88888888), or flippers (96096096).
More so what struck me was how much currency had gone through my hands that I had never paid attention to the serial number. I could have hit the jackpot any number of times, but I just bought a soda with the money instead.
I wrote this post about it on my blog in September 2016 and went on with life.
People commented and emailed me
In March of the following year, I began getting comments on that post. People had found a serial number they thought was worth something, searched Google, and happened onto my post. and asked me about it.
And I answered those comments for quite a while. I was just happy people were visiting the post.
The comments kept coming. Then I started getting emails from people asking about their bills. I answered them.
What took me a bit by surprise was that I'd get questions about serial numbers on totally unrelated posts. Maybe people thought they'd get my attention better if they snuck in the side door or something.
I realized that an audience was showing up
At some point, I got a bit smarter about things.
When I answered people's questions directly, they got what they wanted, and left.
Once in a while, that's fine, but after dozens of people did this, I realized that these weren't isolated interested people.
This was an audience. And if done properly, it was a market.
And it showed up in my lap. I did little else except write a post that got some traction. (Answering questions in the comments probably helped things.)
I don't remember the exact order I introduced these but instead of answering people's questions outright, I offered these options:
- Pay me a small amount of money and I'll answer your question directly
- Buy my ebook to learn about the hobby and how to price bills to sell
- Join a Facebook group and get questions answered there
If people didn't just move on, they most often joined the Facebook group, because it was free.
Setting up and building the Cool Serial Facebook group
I created the Cool Serial Facebook group in August 2017. I remember for quite a while no people were signing up for it (probably because it was a bit tumbleweed there) but then people started showing up.
The group was public at first, meaning that anyone could see who posted what. People still had join to post in the group.
At about 1,000 members, I made the group private at the request of more and more of the members. This helped to make the members feel more comfortable posting in the group.
Other than that, I was just super-supportive
The main observation I had about other similar currency-collecting groups was that a number of them just weren't welcoming of new members. They catered to experienced collectors and dealers, and beginners either got a thick skin really quickly, or left.
I decided that my group was going to be different, mainly for the reason that I wasn't a serious collector but instead a numbers geek who liked patterns and math, and liked treasure-hunting money.
I'm sure a fair number of serious collectors left because of all of the “noise” and “spender” bills that people were posting, but I didn't care. There were, and still are, plenty of groups that have less noise than mine, and that's fine!
What being welcoming and supportive did accomplish, though, was that it kept a lot of members around.
Facebook brought me a lot more members
At some point, Facebook's recommendation algorithm kicked in and they started sending me a lot of new members.
Around 10,000 members I had to ask for help moderating the group. Sometimes (not often) things would get out of hand too quickly for me to take care of things at a moment's notice.
Taking on a couple of moderators (my lovely wife and a currency dealer who mostly got what I was going for and would play along) gave me more eyes on the content before it was posted. In general, this improved the quality of the posts and helped to stave off spammers and fraudsters.
Other than that, Facebook is doing the most to grow the group. At the beginning of 2024, there was a surge in new member requests. While the last months of 2023 gave me (mostly) a few new members a day, 4 January 2024 gave me over 100 new members just by itself. Actually, most of January was great. It tailed off in February a bit (“only” about 15 new members a day) and now during the first few days of March it's up again, to a few dozen per day.
Today, 7 March 2024, my group stands at 21,763 members.
So to summarize how I built a 21,763-member Facebook group from a single blog post …
- I wrote a blog post. I didn't know it was going to take off like it did, but I wrote it anyway.
- It got traction in Google, and people showed up asking me questions.
- I eventually saw what was happening and stopped answering questions one by one.
- I sent people to a Facebook group I set up.
- I nurtured the group there and shaped the environment and identity.
- Facebook's algorithm liked what it saw and has taken over the marketing for me.
Now I have a fairly powerful audience for related money things and social proof that speaks for itself in the membership numbers.
(header image by Nicholas Green on Unsplash)