6 Tactics From Jake Paul’s Marketing Strategy | How To Grow Your Youtube and Twitter
This article will explain the strategy behind:
Calling out Conor Mcgregor
Throwing water balloons at Dillon Danis
Advocating for fighter pay
Boxing Bullies
Opting to fight Tommy Fury
“Beefing” with Dana White
*The power of adjacent audiences (Nelk and Bradly Martyn)
1) Calling out Conor Mcgregor (use audience)
After defeating Ben Askren, Jake Paul challenged Conor McGregor to a boxing match.
McGregor is one of the biggest names in UFC history. Skillwise, he’s way out of Paul’s league. The thing is, the type of fans that were attracted to Mcgregor may also be attracted to Jake Paul - both are charismatic, verbose, have knockout power, etc.
So while Paul never got a response from McGregor, he did get the attention of Mcgregor’s fans.
He actually became the number one Google search result for “Conor McGregor” for an entire week after the Ben Askren fight.
That is a huge win in and of itself.
2) Throwing water balloons at Dillon Danis (use audience)
Jake Paul drove past Dillon Danis in public and launched water balloons at him from the bed of a pickup truck.
Since then, Danis has Tweeted about Jake Paul incessantly.
He’s relatively unknown outside of combat sports but has over 250k MMA fans following him on Twitter.
In other words, once again, Jake Paul has found a way to reach the exact type of person that would be interested in following his boxing career.
3) Advocating For Fighter Pay (attract journalists)
Over the years, in the world of UFC, fighter pay has been a hot topic.
Jake Paul has voiced his opinion on the issue repeatedly and prominently, even donating $5,000 to female fighter, Sarah Alpar.
This is brilliant. Paul is raising awareness around an issue that many up-and-coming fighters run into. It earns him respect from those who participate in the sport and also provides journalists with material to write about, keeping his name trending across the internet.
5) Boxing Bullies (attract journalists)
He’s supporting disadvantaged youth through boxing lessons.
I’m not saying this (or the fighter pay stance) is purely a marketing tactic. I believe Jake wants to do some good in the world. Why not?
Though, the top businesses in the world strive to align their corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives with their overall business strategy. Tactics that do good in the world and positively impact business are the holy grail of CSR.
These last two examples show Paul is achieving this gracefully.
5) Opting to fight Tommy Fury (listening to audience)
The fight with Tommy Fury shows that Jake Paul listens to his audience.
He’s received criticism for fighting older guys who aren’t real boxers.
So he selects Tommy Fury, a young man with a professional boxing record.
The opponent selection is genius for a couple of reasons:
Fury’s name is hot right now because his older brother recently knocked out Deontay Wilder
Fury is in all likelihood an easier opponent than Woodley, there’s just a public perception that he’d be a harder fight
6) Beefing with Dana White (use audience)
Jake Paul has called out Dana White for being greedy and having a cocaine addiction.
Journalists at the next few UFC press conferences naturally ask Dana White if he’s heard the comments. Dana has even made a video responding to Jake Paul.
Why call out Dana White? He doesn’t even fight. What’s the angle? Simple - Dana White’s followers are willing to pay $69.99 for a pay-per-view fight.
This is the exact audience Jake Paul needs to earn more money as a boxer - most of his fans lean younger and won’t pay $70 to watch a night of fights. Dana has the fans Jake wants, and so it makes sense to engage with him.
His strategic pursuit to win over UFC fans shows how valuable it can be to target existing fanbases and audiences.
What if you don’t want to “play the villain” though? After all, Jake Paul receives a lot of hate and not everyone is going to be comfortable with that.
Perhaps Bradley Martyn and the Nelk Boys provide a solution.
The Power of Targeting Adjacent Audiences
The Nelk Boys went viral a few years ago for doing prank videos on Youtube. They frequently drink alcohol, party, and talk about girls in the videos as well. Bradley Martyn has been internet-famous for years. He posts videos on weightlifting tips, work ethic in the gym, supplements and nutrition advice, and fitness more generally.
At first glance, outside of each having millions of subscribers, these two Youtube channels have absolutely nothing in common.
Yet, both of their audiences consist primarily of high school and college-aged males.
Over the past year, Bradley Martyn has appeared in countless Nelk videos and Nelk has appeared in some Bradley Martyn videos as well.
The type of person that likes Bradley’s videos, likes Nelk’s, and vice versa.
The collaboration is genius and both parties have been able to drastically increase their followings from it.
The key is to identify where your potential audience is already spending their time online and find a way to insert yourself (or your brand) into the conversation.
