For the right business with a Skool group, there is so much potential for Skool's Growth Boost program. I love watching groups take off and thrive with that lovely tailwind! Because I grow primarily with collaborations, my business is not one of them at this moment. Many of the "Skool Network" attributed individuals, as it turns out, are not truly thanks to Growth Boost and/or Skool marketing on my behalf. GROUPS THAT DO WELL WITH GROWTH BOOST: - Bring in a lot of outside traffic - The humans who show up, often join (high conversion %) - Extremely clear niche and "target" "avatar" (But let's be real... they are simply lovely humans who are a good fit for what we offer. The marketing lingo can sometimes feel so very inhumane!) BUT. I have a whole different situation right now. 1️⃣ I love collabs and will be ramping them up. This is my favorite way to grow because when a new friend arrives they are ALREADY connected in a way. So it feels lovely to drop in. 2️⃣ ALSO FYI: We have the affiliate % turned up to 50% for now, and that feels like a great way to grow! AND 3️⃣ IS THE REAL CHARM / A QUICK ATTRIBUTION STORY. It's about a friend I adore. He's a super cool guy, and I joined his paid group. But before I did, I waited and got his direct link. He DM'd me the link, I joined his group at that exact second without clicking anywhere else. Guess who got the attribution? SKOOL NETWORK got it. Whattt?! Right now a lovely team member at Skool is looking into this to understand because that's not the intended design. BUT -- I don't need her to do that research for me to know with 100% certainty exactly what I did. I was intentional about the whole thing. Making sure that I clicked the message then joined his group directly and immediately from his direct link. He's my friend and someone I want to learn from, not some rando who's group got placed in my face. This leaves me with some real questions about attribution. THAT + MY SITUATION DOES NOT MEAN: 1. This glitch is consistently happening (my hope is this was an anomaly) 2. Growth Boost is bad 3. YOU should turn it off for your group

As mentioned on Tuesday's Skool News, there would be some wonkiness and changes in Discovery. We now have a new algorithm. What I believe is that Skool's new efficiency score is almost exclusively what is determining the ranking. It looks at conversion rates, traffic, income and revenue, but also the Growth Boost percentage (we have the option to slide from 30% all the way up to giving Skool 70% of our revenue in order to get more traffic). And perhaps other details I've missed or simply am not privy to. In practice, that means that "trending" is almost more like an auction or marketplace for how much revenue a group can bring to Skool, rather than a more traditional meaning of how popular something is. This is way more than popularity. The 30 communities on page 1 more or less show which groups Skool's algorithm currently sees as the most profitable / "efficient" to promote. THE FORMULA IS LIKE THIS: Expected value per visitor ≈ Conversion rate * expected customer LTV * Growth Boost percentage (and then some other bits that surely factor in, like the amount of traffic a group is sending to Skool) MORE PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS - A lot of the Platinum program folks are there (meaning: those supported by Skool's platinum program, with at least 1/3 who were in it) - Many have huge audiences and are likely sending a lot of traffic to Skool - Most didn't have tiers OR had simple tiers dynamic (24 out of 30 didn't have tiers, in the top 10 NONE of them had tiers!) - ZERO free or freemium groups - Many of the groups are way more expensive than just a couple weeks ago what you'd see on page 1. Now the average entry price is around $100 - The majority have at least 100k followers - Vast majority have strong promises or guarantees --> first client in 90 day, $1k/day, $2k/mo, get hired, get funded, hit $100k/mo, close on the first call, money-back guarantee - More than 2/3 have an annual plan and those are often steeply discounted I created a spreadsheet documenting all 30 communities -- including their rank, prices, tiers, membership, owner audiences, annual discounts, links, and several calculated comparisons. I've shared the complete spreadsheet inside Focused Founders. An AMAZING group of humans, many of whom own Skools and are highly collaborative lovely founders!

There's so much more to the story, but I'm headed to an IRL meetup and need to come back to this to share the full scoop. I'm not even concerned about potentially paying commission to Skool that's not "correctly" attributed. I'm thinking way bigger than that. But for now... If you're seeing this post and have insights on it, share yours in the comments! (You don't have to love it, but I always appreciate staying respectful!! 😅 P.S. My traffic looks about the same for these couple days with it back on, but again... thinking bigger and longer here...!!! OH the mystery! 🫠🙂

If you're not familiar with the finer details of Growth Boost, this post will help. While I have kept Growth Boost on for THIS group, it's off for my main group: Focused Founders™ So here's what happened >> #1 / WE DISAPPEARED FROM DISCOVERY. - My group was #1 for "Focused". Now it's not there at all for that keyword. - My group was #1 for "Founders". Now it's not there at all for that keyword, either. - My group was also, of course, #1 for the name of the group "Focused Founders". Even that is hidden. - You previously could search my name and find my group. That also doesn't work. #2 / TRAFFIC WENT... UP. - It's slight. But this is funny. - Traffic went up the next day, not down! #3 / I'M RESPONSIBLE FOR MY GROWTH. - This means: no cold traffic from ads. - And: no cold traffic from Discovery. - But: no 30% lifetime tax for friends in my network who click my profile to join my group. - And: those who join are likely to come across my YouTube, LinkedIn, workshops, posts, comments, etc... so they have SOME kind of relationship when they join and are more likely to be kindred spirits. This feels good! OUR #1 SOURCE OF GROWTH? It's always been relationships. Showing up for members and friends, showing up in a thoughtful way, just... showing up and caring! I love my Skool network, and despite not aligning with the way this new program was released, turning OFF the Growth Boost helps me to feel good about remaining here. I felt an immediate relief on turning it off, funny enough. I don't even mind being hidden! 😅 Fun Fact: When I joined Skool in 2023, the Discovery didn't even exist! This doesn't really impact my world in any major way because I never have relied on Skool to hand me clients. I will be doubling down on what works, which is generally a great idea anyways! SKOOL GROUP OWNERS: What are you doing about this? Keeping it on? Turning it off? Watching and waiting? Or... something else?!

If you have missed all the recent Skool News, this is what's current: ✅ Growth Boost Lifetime 30% Commission. This is a lifetime commission for members who join any paid offer in your group, if they joined the group via Skool Network. It includes members who join your group because: 1. they visited your profile (example: if you were to click on my profile after reading a post like this in a group, that is "Skool Network" or if I gave a workshop in a group and you saw my post about it, that is "Skool Network") 2. they were targeted by a FB ad paid for by Skool 3. they found your group in the Discovery 4. they saw your group on someone else's profile and clicked to check it out. The 30% commission does not apply when they click a link you provide them and they then DIRECTLY GO TO and join your group immediately without clicking around in a way that causes attribution to be reset. (It's last-touch attribution. So, let's say you have a free group and paid group. Between being in the free group and paid group, if they become part of the network, Skool takes the lifetime 30% commission.) It also does not apply when a member joins from an affiliate link provided by one of your affiliates. AS OF YESTERDAY, the most recent news is that they will be penalizing groups that have a link in their about page of any kind (presumably because this can change the attribution and no longer be the Skool Network). Soon they will also HIDE the sidebar links (that show up on Desktop only if you have a pro plan). I assume that will coincide with the Discovery penalties that will begin on next Tuesday, for those groups who have a link. This even includes a link, for example, to reviews of your group. This post is mostly to be sure you're aware about 1/ links 2/ making sure to join groups and share links intentionally 3/ how the Growth Boost program works 🙂 If you have any questions, I will probably know the answer but if not, we can find out! In just under 3 hours, I'll have a 60-minute call that digs into this + open conversation for the final 30 minutes.