Vin Clancy – Ace the Game; Growth Hacks, getting off Welfare; Burnout

Vin Clancy is an infamous growth hacker that went from being on social welfare in the UK to winning best speaker at SXSW V2V for his growth hacking talk, finishing a 100-date world tour, and earning six figures on his debut growth hacking book.  Vin created one of the biggest marketing communities on Facebook, and moved to L.A., where he teaches companies how to rapidly grow their audiences and businesses.  Vin is on a mission to speak truth to the many lies some internet marketers tell. He’s ready to debunk myths and share growth hacks for any industry related to your audience.
Vin Clancy Vroom Veer Stories

What is a growth hack?  How to companies grow some big without traditional advertising?  Example:  Lyft drivers give away $20 off your first ride...that's a growth hack
How did you earn 6 figures on a book with a book publisher?  With a viral queue!  You drive traffic to a landing page and give them freebies for sharing on social; they were among the first folks to try this hack; the also did a thunderclap; got 100 people to post on Facebook at the same time
Was both slammed by Wired and praised by Vice for his Tribute to Harambe.  He raised 5K on Kickstarter to hold the "tribute" event which was poking fun at the viral meme instead of the tragic event.
One night he met a girl and was late into work the next day; he was fired (sacked); he decided not to get another job; lived in a broken down house with water dripping from the roof; he had a roommate (flat mate) who get high and steal his food
2011 Lewisham riots'; Lived through looters banging on the doors
Got the startup bug after watching The Social Network; met a 17 year old kid who he partnered with to start a business; read a ton of books on starting a business
Guardianship scheme; you look after a place to protect it from squatters moving in; the mafia showed up and asked him to squat for pay instead of cheap rent; he didn't take that deal
Was briefly homeless; found another place through the Guardianship scheme for very cheap rent but the place was cold and damp and the heating broke
Had to buy an electric heater; which eats electricity; the flat had a coin-op meter for the electricity
Had a dream and woke up and registered planetivy.com a global news site where the writers were the stats not musicians;  offered university student writers the opportunity to write on their site
Within 10 months the site had over a million views; they can a public talk and someone that had just left Facebook approached them about getting investors; shortly there after they were funded with a quarter of a million dollars and Vin got off Welfare
 The last day of his job; Justin Bieber was two hours late to the stage and he had to deal with the ticket holder complaints
He started another spin off site that grew rapidly called ScreenRobot.com
Accepted into the prestigious "Techstars" accelerator in 2014; and then launched a growth-hacking agency to help companies hack growth
His friend had a no-parents allowed club house with a pool table, DJ Decks and they managed to find some beer to enjoy England defeat Germany 5-1
Feels now like he did sign a deal with the devil; yes he has enjoyed success and some wealth but he now realizes he is burning himself out

Vin Clancy Connections
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