I sold my successful seven-figure agency to lead The Content Hacker.
My small, high-level core team and I are here to bring heart AND profit back into marketing. You CAN have both – despite what you’ve heard.
Stick around for the reality of growing online, without selling your soul or losing all your time.
Defining a Content Hacker
Content hacking: implementing and building growth-focused content marketing strategies.
Content hacker: Noun. A content hacker is a practitioner of growth-focused strategies. They are bent on 10x’ing their businesses with long-lasting, ROI-bringing content.
Can you guarantee that you (or your client’s) business will grow through every blog you publish?
Most can’t. In fact, a ton of content goes to waste – 94% of all blog posts on the web go to waste, earning a total of zero backlinks. (Backlinko)
Yet, look at these statistics when content is created in a way that brings growth:
- SEO will send you 1000%+ more traffic than organic social media. (BrightEdge)
- 53.3% of all website traffic (7 billion searches/day) comes from organic search. (BrightEdge)
- 60% of marketers say that inbound (SEO, blog content, etc) is their highest quality source of leads. (HubSpot)
- SEO leads have a 14.6% close rate. (HubSpot)
As the founder of a former 100-person writing agency, I’ve forged a well-oiled empire on the basis of knowing exactly how to create content that works (aka, content hacking).
I turned a $75 investment I made at 19 years old, into a thriving business with $5M in sales, 40,000 projects completed, and 5,000 clients served.
I did it by hiring an amazing team, a ton of failures before my successes, and learning on the fly. My sole marketing method? Content.
Serving my people through The Content Hacker is some of the most rewarding work I do in my day.
My content techniques not only get results, they help content writers, agency creatives, and small business CEOs make a difference to their bottom lines.
But who am I? What’s my story?
If you’re into long-form, keep reading.
I Want
You In
My Club!
Let’s Hack Together
Yes! I’m ready to exploit best practices in favor of what works. I want to be a part of Julia’s proven hacks and the Content Hacker community!
Hi, I’m Julia McCoy.
I help creative entrepreneurs get their online content strategy, skills & systems down for massive revenue.
At the age of 19, I dropped out of college to follow my passion and start a writing agency out of my last $75.
I put incredible sweat and hard work into my dream, and grew my business to over $5M in sales and nearly 90 team members on staff. I’ve gone on to launch seven brands in total.
(Two of which completely failed. You learn from failure, too.)
I did not get to my success by accident.
I built my successful businesses 100% through value-focused, reader-first content. I put into place great content marketing, and it drove my entire customer base to me – to the tune of $250,000 months, at the height of my agency.
Now, I’m VP of Marketing at one of the fastest-growing AI writing tools in the space – Content at Scale.
Here’s how I’ve built every business – mine and others’:
Content marketing (consistent content with a consistent strategy), combined with a strong brand presence (website).
I believe that this is possible for anyone.
You just need to be consistently great at your website content marketing. Your website needs to KILL IT in design and structure.
I’ve written books about this topic, because it’s so important to me. You can get my books on Amazon, Walmart, and Barnes & Noble.
So You Think You Can Write has been purchased over 3,000 times. And Practical Content Strategy & Marketing has been read in over 90 countries worldwide.
My third book, Woman Rising, has had over 1,000 readers in a single DAY organically on Amazon during debut launch week on February, 2020.
Skip the Degree, Save the Tuition and Content Burnout, have earned great feedback.
My new back-to-the-basics primer, Content Writer’s Handbook, is a star favorite because of the AI writing advice (along with key fundamentals) inside.
But before any of this, there was a long road I’ll always remember.
The story begins.
Julia’s Work Has Been Featured In
Raised just outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, I knew I loved writing from a very early age.
But here’s my unbelievable childhood reality…
I was raised in a cult.
Yes, a real-life cult – where every day, I was forced to wear long dresses, locked in my room at night, given a list of infinite rules, and at 13 years old, forced to sign a document that kept me in slavery in my father’s cult. All of these things and much more were not only wrong, they were illegal – but I didn’t know it at the time. (How can you, when you’re brainwashed in this environment by your own father?)
What a difference 10 years makes – 2012 vs. 2018, via my Instagram:
The dumps of Pittsburgh, side streets and alleys that made you question your personal safety if walking at night. This was my childhood scenery.
View this post on Instagram
Prior to the launch of my book Woman Rising, I didn’t talk about this side of my life and actually hid it from the public for the first five years out of the near-decade I’ve been out. As a woman in business, it’s been difficult to bring this up publicly. (Telling your story, however, is freedom. And it can be liberating, I’ve found, for others to hear too.)
I broke out in 2012.
I was born into the cult, imprisoned at birth, and subjected to a life that nearly broke me. I considered suicide at 19 years old. The religious and hour-by-hour constraints and punishments I was kept under negated any joy I had.
To escape the regime and abuse, my escape was my passion. Writing. My childhood revolved around the stories I wrote and read, and my imagination gave me a much-needed outlet of escape and dreams. The reality in my books were ten times better than the one I lived in.
A very unhappy 16-year-old me, inside of a cult.
Then, my parents were given a computer by an old family friend. I’ll never forget hearing the modem connect at 7 years old. I knew, somehow, that my future was tied to this magical realm.
Growing up, my parents couldn’t afford to feed or clothe me many times.
Using our donated computer, I turned to the internet, and decided to try to make money.
I earned my first paycheck at 13 years old filling out surveys.
There was one month I earned an entire $350. My father happily took half for his church.
But then… at 19 years old, I found myself failing college and hating life in general.
It was one of the worst years I’ve ever lived through. I even considered suicide.
And then, in the middle of that dark year… I woke up one day with this simple thought:
How can I do what I love, and make money doing it?
I knew the answer: writing. That one simple thought gave me enough fuel to teach myself writing and earn my first clients, all within just three months.
My simple little goal was to create some of the best content on the web.
(This still fuels me today, and especially comes through BIGTIME in our website services.)
When I failed my semester at college, I focused on my writing. I put 90-hour work weeks in, called leads every day, and made sure I was always on time and consistent with quality in everything I did.
I also learned as much as I could every day. Before I knew it (in less than three months!), I was running a small business!
I’m so thankful I decided to follow my passions. Incidentally, my business actually gave me the means I needed to escape the cult. Through my little writing business, I saved up the cash I needed to buy a car and get out.
The reason I woke up to the fact that I needed to escape was incidentally also my business. When my dad and mom tried to control my profit margins and stop my success, I knew I had to get out. There was no way I could ever see success, joy or happiness in that toxic environment.
And that’s why at 21 years old, I left my father’s church in the middle of the night to escape an increasingly abusive environment.
I met my husband Josh on the internet, and escaped to him in Springfield, Missouri. I set up my first office in an apartment I was able to buy with cash – what a great feeling, to be independent!
Here’s a picture of my very first office. I was so proud of it.
Josh and I married three months after I escaped the cult.
He was the only human there for me when I escaped… in hindsight, it could have gone very badly, but he was the most genuine human I’d ever met.
Our marriage is going on strong eight years, and we just had our second baby in March of 2022. The difference a positive, joyful, affirmative environment makes is unbelievable.
God is good.
And my business grew and grew.
Success, to my surprise, was within my reach.
This picture was taken after I’d been paid $12,000 to travel to California and speak for a half-day on content marketing! #feelingfabulous
I’ve always been curious about entrepreneurship and writing.
To fill you in on more of the story, without giving you the book I wrote on the story…
At the age of 9, I’d filled countless journals full of stories.
One story I loved writing turned into 200 pages and evolved into a full medieval tale with well-developed characters and a central story plot, by the age of 12.
I consumed and read hundreds of books yearly, which set my world alight.
And my ambitions.
Insatiable curiosity led me online…
Scams were everywhere, but I discovered how to avoid them.
Making money online was possible.
When I began writing…
I didn’t just figure out how to make a living by writing.
I learned:
How to write incredible SEO articles
How to rank in the top 3 spots of Google
How to get clients on repeat, without wasting money on ads
But most importantly:
I learned how to do this consistently, again and again.
Our first site was hand-coded by me and a designer in the Philippines. In ten years, we grew it with a custom eCommerce platform and over 1,000 published blogs.
The evolution of our logo says it all:
Some of the first marketing copy I developed for my business was atrocious, but actually earned a couple clients.
I’d print this out and hang it up in different random grocery stores:
I hustled, hard. I got smarter than this first ad – took it down within a month – and switched to a content-first, blog-first approach.
Every year, we began to make more money – good money – but things didn’t really come together for a long time.
I worked hard for five years. Then, in the sixth year, the magic happened ($70k+ months).
But before that, there was mayhem…
I almost lost it all.
Imagine this:
You put your faith in two managers. Then they scam you, breaking your trust and coming close to crushing everything you had worked for.
Their attempts to swipe our client list and clone our products and services cost me a fortune.
But through struggle comes growth.
Starting anew, I was ready to make a stand.
Confident in my knowledge of how to hire. and how to trust, I rebuilt the business even better than before.
Before I sold in 2021, our team became a thriving hub of creativity and passion, full of bright ideas and remarkable strategic moves. Everyday, I felt honored to work with them, helping our clients’ content gain real traction.
Why I believe in risks—and how they’re necessary to success
Ray Bradbury once said:
“First you jump off the cliff, and then you build your wings on the way down.”
I’m where I am now because I took risks.
Today, you can see the impact those risks have had:
- Thousands of international clients around the globe, including household names like Johnson & Johnson, Walmart and Nordstrom.
- A 99% success rate with 40,000 projects in six years of business
- Featured in Forbes
- Over 20,000 organic keyword spots in Google, which accounts for 99% of our new leads and sales.
From the start, I’ve found real happiness working with talented people, discovering how to train them and how to improve their skill-set in writing and strategic content marketing.
Our primary focus has always been to consistently create amazing content – and help others achieve exponential growth through greatness on the internet, too.
That’s why we have the incredible success we enjoy now.
Suddenly, I discovered an opportunity to not only help my business thrive, but also help the industry grow.
When a client invited me to teach his office practical content strategy in 2017, it sparked the idea of creating my first course.
My in-depth research uncovered the truth:
People lacked the knowledge of content marketing – a remarkably profitable skill.
Instantly, I took action.
Consulting with content marketers and industry experts, I put in thousands of hours to create my new course.
And it paid off.
75% of the people who took the initial survey ended up investing at the beta launch.
Recording course content in my beautiful home office (2021)
My journey into teaching is the reason Content Hacker™ was born
Teaching, I’ve found, is incredibly empowering.
It’s beautiful to see other people succeed.
The whole idea of The Content Hacker™ didn’t come from me. Honestly, it started when an agency client called me in 2017 and said, “hey, can you come to our offices and teach what you know?”
I’d been creating content since 2011, and it was second nature to me to create content that earned real results.
Before this call, I’d naively assumed content marketers knew how to be profitable.
I declined the offer, since I didn’t have any formal training created at the time, but that’s when I realized what I knew — profitable content creation — needed to be taught.
I studied content marketing, and was shocked. I found <10% of content marketers were “very successful,” per their own reporting in a CMI B2B benchmark study. It inspired me to get serious.
Since then, I’ve even had the honor of being invited on countless stages to speak and share what I know, including Content Marketing World, the largest conference in the industry.
What makes me the most excited about content marketing are the people in this incredible industry. I absolutely love teaching, guiding, and helping smart people get great at content.
We’ve had over 1,000 students join the Content Hacker Academy, and some of them have had life-changing results.
I believe content greatness happens when you invest in the steps you need to take.
Because when you care about yourself, your quality of knowledge, and who you serve, and you actually invest in making your brand look fabulous on the internet…
Then you can enjoy real fulfillment and success that comes from passive content marketing and creating content so good, they HAVE to stop and look.
“Create content so good, they HAVE to stop and look.”
I’m here to help you create that kind of content.
I want to become a known expert in your field.
Today, there is a myriad of executive-board-friendly talk in corporate business, which fails to truly convey real world skills.
I’m known for being practical in the industry, instantly cutting through the sea of content marketing confusion to point you to the results. ⚓️
And I will forever uphold that standard for you.
(Shameless plug: Subscribe to my blog, or if you’re an audio person, sign up here for the Content Hacker podcast.)
Best of all:
You can feel secure knowing that I care. I will bring you the best of what I’ve spent years learning, through trial, error, and finally, success.
Sure, I have crap days, just like you. But here’s my promise to you: You can expect me to consistently care about giving you my very best.
Ready to take a HUGE action step forward in your content marketing?
I’m not going to tell you that you need to hustle.
I bet you’re here because you’re already set to hustle.
You might already know what hard times are like. Now, you’re ready for the good times.
You’re toughened up, ready to graft, ready to thrive.
Why?
Because you’re ready to earn success.
If that’s you, then you and I will make a FANTASTIC fit, my friend.
Have you ever heard this? “Just create great content and the doors of digital marketing will open wide.”
As someone who’s had more than one door slammed in her face (way back in my very first year of freelancing, in 2011, I got more “no’s” than “yes’s”), I know that it’s not that easy.
It takes understanding exactly how to pivot when the market changes. Given that Google changes their algorithms 500-600 times per year and consumer taste changes practically overnight, that’s a whole lotta shakin’ going on!
That’s where my new personal brand, primed and ready for today and the future, Content Hacker™ comes in.
My goal is to build a place, a platform, a tribe of elite Content Hackers™. For years, I felt like I was the only content creator focused on bottom-line growth from my content. While that wasn’t the case, I didn’t really have a “tribe” that knew and loved content like I did. Content Hackers™ is here to help you be a part of the elite tribe of maverick content creators who want real growth— and revenue — from their content.
It’s time for you to stop being the Lone Ranger of content. Come with me, Kemosabe, to a place you can call your “content home.”
Join Content Hackers™ and Be a Growth-Focused Content Marketer
Great things ahead. No fluff, filler, or “blah, blah, blah.” Just fiercely actionable advice geared toward knocking your business strategy thinking out of the box and into an entirely new — and profitable — mode.
I Want
You In
My Club!
Let’s Hack Together
Yes! I’m ready to exploit best practices in favor of what works. I want to be a part of Julia’s proven hacks and the Content Hacker community!
Meet the Content Hacker™ Team
Get to know our team here at Content Hacker.
Julia McCoy
CEO & Founder
I wrote my first 200-page book at the age of 12, yearning for a way to engage my passion inside of a real-life cult (it’s true, that’s how I grew up). That started my love affair with writing. In 2012, I escaped the cult thanks to a baby business I’d just started: an agency, where I gathered the best writers together to create great content for our clients. We were one of the first writing agencies to ever launch an ecommerce Content Shop. Now, I’ve left my agency, and my full-time gig is teaching and guiding our rockstar clients at Content Hacker. I’m very hands-on in my work (read: anti-scaling), and I thoroughly enjoy changing and impacting lives through great content. When I’m not writing, I’m enjoying Texas Hill Country life with my two kids, husband, and our German Shepherds on our little farm.
Josh McCoy
CTO
My background is in project development, internet marketing, and SEO. I met & married Julia in 2012, after hiring her to write my content. I have a passion for designing, branding, and building businesses. My role previously in the agency we co-ran included overseeing our entire website development, including our custom-built workroom and client site. Now at Content Hacker, I help develop our site and the technical aspects of what we do, and oversee client’s custom website development.
John Kensinger
Content Marketing Coach
I’ve led the strategy and creation of short and long-form content tailored to the health industry (one of Google’s toughest YMYL verticals!) and managed over 350 new pieces of content that added profits and growth to the company. The weekly newsletter I created reached 100,000+ subscribers. I’ve been trusted to develop and execute entire product content strategies and lead multiple channels of external content. I enjoy working with teams and employees to create exceptional content that is worth reading and subscribing to, and I’m excited to bring that to our Accelerator clients at Content Hacker.
Victor Sokpor
Administrative Specialist
I’m Victor Sokpor, from Nairobi, Kenya. I studied and trained as a mechatronic engineer but my experience and apparent passions lie in business growth, as well as client member support and success. Away from work, I can be found riding a motorcycle somewhere or hacking an interesting piece of machinery. I’m absolutely stoked to be a part of the Content Hacker team, serving our amazing community of clients and learners. I can be found anytime at [email protected], , hanging out in our calls, and setting up our clients and students for success.
Alyssa Villeneuve
Lead Writing & Strategy Coach
I’m a freelance writer and editor based in the Midwest. I’ve spent nearly a decade writing content and copy for a wide variety of clients, including Julia – who I’ve worked with closely for over five years. Most importantly, I’m a lifelong lover of reading, books, and storytelling — the best training of all. I’m also a fan of the Brontes, iced coffee, and my feisty pup, Scout Finch. In the Content Hacker mentorship, I’m here to help you refine your website copy, blogs, and content and provide insights to improve your online writing.
Tiago Aragona
Visionary UX/UI Designer
Hey! My name is Tiago Aragona and I am a UX/UI designer from Buenos Aires, Argentina. My design career started at Brown University, where I took courses on design and engineering. Then, I entered a strategic design major, which introduced me to the beautiful world of User Experience. I’ve worked with over 100 clients from around the globe, providing user-oriented design solutions in various industries. If you’re wondering why you are not converting traffic into effective sales… better interactions mean more conversions. I’m stoked to be here at Content Hacker, helping our clients have more conversions and results with better website design flow.
John Pratt
Content Strategist
Years ago, I quit college. It couldn’t teach me what I wanted to learn: proven strategies in digital marketing. I decided the best way to learn was to do. I made a name for myself making videos for YouTube and TV ads; audio for podcasts, radio ads, and even producing music for recording artists. But these projects were expensive and I discovered something ironic: the best digital marketing can also be the cheapest. I’m talking about blogs. High-quality, well-researched blogs give online businesses actual data about what customers want and how to reach them. I’m now positioned to help you understand the interplay between all your content types (hint: blog always comes first). My love of marketing, strategy, and business converge as I help you understand how to use the Content Transformation System to control your marketing and scale your business.
Shannon Vincent
Systems Coach
Shannon Vincent, based in Idaho, is a ClickUp Vetted Consultant, Zapier Certified Expert and Airtable Consultant, one of the top 5% on major freelance platforms. As a ClickUp Consultant, Shannon has experience implementing this system for teams in a wide range of industries including digital marketing, bookkeeping, construction, interior design, executive coaching, real estate, consulting, and more. She also use ClickUp daily for her own internal operations. As ClickUp adds new features, Shannon studies them quickly so she can upgrade and improve based on the latest and greatest features. Shannon is the creator of our ClickUp tutorials, custom Spaces for content management and pipeline, and freelancer (contractor) management and payroll.
Marti Mendoza
Social Media Manager
Hey, y’all! I’m the one posting the content we create on Content Hacker’s Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. I graduated from the University of Houston with a Journalism major and Marketing minor. I also work for a digital advertising agency dealing with all things content creation, digital marketing, social media, and more. In my free time, you can find me hanging with my family and dogs, binge watching all the latest TV and movies, and keeping up with sports. I’m excited to connect with you!
Sarah Greenberg
Strategy Coach
I’ve worked in the content marketing space for ten years, creating in many environments—agencies, corporations, small businesses—and industries—advertising, federal resume writing, science, and health. One constant has become clear: I loves content, teams and helping teams achieve goals through content. At The Content Hacker, I help guide new prospects through the journey of Content Transformation to determine if it’s their best-fit, and work alongside our lead coaches.
Alexander Cordova
Tech & Strategy Writing Coach
I’ve been writing for tech blogs about web development, SEO, and content marketing for years. On top of writing and coaching inside Content Transformation, I help website owners figure out the right content strategy to maximize their growth. When I’m not working, I’m either cooking or tending to my plants.
Sara Noë
Strategy & Writing Coach
I’m an award-winning fiction author, photographer, artist, poet, blogger, and freelance writer from Indiana. In 2016, I created my first website and blog from scratch. Now, I manage three of my own websites. I’m always busy creating content, whether it’s artwork, blog posts, or the next novel in my series. I had the pleasure of writing for Julia after I said goodbye to my office job to pursue a full-time writing career, and I’m thrilled to join the Content Hacker team and start a new chapter with a community of inspiring entrepreneurs.
Çağrı Cilara
Video Producer
My name is Çağrı Cilara. I work with Julia and her team to produce the beautiful videos you watch inside our Academy. I’ve been in advertising since 2004, and I’m a professional video and graphic designer skilled in Apple Final Cut Pro, After Effect, Illustrator and Photoshop. I’m a strong business development professional graduate from Dogus University, Computer Engineering and Anadolu University, Business and have even served as a lecturer giving advertising lessons at Sehir University in 2013. Today, I’m proud of doing business in 32 countries. I’m thrilled to be here as an on-staff video producer and add my expertise from crafting thousands of creative videos for companies and brands, from fashion to entertainment. I love what I do.
Nikki Martinez
Sales & Copywriting Coach
Hey, I’m Nikki! Copywriter, email marketer, fur baby lover. I have a passion for the written word, and cringe hard whenever the wrong verb tense is used. I’ve collected books all my life, and always look for the story in everything. I’ve trained under Julia for years and written much of our sales copy. In Content Hacker, besides writing, I’m delighted to help coach, guide, and help our community get better at their messaging and make more sales.