How Not to Waste 2 Years Building Things
About 2 years ago, I joined this wonderful community and it inspired me to make things and become a profitable bootstrapper. Well it's been a while and I'm not in the place I would like to be. No matter how unpleasant it feels, after 2 years of building products, I didn't reach the financial results I wanted. I thought it might be an opportunity to share what I've learned.
So, what if I could talk to myself from 2 years ago and give some KNOWLEDGE? Perhaps you can learn something from this dialogue too.
2 men walk into an elevator. A button is pressed and the elevator starts going up to a coworking space. Awkward silence. After a few minutes the elevator still hasn't arrived. One person is noticeably agitated standing in the elevator. The other one decides to speak up.
Steve from the Future: You seem to be in the rush, anything urgent?
Steve: Hey! Not really, I just wanted to fix a few bugs for my new digital product and add a new feature for a Product Hunt launch.
Steve from the Future: Ahhhh, it must be a Slack Bot app, right?
Steve: Wait, how do you know? Who are you?
Steve from the Future: I'm You. But from the future. I've experienced all the future business failures that will happen to you in the next 2 years. I'm here to warn you.
Steve: Ok, let's pretend that it's all real and you actually have something insightful to say. Can you just tell me what feature is going to be the most impactful to build? Or maybe give me new business ideas, cause you're from the future. You've seen what will be popular.
Steve from the Future: Oh. No. In fact, I'm here to change the way you think about businesses. Even if I tell you what products will get hyped a year from now, it won't help you. I have something more useful to offer. So let me start with a question. How do you think you're going to reach your first $1000 MRR?
Steve: That's easy. You know the answer too. I will build something that people want.
Steve from the Future: Haha. You probably just reread an essay from Paul Graham. Nice! Do you have an Indie Hacker that built something the way you expect it to play out for you? A role model maybe?
Steve: Yeah, Pieter Levels is a great example. Look, he started with a few products. Eventually, he was able to build something that people actually want. In fact, he has two great products now. By building a lot of things, I will stumble upon a great idea too.
Steve from the Future: Very funny that you actually believe in it. What if I told you that Pieter and many other bootstrappers have marketing as the core of their business? Technology, code, and products are secondary for them.
Steve: Honestly, I'm very skeptical and not sure what you mean. But I'm ready to hear you out since we're still stuck in this elevator and you're me from the future. So, I'm kind of intrigued by the whole situation.
Steve from the Future: Ok, what was Pieter's first product that got traction?
Steve: Nomad List. He started it as a Google Sheet and then...BAM! It all rolled from there, a single tweet. Only if I knew what to tweet or build, the people will be ready to hand me the money.
Steve from the Future: Sure. Do you think there's a coincidence that his tweet blew up?
Steve: Of course not, he was there at the right place at the right time.
Steve from the Future: I see, I remember myself back then. So, this naive thinking is just fine. Pieter's success didn't rely on the right idea at the right time. He was able to build a marketing machine that was ready for the right fit. If you listen to his presentations close enough you will see that he was building pretty useless ideas and then his story broke the internet. He got covered by the media like Wired. The man started getting recognized on streets by digital nomads. Because his story was unique and relevant, he was able to win the trust of thousands of digital nomads around the world. That way he built his audience. A group of people circled around his Twitter to maybe learn something new. They were mostly digital nomads.
Steve: Yeah, but he still had to build the product.
Steve from the Future: In a way, sure. But it doesn't matter too much what product to build at the core. That's why both Remote OK and Nomad List are popular. It was fit for his audience. Pieter could write a book on how to quit a job and travel the world cheaply. It wouldn't be too bad too. People who followed this topic were ready to buy an idea/product/service from a Pieter because they trusted him and had problems to be solved. If Pieter came right away with Nomad List it would be not as easy to find users. And if he made that famous tweet without his audience nothing would have happened.
Steve: Are you trying to say that Pieter became a digital nomad and built an audience by doing a marketing stunt? Should I also do something cool to get attention. Do you have ideas?
Steve from the Future: No and no, and that's not how you should think about it. Just try to be interesting for your audience. No need to come up with some crazy ideas. Be helpful. Genuinely helpful. Turn a stranger into a friend. Start one by one. That way you will understand what problems they have. Build a friend list, in a way.
Steve: But what about building? I quit my job to build products.
Steve from the Future: Yes, but for now, just forget about it. Trust me, you will save yourself a bunch of time. Think about people and marketing first, and products later. In fact, when you and your audience are both ready just build something small. It doesn't have to be a SAAS business right away.
After that phrase the doors of the elevator opened. The agitated young man left first and turned out to ask another question but there was nobody behind him.
Thank you fellow Indiehackers for this great place on the internet. I hope it was helpful for some of you. Feel free to follow me on Twitter https://twitter.com/sooosteve
Stay winning my friends
