Tweets

@Evanish @nbashaw Podcasts *are* being indexed by Google now:

https://youtu.be/3WwH3l_guCw

@deifosv @IndieHackers @HowIBuiltThis Thanks Vlad!

@itsdavemartin I think you could get over that hurdle. 😉

"The only way to get good at making money is to practice, just like playing the piano takes practice." – @jasonfried

To know if your money ideas are good, you've got to put them into practice.

@MoreWillie done! ❤️

Congrats to you and @codywanner.

Podcasters! For the next 20 minutes, I'm happy to leave you a review for your podcast to get you started. https://www.pscp.tv/w/b7cYKTM4NTU1MXwxa3ZLcE9aV1ZaYXhFHMeZI0HAWba1nFuxOnXqB0UkcB9_20_nvwicuOrq4KI=

If you're considering going after a small niche market (and want to know the pros and cons) definitely check out @justinvincent's interview with @ted_pitts & @harryhollander from Moraware. 👍

http://techzinglive.com/page/1080/190-tz-interview-ted-pitts-harry-hollander-moraware

@FerIsella @TransistorFM Thanks!

Whoa.

https://twitter.com/owenconti/status/1131642828990210048

@spencerowland Before I respond, a few quick questions:

1. What's the service you provide for them?

2. How do you plan on reaching them?

@mjwhansen Nice work!! 🔥

@earthlingworks @daverodenbaugh @scottbolinger @CasJam @JordanGal @Patticus This *is* my work. 😜

@daverodenbaugh @scottbolinger @earthlingworks @CasJam @JordanGal @Patticus I'm happy to jump on a Skype call now if you're game. 👌

@daverodenbaugh @earthlingworks @scottbolinger @CasJam @JordanGal Hey Dave, can you give me an example?

Also, what does "WTP" mean?

@Folletto Totally. I like that you asked about that, because success is relative.

I'm thinking largely of folks in the bootstrapping community who want to support their families.

@anthonystauffer @TexasBluesAlley 👍

What's SRV?

There are certainly exceptions, but I’ve seen data from hundreds of indie businesses.

Almost everyone who is consistently earning more than $10k / month (and certainly those that break $50k) targeted a large, or fast growing, market that they could reach efficiently.

@productgangsta You could be right.

I see a lot of indie businesses too, and my perspective is different.

Almost everyone who is consistently earning more than $10k / month (and certainly those that break $50k) targeted a large, or fast growing, market that they could reach efficiently.

@Folletto I agree that success is relative.

I’m thinking of folks who want to earn at least $10k / month (salary and dividends).

@CasJam @JordanGal Yup, this is something @earthlingworks said to me recently as well.

@productgangsta Can you give me an example of a smaller niche that you felt worked?

RT @JordanGal: @mijustin Right product, *right market*, right time.

Need all 3, but if you don’t have the market right, everything is har…

What's an example of a good niche?

Shopify stores.

There are over 500,000 active stores running on Shopify. These are businesses, with revenue.

They will gladly pay you $ if you help them earn $$$ more from their store.

(my friend @JordanGal, at @CartHookis banking on it!)

@kodiebeckley but I backed 32 games on kickstarter 5 years ago and they just all got shipped to my house.

@rsobers I think so...

Do you think it would be different for other forms of business?

My company (@transistorfm)'s biggest competitor is Libsyn. They host 62,000 podcasts.

There are 700,000 podcasts on Apple Podcasts (it grew by 100,000 in the last year)

What % of podcasters know about Libsyn?

What % know about Transistor?

Typically, we start our funnels at "number of visitors" but in reality the funnel looks like this:

Total market > Visitors > Trials

Your "market to visitor" conversion rate will be lower than you think.

But, I think you still need to look at the broader picture: what is the *total* addressable market?

If you need to get 1,000 customers to make something viable, but the total market is only 10,000, it's going to be really difficult to convert enough people to customers.

Seth Godin advises to “begin with the smallest viable market. What’s the minimum number of people you would need to influence to make it worth the effort?”

You can target a speciality niche, but there should be millions of them (instead of thousands).

If the market you target only has 1,000 people worldwide, that's likely not going to be enough to sustain a business. (Except in edge cases)

There's a myth that, regardless of which niche you choose, the internet is big enough to make your business a success.

But in reality, most successes come from targetting a big (or fast growing) market.

@ProductHuntHi @ProductHunt you folks might want to re-feature this one tomorrow morning. 👍

This is crazy.

@panic (the creators of Mac apps like Transmit) just made the most adorable portable gaming system: @playdate.

I just posted it on @ProductHunt here:
https://www.producthunt.com/posts/playdate-2

@kerranm @TransistorFM In @clubhouse (our project mgmt software) we track how many support tickets have requested a specific feature / update.

This story had a lot of tickets attached to it. 😉

@jesterhoax @TransistorFM I'm not sure what you mean. I'm just using MacOS and Finder... I think.

For organizing windows I use "Magnet."

RT @builtbykrit: . @mijustin challenges us to consider different angles on marketing, customer development, and bootstrapping. All 👏 the 👏…

@kirillzubovsky @jonbuda @2centdad @sudyk @TransistorFM Oh awesome! Thanks! 🙌

I want to keep improving our app (@transistorfm) - diving into a new Rails project now. https://www.pscp.tv/w/b7W5zDM4NTU1MXwxZGpHWHB3d2xXTkdapsba3sJBOg2h9rE_3sKpau1QWFBHFae1wYzV0W__j0U=

Interested in bootstrapping a SaaS? @jonbuda and I are sharing our journey here:

https://overcast.fm/itunes1357295850/build-your-saas-bootstrapping-in-2019

@JThorn_ Dude. There's so much there. That track "Eighties" is so close to "Come as you are."

@christophrumpel @marcelpociot @LaraconEU @enunomaduro yessss

Oh god. Now I'm down a grunge rabbit hole:

"There's a lot of Black Sabbath in Nirvana that people don't hear. In fact, 'Come as You Are' was [copied from] Killing Joke's song called 'Eighties', and Killing Joke was very influenced by Sabbath." - Corgan

https://music.apple.com/ca/album/eighties/714822155?i=714822366

Proof that Corgan was heavily influenced by metal (Sabbath, Metallica, Rainbow, Slayer): https://diffuser.fm/smashing-pumpkin-billy-corgan-metal-favorites/

@carljbusch The opening riff dude! Listen to it.

Then go and listen to "Seek & Destroy" by Metallica.

I'm telling you, Corgan wrote some heavy riffs.

@3dfordesigners Just donated. Rooting for you!

@podcastharry Hey Harry! We average out the first 24 hours of downloads of your last 3 episodes to calculate an estimated subscriber count. The graph is an estimated count over time.

Pumpkins were really metal. Listen to that opening riff!

Smashing Pumpkins, Zero. What a great fucking song.

Apple Music: http://music.apple.com/ca/album/zero/1455510683?i=1455510869
Spotify: http://open.spotify.com/track/4YFcGTdgmEuw8xTO4XrxbB

@marcelpociot @LaraconEU @christophrumpel @enunomaduro I'd love to join!

Wish I was there. 😊

In 2008, I was new to the software industry, and my boss gave me a copy of "Getting Real" by @dhh and @jasonfried.

It's still one of the most impactful books I've read. It changed the way I thought about building a business.

https://basecamp.com/books/getting-real

@steph_happens Getting Real: https://basecamp.com/books/getting-real

Changed the way I thought about building a business.

@meet__chopra @ConvertKit @nathanbarry @TransistorFM 🙌

@CohanRobinson @jonbuda that’s the name i was looking for! “PubSubHubbub”

RT @jessarchercodes: 🤩 I never could have imagined that I'd be doing a podcast with JMac, but here we are!

The BaseCode Field Guide is an…

@teslainvernon @frankholdem @BCSCRAPIT Super helpful; thank you!

@owenconti Yup! http://join.megamaker.co

I sell my books + courses there. 👍

@owenconti yup!

@hunterwalk @anuaimi @MediaRadar @Casper @WarbyParker @birchbox @brooklinen Wish I could see their podcast spending on that list too. 🙏

@BradyHaran You'd have to forward your old RSS feed to ours. (We can't currently support feeds on custom domains).

Forwarding the old RSS is pretty painless. I wrote a quick guide on that here: https://transistor.fm/switching-podcast-hosting/

I'd forgotten about this album!

(I was 15 when this came out.)

@mitchdav @BradyHaran @TweetsByZaid @squarespace @SquarespaceHelp @TransistorFM We've already had someone switch to @transistorfm from Squarespace this morning. 😁

We do one-click podcast imports. 👍

@shl Cement is pretty important

@iChris Oh no.

This is me. https://twitter.com/samreich/status/966729805285806081

RT @samreich: jesus: eat this bread, it is my body

jesus: drink this wine, it is my blood

jesus: close your eyes and feel this spaghetti,…

RT @wardsandler: Know when to hold em, know when to fold em 🃏🃏 via ⁦⁦@mijustin⁩ https://justinjackson.ca/giveup

@garrettdimon @adaptable_org Nice!

RT @eliajf: And nice article from @mijustin on figuring out when it is time to hang up the cleats. https://justinjackson.ca/giveup

@CasJam The way @statamic treats blocks is waaaaaaaaaaay better! 👌

@saeidhalvaeian @jonbuda @TransistorFM Yup! We talked about it here:

https://saas.transistor.fm/episodes/finding-a-cofounder-you-want-to-work-with

I've added Derrick's link to the footer of tomorrow's newsletter as well. 👍

@kudapara @derrickreimer yup! Just made it the PS. 👍

Incidentally, "when to walk away" was already the topic for tomorrow's newsletter. You can subscribe here to get it: http://justinjackson.ca/newsletter

My friend @derrickreimer just published an in-depth retrospective on why he decided to walk away from a product he'd been working on for a year.

Recommended for anyone trying to bootstrap something new:
https://www.derrickreimer.com/essays/2019/05/17/im-walking-away-from-the-product-i-spent-a-year-building.html

I was a solopreneur for years. I liked the freedom to move quickly.

But...

It's been unbelievably helpful to have a cofounder (@jonbuda) who questions my assumptions before we make decisions for @TransistorFM. 💯

@siddharthkp @r00k Initially, I used Garageband.

Then, I used Screenflow (much faster).

Now, @iChris does our editing. 👌

RT @evanlapointe: @mijustin I like to think about the business as problem, product, position. Most great companies (Disney) struggle with p…

@evanlapointe Great thread! 👍

@sehurlburt We're talking Little Mermaid, right? Because I sing that song 3x a day every day.

@DaronSpence Nice work! I've got a pretty good sample landing page here that has all the basic elements in it:

http://MegaMaker.co/sample

@RossDCurrie Sometimes, you just gotta keep rehashing the same old wisdom. 😉

@Patticus I don't believe you. 😄

I'll write more in this Saturday's newsletter:

http://justinjackson.ca/newsletter

How long should you wait for that to happen? That's up to you.

It usually depends on how much time, money, and energy you have left.

The internet has definitely given us the ability to test ideas faster.

Derek @sivers says:

"Don’t waste years fighting uphill battles against locked doors. Improve or invent until you get that huge response. Instead of trying to create demand, you’re managing the huge demand."

Yes, it will take some effort to position your product properly.

Yes, you might need to find the right distribution channels.

But ultimately, people should be coming to you on their own. It shouldn't feel like a grind.

If you have something people really want, you shouldn't have to put a massive amount of effort into convincing folks to buy.

Last week, I wrote about how Walt Disney persisted for 10 years before seeing any success.

This week, I want to write about "when you should give up."

What do you think? When should you quit working on your startup?

Me too! 🙌 https://twitter.com/iamashley/status/1129082307317567494

@MRyanMcCarthy 😜

https://twitter.com/shpigford/status/1121465923381153792?s=21

@brandonklotz What a nice thing to say! Thanks! ❤️

@kodiebeckley My entire financial future hopes you're wrong. 😉

So true. https://twitter.com/excid3/status/1127935421881700352

@brandonklotz Yup! It's all here:
http://justinjackson.ca/livestreaming

RT @marshal: 5/ I feel lucky we traveled for 5 months. Don’t get me wrong, it was amazing. But I’m here to say, extended travel won’t solve…

@dylan_penguin Thanks Dylan! 🙌

@joanyanw Glad it was helpful!

Writing a follow-up this week: "How do you know when to quit?"

@shellen Yes! Party time! 🕺🔥💃

@justinabrahms I loved Trillium!

Too many silos now; it's really sad.

@m1guelpf @florinpop1705 38 😜

@CasJam @adamwathan @tailwindcss @TransistorFM Not live yet.

My personal site is on @statamic and i ❤️ it.