Tweets

RT @dvassallo: Lifestyle design by @mijustin — http://justinjackson.ca/work-harder

@anilbms75 Thanks!

RT @mijustin: No matter your stage of life, the best advice is still: “do what you can, with what you have,” and “start now, start small.”…

@jamesrsowers @thegood What’s the current state of things in e-commerce with regards to the pandemic?

Are you still seeing strong demand for e-commerce brands?

@dvassallo Yes!

Back in 2012, working remote gave me my first real taste of lifestyle design.

https://justinjackson.ca/remote

@mikevardy It’s only 10:04 on Sunday tho

@jongold I’m not good at it, but over the pandemic I’ve found guitar strumming, piano plunking, and singing badly to be incredibly therapeutic.

@charliprangley 🍾😄

@kalita_kirill Thanks!

@Tim_Aton 😂

@earthlingworks @KennethCassel @immad @Jason +1 from us at @TransistorFM

We ❤️ Mercury.

@evangoldin I hate stuff like this!

@MatthewBogart My 16-year-old just finished reading Vol. 1!

@Ryan___Doyle @FounderSummit I’ve (legitimately) had this experience multiple times at conferences:

“Whoa, Justin. I thought you’d be taller.” 😜

RT @mijustin: Working harder (on its own) doesn't make you more successful.

https://justinjackson.ca/work-harder

@mjwhansen @EmmettNaughton 🤣

@EmmettNaughton 5’8”

@iChris Sending you and the fam lots of healthy vibes! ❤️

I’m shorter in real life. https://twitter.com/JavaScriptCoff1/status/1479771822610604034

RT @dbustac: (At @ship30for30, we host our pod in Transistor.

There are many reasons to that.

But one of my favorite features is definit…

@robwalling @MicroConf @AndrewWarner These are great!

@ivanburazin Yup. 👍

Also: lower priced (prosumer) plans don't necessarily mean customer support is going to be worse.

https://twitter.com/earthlingworks/status/1479891348631130113

@peldi Personally, I'm curious about the fads you participated in prior to 2009:

Hair metal in '84?
Pogs in '93?
JNCO jeans in '99?

Working harder (on its own) doesn't make you more successful.

https://justinjackson.ca/work-harder

@rosiesherry Yup, I expand on that piece here:
https://justinjackson.ca/work-harder

@dvassallo What do you mean by ambition and dreams? Like, more materialistic goals?

@dvassallo For me, most of my direction was determined by:

1. How I wanted my life to be different
2. How I wanted an average day to look
3. The freedom and flexibility I desired
4. My values

How do you know if you’re going in the right direction?

1. Be clear about what you want: “I don’t want a boss. I want to earn $250k/year.”
2. Be a clear about *why* you want those things: “More freedom to be there for my family. Less financial stress.”
3. Define your values. https://twitter.com/lx_xlyo00/status/1479913555524653056

The problem with “work smarter” is people often equate that to “less effort.”

Instead, I’m saying: you still need to apply some grunt work, but that grunt work needs to be in service of high leverage activities, on a path that leads in a direction you want to go. https://twitter.com/StevenDSanders/status/1479914575109795850

Success in business is more about doing the right things consistently than just "brute force hard work."

If "hard work = success" then people doing manual labor would be the most successful people in the world.

Trust me, no entrepreneur is working harder than the person doing road construction (night shift), in freezing cold temperatures.

Success is the accumulation of consistent effort, over time, in the right direction.

People often say that the key to success is “hard work” but that doesn’t quite encapsulate it.

For me, it’s more like “consistently pushing forward, in the right direction.”

Every day I wake up, and push the rock a bit further.

@randfish Thanks so much for this thread. 🙏 Incredibly helpful to hear about all these details.

@earthlingworks @mattwensing Yup. Very similar at @TransistorFM.

Low price point does not necessarily mean “support will be terrible.”

@JordanGal Looks great!

@rofigueras @laserlikemike I wrote an overview here: https://justinjackson.ca/build

@tylertringas cc @cheriehu42

@jimhilluk @jonbuda Haha, oops!

Our site is static (and hosted on Netlify) so I needed to deploy a new version before that would update.

(Even though it was updated locally🤦‍♂️)

@Patticus Congrats!!!! 🎉❤️

Nice. 👍 https://t.co/FnUr937o96

Still a good list of ideas to pursue in 2022. https://twitter.com/mijustin/status/1037611977877516288

Some wheels don't require as much grease.

If you're constantly having to grease the wheels to keep your business working, it might be time to pivot to something new, or create something different for a different market.

Good businesses give back more than they take.

Yes, the category of product you choose to build matters.

All categories have a different “shape”:

How many people want this thing?
How often do they want it?
How much will they pay?
How costly is distribution?
How complex is the product?
How expensive is the production?

@paleochef 🙌

@finereli This was my first SaaS as a founder.

Worked for other SaaS companies from 2008-2016. Went solo in 2016-2018 with smaller projects.

https://justinjackson.ca/2016-review

@finereli I know that’s the popular sentiment, and I’ve experienced something like that in previous jobs, but at Transistor we’ve found the opposite: thousands of awesome customers, and way less exhausting than other SaaS I’ve been apart of.

@brianclark Yup. And they’re still decentralized. Podcasts as well.

@mhmazur I think "2 months free" is pretty standard.

$19/month --> $190/year
$49/month --> $490/year

@jdnoc What you've accomplished and learned before the age of 30 is truly inspiring. 👍

Well done. Cheering for you and your next project! 👏

“There’s a false dichotomy between imitation and innovation. They’re part of the same process of discovery. Some of history’s most creative geniuses started off by simply imitating the right model.”

– @lukeburgis, Wanting

“I don’t invent anything, I start where the others came from.” – Lamborghini

@LumSmith My experience is there’s a certain kind of Prosumer customer who’s much easier to support than a certain kind of SMB.

This is me.

Playing with a husky puppy.

In northern Alberta, Canada.

In the early 1980s.

@mikeymayers Agreed.

@theKevinShen Subscribed!

@mikeymayers For bootstrappers, there is a ton of opportunity to build awesome $1M-$5M/year businesses.

In 2022, more entrepreneurs should seek to understand the Prosumer category.

There’s a spectrum of serious hobbyists, aspiring creatives/makers, and brand new (tiny) SMBs that are worth considering (and who make incredible customers), but are outside of traditional B2B.

@TimVanDijck This is why understanding the emerging Prosumer category is key.

There’s a spectrum of serious hobbyists, aspiring creatives/makers, and brand new (tiny) SMBs that are worth considering (and who make incredible customers).

@destraynor What changes this dynamic considerably is the “Prosumer” element.

When a consumer is an aspiring professional, takes their hobby really seriously, or is launching a side-project, their LTV can be substantial.

In fact, I’d wager that many of the indie tech companies you admire have a substantial % of customers who are working on side-projects, are aspiring creators, hobbyists, etc…

@ConvertKit, @Mailchimp, @heyreform, @savvycal, @usefathom, @ZipMessage, @typefullyapp, @iloAnalytics

Successful indie startups who serve prosumers, hobbyists, and consumers:

🗃 Carrd by @ajlkn: I’m guessing he is close to 1 million customers. $19/yr

🌬 @tailwindui: main product costs $199 (one-time); millions in revenue.

🎙 @TransistorFM: $19/month, thousands of users.

My larger point: if you see an opportunity with growing demand, and it’s a good fit for you personally, don’t ignore it just because “it’s not B2B.”

Your business doesn’t have to fit the dominant narrative to be successful; indie B2Prosumer products can be incredibly profitable.

The old rule for bootstrapping was “just do B2B, never do B2C,” but now we have multiple examples successful indie businesses serving hobbyists, prosumers, creatives, and individual consumers.

In 2022, don’t limit yourself! There are good opportunities outside of B2B.

@thomashazledine Happy new year!

I think our approach with @meepsapp is what I'd advise:
https://meeps.app/newsletter/nddsog

@AmandaMGoetz This list of drinks is still the most popular article on my site. 😉

https://justinjackson.ca/nobooze

Here’s my 2021 year in review:

https://justinjackson.ca/2021-review

🎯 Good approach https://twitter.com/SharkawyMD/status/1477132249875329026

@iamcoreyg Definitely sounds like a threat! 🤣

@RamliJohn NICE!

This video out of Colorado is so scary it feels like it must be a movie.

But this is real.

All our apocalyptic fiction is becoming a reality because of the climate crisis.

These unbelievable events are becoming more and more frequent.

Wildfires in Colorado IN DECEMBER.

Winds 80-100 mph. 1600 acres. More than 30,000 people evacuated.

My ❤️ goes out to everyone affected.

@heystefan_ I have no idea what this company does. 😜

@bentoalson Cool!

🙌 https://twitter.com/CasJam/status/1476606501494169601

💯 https://twitter.com/JacquelynGill/status/1476275266209165319

@Swizec Write about that! Share what works. 👍

@nonlateral I’m confused about “centralization around ownership.”

What’s an example of that currently?

@JackRhysider Yes, but indie podcasters have always had to find “networks bigger than themselves” for to gain traction and distribution.

With podcasting, the decentralized nature of RSS has held the “balance of power” between Apple, Spotify, Google, etc.

Do you think web3 will be the same?

@JackRhysider But now Spotify, Google, YouTube, Amazon, etc essentially have centralized power because they control the primary means of distribution.

Individual creators and artists can’t get traction without the big, centralized, platforms.

@alpipego Yes; because currently getting any traction for your project, product, NFT, artwork, music, video, requires distribution from the big centralized aggregators (Google, FB, Spotify, etc)

Without them, there’s no discoverability (even for small indie projects).

@joshaledgard @Shopify This is, in essence, what Mastadon has attempted, but it just doesn't have the network effects of centralized platforms like Twitter.

@benedictevans Yes! The concept of decentralization and community ownership appeals to me, but ultimately whoever owns the Means of Distribution wins.

https://twitter.com/mijustin/status/1476287719177265152

I love the idea of the ownership economy (as summarized here by @She__Fi).

But web3 can't deliver on its promise of "freedom from the big platforms" as long as we're beholden to big platforms (Google, Facebook, Twitter, Spotify, Amazon, YouTube, etc) for distribution.

@ianlandsman @cdixon @naval I think you're underestimating the cumulative accrued strength of centralized platforms like Amazon, Google, Twitter, Spotify, etc...

People instinctively go to Amazon first to buy products.
They go to Google for search.
They open IG for photos.

It's not easy to "replace" that.

@songadaymann But I don’t see how web3 architecture could ever solve this problem?

@joshaledgard And discoverability is still "centralized" in that those @shopify stores still have to use Google, FB ads, Instagram ads, etc to attract customers.

@ianlandsman But that’s not what I hear folks like @cdixon and @naval saying.

They seem to be saying that web3 will help us subvert the old centralized model:

Ideologically, I'm pro co-op, collectivism, and co-ownership.

But practically, I see that the only way to disrupt the status-quo is to own the Means of Distribution.

If web3 solved for that, I would get really excited.

https://justinjackson.ca/main-street-fights-back

Some folks in web3 are underestimating the cumulative accrued strength of centralized platforms like Amazon, Google, Twitter, Spotify, etc...

People instinctively go to Amazon first to buy products.

It's not easy to "replace" that.

https://twitter.com/maximehugodupre/status/1476295172426240001

@gregorywitek @tferriss @naval @cdixon Discoverability is immensely profitable: it’s Google’s whole business model.

They index the web and become the central location for accessing anything on the web.

@FAfied32 Yes; my thoughts exactly.

It looks like @benedictevans is simultaneously making the same point in his latest thread. 👍 https://twitter.com/benedictevans/status/1476285185557774337

@erwblo @benedictevans Thx! Hadn’t seen this.

Won’t web3 projects continue to need centralized aggregators like Spotify, Apple, Google, Facebook, Discord, Twitter in order to reach an audience?

If that’s true, in a web3 world, won’t big corporations continue to control distribution, and assert considerable power?

@fran_rimoldi @tferriss @naval @cdixon You’re missing the point: won’t NFT projects continue to need centralized aggregators like Spotify, Apple, Google, Facebook in order to reach an audience?

On @tferriss's podcast, @naval and @cdixon spoke about how web3 enables creators to own digital property.

But what about discoverability?

Spotify's power is in its distribution; it's a central place to find, discover, and consume music.

How will that go away under web3?

@maximehugodupre How are people going to find your NFT?

Clarifying my use of the word "distribution."

Here, distribution = promotion, discoverability, findability.

Websites, RSS feeds, podcasts, email lists, apps, art, creative projects, & music have always relied on centralized directories and search engines for customers/audience.