Tweets

These are the memes my son sends me now.

YESSSS! 🔥

So excited to have Full Stack Radio on @TransistorFM.

Thanks for switching Adam! ❤️ https://twitter.com/adamwathan/status/1296832034988527617

Founders have to be wary of "made up problems."

It's that inclination we have to say: "This [existing thing] is not-optimal so it *must* need a solution!"

In reality, people engage in non-optimal behavior all the time; in fact, they often *like* that behavior! 😜

Prediction: ConvertKit will expand into digital ecommerce in the next two years, enabling customers to do the actual transaction and delivery through their platform.

(I have no inside information; just a hunch. Seems like a natural extension of their current trajectory.) https://twitter.com/nathanbarry/status/1257662376893009920

Business is profoundly affected by the outside world.

Politics, natural disasters (and our response to them), economies, societal beliefs: all of these things affect markets.

So if you're a "business person," you should care about things not related purely to business.

Most big changes are the result of small nudges over time.

How does someone change their mind? Small nudges over time.

How did we destroy the planet? Small nudges over time.

We’re moving forward (or backward) in tiny increments.

I just ended up replacing my MacBook Pro with an iMac because of all these issues.

Apple really needs to fix their MBP.

There’s a ton of us who rely on the MacOS ecosystem and need these machines to work. https://twitter.com/levelsio/status/1190250314017820672

Building a SaaS marketing site is difficult. Trying out these new @tailwindcss UI components. https://www.pscp.tv/w/cFveIzM4NTU1MXwxbkFLRVpqTVBYa0dMQZ2NYUOX0cVHCBfUBEjN684DbrNBUvB_bhNfBxYKIK8=

And from Will Smith:

"If something is broken it's your responsibility to fix it. When you're in victim mode, you're stuck in suffering. The road to power is in taking responsibility. Your life, your heart, and your happiness is your responsibility and your responsibility alone."

Love how ⁦@taylorotwell⁩ does his podcast.

No theme music.
No long intro.
No ads.

Taylor just starts talking. 👍 https://overcast.fm/+QKRFazIO8

Doing another live coding session: building my first app in @laravelphp https://www.pscp.tv/w/bxdZ1TM4NTU1MXwxeXBLZE9yQmFaVnhXCZx3fBHU_4I5QUpGy3Jq3oetnozabENG0WsA7v9JMYM=

⚡ New article just published on @IndieHackers:

"Ideas for promoting your software product"

@mijustin/ideas-for-promoting-your-software-product-4c2f415595" rel="noopener noreferrer">https://www.indiehackers.com/@mijustin/ideas-for-promoting-your-software-product-4c2f415595

Wish these days would last forever.

This insight is so key.

👉 The market you choose is often more important than the product you build.

http://a16z.com/2017/02/18/12-things-about-product-market-fit/

Plans, routine, and constraints are all essential.

Creativity thrives with structure.

omg @reverentgeek drew this cartoon avatar of me and I think he nailed it.

Your 30,000 word book should be 10,000.

Your 60 minute speech should be 30.

Your 166 lines of code could be reduced to 25.

I used to think that tech + disruption would lead to massive, positive societal transformation.

But now I see that we don't need more innovation.

Instead, we need to ask: "how can we help society deal with disruption?"

A landing page should also tell visitors *why* they should trust you!!!

- testimonials
- case studies
- social proof
- your bio

Just posted the slides from my #laracon talk:

https://megamaker.co/laravel-2017-talk/

Folks, if you're a solopreneur, remote worker, or small tech company, here's a big reason to move to #vernonbc. 🇨🇦

Lots of folks want to learn markdown, but don't know where to start.

@mariordev just created a crash course 👍
https://levelupwithmarkdown.com/

"If you optimize for the average visitor, you get average results." – @copyhackers #microconf

I want a LIFE not a HUSTLE.

https://twitter.com/marcjohns/status/849012425584123904

Increasingly common: volume over truth.

Just caught my 11-year-old looking at Google Trends.

Customers have decision fatigue.

They're tired. They don't want more information.

They just want to know how you'll make their life better

My kids are paranoid that I’m eating ice cream when they’re in bed.

And here’s the thing: I’m always eating ice cream when they’re in bed.

If you're having a rough day just remember that in grade 9 I got braces, headgear, glasses & a mullet on picture day

Does the Laravel community have youth pastor vibes? Discuss. https://twitter.com/briancoords/status/1839368262490230820

Today is @HelenRyles' THREE-YEAR work anniversary at @TransistorFM! 🙌

Congrats on three years, Helen! Your work has made our service 1000x better. We appreciate you! 🥳

It’s good for the podcast economy. 😉 https://twitter.com/shl/status/1704870467809812696

The biggest temptation for individual creators (and small business owners) is continually adding more to their plate in the pursuit of earning their desired $/year.

Much better to find 1-2 "main things" that can drive the kind of revenue you want/need.

I just spent a few hours trying to take photos of myself for YouTube thumbnails.

I think this one is my favorite.

Indie entrepreneurs need to stack every advantage they can get:

- skills
- capital
- insights
- channels
- expertise
- experience
- community
- connections
- partnerships

Most good markets are competitive! You can't just show up with a product; you need to have an edge.

Just finished @adii’s book, and I highly recommend it.

Many of us started businesses so our families could have a better life; it’s time to evaluate whether we’re actually achieving it. 👍

"How do I:
- install and config @tailwindcss,
- so I can build an HTML landing page (using @tailwindui), - and deploy it to Netlify?"

@adamwathan just walked me through the steps (using @youyuxi's @vite_js as the build tool).

I'm going to publish this as a tutorial soon. ✌️

Another observation:

You can’t be on Clubhouse/Spaces and be around other people IRL at the same time.

(If I’m at home on CH, I almost always have to hide away somewhere)

These apps require all of your real-time attention.

They’re not easily mutable, and you can’t hit pause.

In traditional economics, price is determined by the intersection of demand and supply.

(For example: when supply increases, prices generally go down)

But, how does this work with digital goods, where supply is unlimited? 🤔

Do online ads work?

In most cases, would the customer have bought anyway?

This is a good read.

https://thecorrespondent.com/100/the-new-dot-com-bubble-is-here-its-called-online-advertising/13228924500-22d5fd24

If you’re building your own company (or you want to) this is the book you should read. https://t.co/WublOWuxAT

Excited to have @bfeld & @davidcohen host their new @techstars podcast on @TransistorFM! 🎉

Subscribe here: https://givefirst.techstars.com/subscribe

I was someone from outside the tech industry who was invited in.

Since then, some of my best hires have been folks outside tech: bank tellers, coffee shop managers, social workers.

Don't ignore these folks. Many are whip smart, and incredible operators.

https://twitter.com/sehurlburt/status/1125093058469490688?s=21

My friend @taylorotwell has a new @laravelphp podcast! 👨‍💻👩‍💻

You can now listen to it on Spotify! 🎉

https://open.spotify.com/show/1JRsUoFejkMUjJZLzBCGOq

WHAT THE HECK PODCAST LAND

https://twitter.com/spotifynews/status/1093103001315745793?s=21

@laravelphp I'm not a developer.

The startup I co-founded (@TransistorFM) is written in Rails.

But for my personal projects I'm learning PHP + Laravel.

It's the community, folks. It's just more fun to learn a framework that has good community.

This is a good reminder: resist complexity, both in your business model and your technology.

https://willrobbins.org/degrees-of-freedom/

The only "yes" that feels good is the "OH HELL YES."

What doesn't feel good:
- "OK, I guess I could do that."
- "Umm, maybe in a few months?"
- "Sure, I can probably do that for you."

Most of the time, saying "no" feels way better.

Targeting absolute beginners is really tough.

It's more effective to help someone who's already "pretty good" get better.

"Dad this is a quality tip: people hate paying for subscriptions! They prefer paying a lot more and having it for a lifetime." - 11yo

Don't worry too much about your skills; focus on the people you want to serve! Skill only matters inasmuch as it helps you help others.

If you're bootstrapping, you can't build a product that's a "hammer looking for nails."

Find an existing customer struggle, and solve that.

Marketing is emotional.

Product is rational.

The buying decision is emotional.

Usage is rational.

(Why product-market fit is important)

Great story:

“How I Sold my Bible App Company” by @TrevMcKendrick https://medium.com/hackerpreneur-magazine/how-i-sold-my-bible-app-company-efa5c692bbf4

I loved the cut, fabric and fit of @ugmonk’s blank t-shirts but they’re not being made anymore.

Anyone find a good replacement?

Taking the train through Germany! 🤩

2. Get in motion by building side projects in public.

Good ideas almost always emerge while you're doing something else.

For example, @adamwathan was livestreaming while building a SaaS product. People started asking him about his CSS. @tailwindcss was born out of that.

A few photos from hack night last night.

We rented a bar, people brought their laptops, worked on side-projects, demoed some stuff on stage, and hung out.

I think we had 20-30 people total?

Really great (especially for a small town).

Today @jonbuda and I recorded an episode of @buildyoursaas! 😮

This is why I love running an indie product.

A few days ago I said: "It'd be cool if we could autofill podcast credits directly from Twitter"

Today @jonbuda deployed the feature to production. 💪

❤️ @transistorfm

For remote companies, I highly recommend Old Montreal for team retreats.

The @TransistorFM team and I had an incredible time eating amazing food, going for walks, seeing a hockey game, going to a concert, running along the water, and seeing beautiful fall colors.

The highest-value (and most under-estimated) feature you can add to your web app is PDF reports.

I've been getting so many DMs from SaaS founders about this @Patticus interview.

A really 🔥 clip:

"The dynamics of your market guide everything. The thing I got wrong was 'the market.' Some markets are not big enough!"

Well, it's official.

What are you thinking/feeling right now?

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/25/twitter-accepts-elon-musks-buyout-deal.html

Why is increasingly difficult to hire young @laravelphp or @rails developers?

From my conversation with @taylorotwell:

In the "old days," folks would learn something like PHP first, but these days, younger developers are learning JavaScript first.

@r00k @tuple A few ideas:

- give Tuple for free to colleges and bootcamps. Students will become evangelists when they get jobs
- create a pair programming documentary that goes through the history + benefits
- YouTube channel where every week you pair with a new celebrity guest

"Do you think in 10 years we'll still have full stack web developers?"

I heard this line on a podcast, referencing whether frameworks like @laravelphp or Rails would still be the underlying engine for SaaS apps in the future.

What do you think?

What was the most inspirational indie business story of 2021?

🎯 Very true: "Ironically, some of the best marketers can find themselves working on the worst products."

https://twitter.com/thefirejar/status/1419762854631256073

Who is the best web dev you know who can make Tailwind *not* look like Tailwind?

Feels like a “slow day on the internet” today.

Not much action on Slack, customer support, email...

Kind of nice 👍

Clubhouse doesn’t feel like it should be even close to that kind of acquisition price.

Facebook bought:

Instagram – $1 billion
Oculus – $2 billion
WhatsApp – $19 billion
Giphy – $400 million https://twitter.com/Keith_Wasserman/status/1357697913904717824

This is “jobs to be done” in a nutshell.

People are hiring the coffee shop for multiple “jobs” in their lives (many of which have nothing to do with caffeine). https://twitter.com/pcrowe/status/1313991852727693312

"Ultimately, I'm doing this for the money."

☝️ in my experience, if you're running a business, that motivation won't be enough.

"You think a dev who understands marketing was dangerous? JUST WAIT until you see a marketer who understands JavaScript. I'm going to be building popups like you've never seen." 🤣

What are the downsides to having an audience?

When you're validating an idea, your fans often add noise to the signal.

They'll sign up because they want to support you. They'll be enthusiastic even if they don't really want the product.

"Five or six years ago, I decided that I was going to live my life in three parts:

One-third for my business,
One-third for my family,
One-third for myself.

The distinction helps me to find balance and contentment in each area." – @ericripert

In order to succeed you'll need to execute these steps well:

1. Pick a good market
2. Discover what they desire
3. Build something that gives them the outcomes they want
4. Do it better than the competition 😉

Just put @r00k's "weekly co-founder questions" into the meeting template that @jonbuda and I use for http://Transistor.fm.

Super helpful for SaaS founders. You can find them here:
https://gist.github.com/r00k/eafb8de3d362902d84d9b55dc61de4a0

Attempting to build my first app using @laravelphp with instructions I got from stranger. https://www.pscp.tv/w/bxJJSjM4NTU1MXwxZGpHWE92ck5CUkta_FURgBM-Tnb477F9gmDu5eIY_XL_uHwNPW9AnTqIWrg=

🤔 Am I the only parent who uses the Apple TV app to pause whatever the kids are watching downstairs, so they come up for dinner?

🤦‍♂️ Having a Facebook Page for your business is a pain in the ass (especially compared to Twitter).

👉 Terrible UX (everything is slow, convoluted UI, messaging is terrible).
👉 The leads that come through FB aren't great.
👉 You have to pay to organically reach your followers?

@tinygoatdotnet Remote work helps a few different ways:
- it gives you the freedom to live where you want
- it helps you build communication skills
- it forces you to build a network outside your town

Can't believe how much better @getRewardful is for SaaS affiliate programs.

Lightyears ahead of anything else I've tried.

https://www.getrewardful.com/?via=twitter

C'mon Microsoft!

This is like asking the DJ to play AC/DC but they play Nickelback instead.

https://twitter.com/MicrosoftStore/status/1025053743241457665

A product’s success is a multiplier of:

- the size of your target market
- how much money they like to spend
- your reputation in that market
- offering something that market really wants
- how easy / expensive it is to acquire users
- how happy users are with the results

After interviewing hundreds of entrepreneurs, the same pattern emerges:

"And then I met [so and so], which enabled me to [get to the next level]."

Wow. In a sea of SaaS with the same generic-blue-intercom-knockoff inspired style, @churnbuster's homepage really stands out.

Well done @SDMattG and co!

Your influence is a product of:
1. The teams you've been on
2. The things you've made
3. The words you've shared
4. The people you've helped

"You can't procrastinate your way to success. Product work isn't easy. It's going to take sacrifice."

Love this quote from @marketingdevs 💯

It's always "people before products."

You start with people, and figure out what *they* need.

Then you build to meet that need.

"Free users want more features. Paying users want better features." - @destraynor

"Show me a credit card that's been swiped to solve this, and I'll believe it's a real problem." - @destraynor #jtbd

@PierreDeWulf 🤔 YouTube has over 100 million Premium subscribers.

💯 to this thread.

When it comes to SaaS marketing, there’s no silver bullet.

Generally, it’s going to involve a mix of content (blog, YouTube, podcast), doing SEO, and some paid acquisition (ads, affiliates).

All of it will take time and effort, and your chances of success… https://twitter.com/yongfook/status/1705800105260126322

5. A successful business idea will emerge from the experiences, connections, skills, insights, and resources you’ve accumulated.

The remedy for “not having good business ideas” is to go out and create more experiences: start a podcast, attend meetups, and run some experiments.

Had a great conversation with @aarondfrancis on this question:

"Should you bootstrap a new company if you have young kids?"

Goes live on the @buildyoursaas podcast tomorrow!

If Elon won't let us post links to our other social profiles, let's share our podcast URLs while we still can.

Reply to this tweet with a link to your podcast.

(RT this so more people see it) ✊

"I'm going to make a daily vlog"
"I'm going to publish a weekly podcast"
"I'm going to send a monthly newsletter"

It's common for creators to have big ambitions.

But be sure to ask yourself:

👉 What is this (ultimately) in service of?
👉 Is this the best way to achieve it?

What are you working on today?