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independence2 unconnected · 2 more authors in those circles
applies to

b2b and consumer, no audience needed

confidence

high

evidence

15 claims · 13 articles · 4 receipts

window

2020-10-09 → 2023-12-22

2 builders who never spoke to each other

Live in the community before you build for it

Go and spend months inside the forums, threads and meetups where your future buyers already talk, cataloguing what they complain about rather than pitching anything. Written complaints beat interviews because people invent grievances in conversation, and the accumulated evidence is what gives you nerve when it is time to sell.

The method

  1. 01

    Take a job or consult inside the industry before starting anything in it, taking notes on the daily frustrations, because the pain you have felt yourself is what you can credibly sell against.

  2. 02

    Stay inside an industry - forums, conferences, relationships, doing the thing yourself - long enough to watch demand shift, then start the company on that shift.

  3. 03

    Spend years embedded in the market before you enter it: host shows in the niche, guest on other people's, join the forums and Slack groups, attend the events where those customers gather, read the trade newsletters, and ship small products aimed at them.

  4. 04

    Spend time inside communities you already belong to that have money to spend, and watch for what causes them pain, instead of generating ideas in isolation.

  5. 05

    Whoever spends the most time inside a community will spot its unmet needs first, so proximity beats cleverness when hunting for a product.

What it returned

  • 2012

    Justin had been podcasting and in podcast communities since 2012 when he saw businesses adopting podcasts, mainstream media attention, and listenership reaching 51% of the population, and joined Jon Buda on Transistor.

  • 20

    Justin spent six years doing exactly this in podcasting, three of his own shows, guest spots on more than 20, Hotpod and Reddit participation, XOXO, MicroConf and New Media Expo, two books and a course for podcasters, and spoke about it at MicroConf 2018 while Transistor still had only 39 paying early-access users.

  • The author opened a snowboard shop in his early 20s with no retail experience and only then discovered the paperwork, ordering, inventory and staffing realities.

  • Advice Justin got directly from Amy Hoy.

Sources

the second source

Three plays a week, for the phase you are in

No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.

One email a week. Unsubscribe in one click, and the address is used for this and nothing else.

More in community

all community plays

the second source

Three plays a week, for the phase you are in

No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.

963 corroborated plays to draw from · 3 a week

One email a week. Unsubscribe in one click, and the address is used for this and nothing else.