Bootstrapped Benefits 🥾
👋 Welcome!
Sam Eitzen has always been a bootstrapper. Over the years he’s asked everyone he’s met that has raised money, what they would do if they were in his shoes. Not once was the answer “go raise money,” mainly for the reasons that his business didn’t need it and as it would lead to some loss of freedom. Beyond these two very valid reasons, Sam summarises seven further benefits he’s discovered while bootstrapping. These include:
Choosing to grow slowly;
Forced to look at niches;
Have a simple yet inspiring story to tell;
No stressful equity conversations;
Learning more about old-school service businesses.
A final benefit that Sam loves is the community around bootstrapping, with people such as Arvid Kahl, Nathan Barry and Andrew Wilkinson promoting the work and progress. He concludes that bootstrapping “is a great path. You can learn a lot. It doesn't always work, but when it does, it's truly wonderful.” Read the full thread.
😺 Products of the Day
August 6th, 2020
🥇 Founderpath: Raise $10k-$1m in 72 hours, free revenue analytics.
🥈 Webflow University 2.0: Learn web design, development, and time travel - visually.
🥉 BooksInAction by Mentorist: Ultra actionable book summaries for you who don’t take notes.
🚀 Maker News
Tweetstorms
In this thread, Matt Tillotson shares eight ways Turner Novak builds interesting, original Tweetstorms in the competitive tech news and finance space. These include:
Adding your own insights to facts;
Collaborating by building on other peoples work;
Using underutilized info resources;
Building shareability into each tweet; and
Proofread each tweet twice.
Finally, remember that “the information market is not efficient,” so even if someone has written about your topic, there is still room for your work and voice. In summary, “research deeply, incorporate and credit the work of others, and build emotion and unique thoughts into every tweet.” Read the full thread.
Finding Customers
Rob Fitzpatrick wrote “The Mom Test,” a book about “how to talk to customers and learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you.” After reading this, Anthony Emberley and his cofounders changed their strategy in finding their first paying customers. Before, they talked to friends and family, built an MVP to solve their problem and launched to 150 beta users. This took seven weeks. After reading the book, they changed their approach as follows:
Define the target user,
Talk to 5 of them,
Ask only for one future product,
Synthesize takeaways, and
Refine target user definition + future product.
Then repeat steps 2 to 5 and build for your now paying customers! Read the full thread.
💭 Afterthought
To finish the week an excerpt from a Twitter thread by Mohd Danish about his first SAAS product after 10 MVPs. In the end, making money comes down to patience and consistency. “Building products is easy but validating and selling the product is hard.” That’s why it’s so valuable for makers & founders to grow an audience by building in public. The feedback you get is priceless, and on launch, you will have customers who want your product. Read the full thread. Take care and see you next week!
If you enjoy my newsletter, please spread the word to other interested people and help grow SpringUp Stories. You can also find me on Twitter if you’d like to follow my thoughts in real-time! I'll be back tomorrow with another newsletter. If you're getting value out of this newsletter please consider buying me a coffee. ☕
