Rooting for you! Thanks for sharing your process.
I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
81–90 of 111 posts
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#82As a solo/indie dev who's currently early in building a product, I've been keeping a journal of "ideas" for content in a txt file in the codebase as I hate context switching and want to build this up before I get to it. Here's what I've done: - At the top of the file I've listed my audience, 3 personas - My content has to be useful to one of those - If I see an interesting post/take on social media I hold the link an…
> many times people/community rally around you
But most of the times not a single person cares about you or your product.
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#83As a solo/indie dev who's currently early in building a product, I've been keeping a journal of "ideas" for content in a txt file in the codebase as I hate context switching and want to build this up before I get to it. Here's what I've done: - At the top of the file I've listed my audience, 3 personas - My content has to be useful to one of those - If I see an interesting post/take on social media I hold the link an…
>"You escape competition through authenticity." - @naval Except none of this is authentic. Its just another form of marketing and it should be illegal to go around spamming posts advertising a product. Or the accounts should be marked as sponsored or promotion accounts so they can be filtered out accordingly.
> Its just another form of marketing and it should be illegal to go around spamming posts advertising a product
I think this is the dogma that holds a lot of devs back, the belief that sharing your work, the product, the thought process, the journey, the mistakes, the wins etc is “spammy”. Would save your rhetoric for those who actually spam - ai slop generators, bots, link farmers, paid shillers etc. Not indie devs on HN trying to build something for the world.
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#84I've always struggled to find the right balance as a solo/indie dev. However, recently I decided to try something I'm calling the SaaS Schedule Sandwich. Each month is split into four weeks: - Week 1: Build - Week 2: Market - Week 3: Build - Week 4: Video Journal And so far it's kept me honest and not made me go live in a cave and code for a year. I actually released the first video journal last week for our new prod…
What are you using to put your videos together?
Right now we're totally bootstrapped so it's a combination of:
- Davinci Resolve (free)
- Epidemic Sound (for music and sound)
- ClearAudio.ai for VO processing
I then give myself the whole week to produce the video and honestly that has increased the quality by 10x. I'm not rushing it and can properly spend 2 days putting the video clips together, and another day on just the voice over alone.
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#85I've always struggled to find the right balance as a solo/indie dev. However, recently I decided to try something I'm calling the SaaS Schedule Sandwich. Each month is split into four weeks: - Week 1: Build - Week 2: Market - Week 3: Build - Week 4: Video Journal And so far it's kept me honest and not made me go live in a cave and code for a year. I actually released the first video journal last week for our new prod…
TLDW - whats your one sentence pitch for your product?
A new kind of database workbench for developers/founders/teams for:
- managing your database
- creating beautiful dashboards quickly
- writing, running and sharing queries (think postman but for db)
- visually building workflows to export and manipulate your database (so underrated)
- eventually building apps directly on to your database (think retool but a desktop app)
It's an all in one, modern way to interact with your database. Desktop app.
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#86Sounds like great advice. Thanks for sharing.
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#87I have been doing something similar for years. My website helps immigrants settle in Berlin. Recently, I've been writing a lot about health insurance.
For the last few months, I've been monitoring all health insurance topics in some communities, and actively answering questions. It gave me a much better sense of what confuses people, down to tiny details like "I was given two documents by my insurer, and there is only one upload field in the visa application system". Another couldn't buy the insurance I recommended them because the options in a dropdown did not match his situation 1:1. No one addresses these blockers; they only cover things at a high level.
Every time I couldn't answer a question with a link to my insurance guide, I updated the guide. I rewrote some guides 2-3 times this year.
On the other end, I was in constant contact with the health insurance broker who answers questions from my readers. That's 5-6 questions per day. Again, I tried to learn from each of those.
I think you have to stay close to your users. You might notice tiny details that make a bigger difference than the superfeature you're thinking of building.
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
What are you using to put your videos together?
Right now we're totally bootstrapped so it's a combination of: - Davinci Resolve (free) - Epidemic Sound (for music and sound) - ClearAudio.ai for VO processing I then give myself the whole week to produce the video and honestly that has increased the quality by 10x. I'm not rushing it and can properly spend 2 days putting the video clips together, and another day on just the voice over alone.
Thanks, it looks professionally done.
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#89It's a nice write up. > Build it and they will come is a fallacy. This is true. But is this the alternative? No trying to minimize the efforts of people who do this as real jobs or influencing - you do you. However, generating fake message screenshot, sending unsolicited messages etc? And the winner is the one who gets the biggest rise from the consumer, authentic or not. Distribution is hard, I get it. But isn't thi…
The alternative is to build the audience first, then sell things to it. If you don't command an audience, you must use someone else's, usually at a cost.
You don't have to be the loudest and most outrageous if your product is great and you speak the right message to the right audience.
Re: I forced myself to spend a week in Instagram instead of Xcode
#90highly recommend focusing on just tiktoks/reels rather than stories that expire every 24 hours. They will pick up more views beyond your audience, especially if you "warm up" your account by engaging with content just on your niche. Look forward to the next experiment!