Why it is so hard to find your target audience
Here it is, I've made the first classic mistake as startup founder.
I've built nofuss.io without talking to users first.
Now, I'm trying to figure out who in 2023 would email markdown files to build websites.
I was so excited about this idea that jumped straight into implementation without doing any market research.
I wish best of luck to all fellow indie hackers, try to source potential customers as early as possible before building the project, write emails, schedule calls to at least get some confirmation that your product is what customer actually wants.
Trending on Indie Hackers
After 19,314 lines of code, i'm shutting down my project
Need feedback for my product.
40 open-source gems to replace your SaaS subscriptions 🔥 🚀
We are live on Product Hunt
Don't be a Jerk. Use this Tip Calculator.
Not just customer research, though, please also look at the market. Customers are critical, but not the sole component of the equation.
I know it is very hard to get enchanted with our ideas, but “I will do it and figure out the rest” is not a healthy approach to business.
If I were you at this moment, I would focus on the market itself. What kind of niche that I could focus to help secure a part of the market.
Or not.
Because the market you are trying to penetrate is a red ocean – already too many competitors with too many value propositions. What advantages you can leverage over incumbents like WordPress or Substack? Customer preferences, as you have already mentioned, is essential. Do people prefer to manage their content through email? Is it something valuable?
Agree,
I started nofuss because I missed similar product myself and actually plan to support it indefinitely as I still have plenty of simple websites to host.
The way nofuss is built, it doesn't have a database and it's not using any frameworks to minimize long term maintenance efforts.
Ah Boris.
Don't beat yourself up about it.
You've fallen for the same product lie that screws most founders - that your product is the key to growth.
Choose a target audience first. And don't sell a product - it's a very ineffective growth strategy: https://www.indiehackers.com/post/the-sell-your-product-lie-that-kills-startup-growth-721370dbdc
I've checked the website, interesting approach, partly reminds me of what basecamp is doing. They have blogs, podcasts and books, which translates into sharing valuable information and what makes you unique.
You mostly have examples with large companies, like Apple, do you know how this approach would work for a small bootstrapped one?
Hey Boris,
Absolutely, with the exception of Apple, the rest of them used this strategy when they were startups.
Two of the bootstrapped examples are Bullet Journal (which has stayed lifestyle sized BTW so no need to go big if you don't want to) and You Need A Budget (YNAB).
There are countless others that use this too, I just need to get round to writing them up as case studies.
Feel free to join my newsletter (you can find the sign up on the website) to be kept in the loop about new posts.
It seems there is a problematic piece of information regarding Apple in your story - Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997 and it took 8+ years for Apple to catch its 1996 revenue and almost 10 years to return to profitability. It was not immediate.
Also, what Jobs did was not selling the product. He practically decreased the workforce and leaned the product line reduce costs and started waiting for the next big thing. You can stitch together how he did it with Your Strategy Needs A Strategy and Good Strategy Bad Strategy. It is not about just using a miracle framework.
Hey,
Apple posted its first profits in 1998, a few months following the launch of Think different.
Of course there were other problems with the company (bloated product line, bad management) but, as Jobs himself pointed out, major part of Apple's problem was the marketing strategy.
Best
Chris
Hiya,
Well, yeah, they posted the first profits in 1998, but it was not because of the change in top-line, was it? It was mostly because of the cuts to expenses. That's not the kind of profitability you want if you are angling for market leadership. Any deep cut in capability might affect future profitability – it has the potential to prevent you to make winning plays when it is time.
I am not sure to which statement you are referring to when you talk about Jobs pointing out to marketing strategy, but I am sure when he refers to marketing strategy it is not just promotion. Bloated product line is a part of a problematic marketing strategy.
Cheers.
Because solopreneurs unfortunately start with product instead of market research.
The place you want to start at is qualitative market research.
If you don't then what you're doing is essentially making a key you absolutely love and then you go into the world and try to find a door that key will unlock.
That's ridiculous. No one would start key first.
You choose a door, preferably one with a simple lock. Then you make a crappy key and iterate a few times until you can unlock that lock and open the door.
This is exactly how you should think about marketing.
Which audience do I want to serve?
Where do they hang out?
Then you study them to figure out what problem they have that they would pay money for in order to have it solved.
Then you try to find proof of that. (proof of buying behavior)
Then you figure out what their desired outcome is.
And then you start pitching and pre-selling them. And only then do you start working on the product.
If you're willing/able to spend some time to improve your fundamental marketing skills, read some of my essays: https://www.younglingresearch.com/essays/fishing
Thank you for sharing and running the yrcbootcamp.
As software engineer, I can see many ways your website can be improved and product you're getting for $16/mo from squarespace is subpar.
You, basically, the target audience for nofuss. Would you mind sharing why would you prefer squarespace to nofuss?
Mental and physical availability.
This is the first time I've ever heard of nofuss.
Also, the tools simply don't matter that much for me. People follow me to hear what I have to say and they couldn't care less about the software I use. I'm still using ghetto ass Gumroad to sell products for example and I've done tens of thousands of dollars on it. https://younglingresearch.gumroad.com
At some point I'll probably update the site but rn it's low on the priority list. Look at PG's garbage site with the insanely minuscule font for example...
All that being said, massive respect for doing this kind of manual outreach. Keep doing what you're doing and I'll keep you in mind when I'm ready to deal with the migration nightmare.
Here's a suggestion to turn this around.
Usually, the best approach is to build an audience first, validate the idea, and only then start building the actual product (this time with buyers in mind). It's a little counter-intuitive, but it's a better approach than the one you took.
Here's how you do it:
Step #1: Think of a target audience for Nofuss. Who are the people who would be interested in something like this? Start building that audience (a simple mewsletter, forum, etc.), and then ask if they would buy it, or if they need something else.
Step 2# If the answer is no (current version is not enough), then ask what they actually want. Run surveys and also do calls. Ask specifically if people would buy what you have to offer.
Step #3: make them pay for it. Collect a little downpayment and promise lifetime access or premium perks. If you get enough people interested with credit card in hand, then start building. If you don't and most tell you this is a bad idea, refund those who trusted you and move on with the next solution.
As a rule of thumb, you should never build anything unless somebody is ready to pay you for your solution.
Made the same mistake with my first startup. It's often way more fun to build product than talk to users, but the latter is way more useful.
It's a shame that the phrase "build it and they will come" became so popular. Maybe was true back in the early web days, but couldn't be more off today.
Agree, I wouldn't write more lines of code before talking to users first.
Wish you good luck Boris! And it's great that you came to the conclusion that you need to have a specific target market in place before building the product.
If I was in your position, I would focus on getting beta testers and work on the landing page with a solid value proposition (What makes your product unique? Who will get the most benefit out of it? How will it make their lives better, is it more money, saved time, faster deployment, no learning curve, etc.... )
Then using the beta testers I can keep on improving the product for a few weeks, before having to fully launch it.
Additionally, I would work on my pricing strategy (Since the project should cover expenses and pay me out to keep the motivation up and keep improving it)
Jason Cohen, the founder of WPEngine, has a really good take on this and I would highly recommend you watching his interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWXBWLTcmn4&t=1740s
Good luck!
Awesome, thank you for sharing this video, I've subscribed to this channel, I'm starting to grasp common sense in product launching
Glad that you found the video helpful! Wish you good luck :D
Wow, that advice came riiiiiight on time for me. Thanks mate
Welcome, I'm glad it's useful
I hear you and I get the paranoia but it's fine, pivots happen all the time and let's be real, if founders won't come out and make opportunities in times of crisis then who will?
Thank you, I checked the promotee as I plan to dive into reddit soon, but still it was hard to grasp how this tool can help me
let's talk over twitter, trust me Reddit is the best place for idea validation.
I think it was the market – the best place for validating an idea…
interesting, why do you say so?
Internet points are not equivalent to cash flow?
??
I understand your paranoia, but it's okay; pivots occur frequently, and let's face it, if founders don't step forward and seize opportunities during crises,<a href="https://www.gopromotional.co.uk/branded-products/promotional-pens">link text</a>
then who will?
I like the simplicity of your website.
Was this a simple idea to build? The great part about simple to build apps is that the building is a part of the testing.
Thank you, I definitely tried to build it as simple as possible in order to make it easy to maintain for next 10 years to come.
As a fellow engineer, this pretty much describes all my projects:
But sometimes I do wonder with talking with a target audience how you balance their feedback versus "they don't really know exactly what they need unless you can show it to them".
fake door test where they actually put payment info in a landing page.
Or
Competition
Actually we are facing the same problem for our AI business plan generation tool: https://planana.io/
very cool, love the design and that you showcase the product from the beginning
That is an interesting idea. Very creative. It looks like a creative solution for a 'made-up problem'. But this can have a great potential for pivoting.
//Why it is so hard to find your target audience//
I think it should be the other way around. Find audience with a problem and come out with a solution.
It's pretty hard as software engineer change your mindset to being sales & marketing first, software second.
True. We all learn from mistakes
It's fine, I'd urge you to not be mad on yourself, focus on proving for the next 1-2 months to market it, take feedback, iterate over it and you'll arrive at a value proposition/pivot, it's not the end of the world.
thank you, wish you best luck with your projects as well
I'd say there are two good demographics for this idea:
Founders that want to build their personal brand. You know the people on Twitter who do threads, etc? Those types. They love to write essays and personal experience blogs.
Any professional that might want to do some content marketing (i.e lawyers, freelancers, etc)
and knowledge.
You would probably need to figure out more pain points to build a really compelling value proposition (what is wrong with current alternatives other than confusing UX)
This is something I know I would use. Not pay for (because the specific pain point you chose is not compelling enough to pay for) but use.
The one thing I did notice is the website design is not super appealing (not saying you should have a complicated landing page. But a better color scheme and perhaps some visuals would not hurt.
I really do hope you keep working on it because this has potential - I have struggled to find good blogging options that are simple.
Thanks for feedback. I'll keep working on it because I really need no fuss blogging for my other projects and the way it's built, it can be maintained very efficiently (no database, no frameworks).
There are projects like bearblog which address similar painpoints, maybe that's what you're looking for.
I'm thinking of adding more ways to publish the content, like emailing link to a notion page or publishing through the slack bot.
If you have any specific ides in mind which you missing in other products, feel free to connect and I'll consider adding feature specific to your needs.
I made this classic mistake not too long ago. It's great to find a community that also shared this classic mistake and learn how they bounced back from that and improved. Good luck!
Also, I am in the process of validating a project that tackles this issue and other issues. I would like to email you about it.
All the best, Boris! Most founders I spoke to have been a part of this very essential learning process. It's frustrating but it also means that there is SO much scope and room for improvement - the thought of that keeps me going to try more!
Thank you, it's like learning a new trade
It does look like a great idea, kind of similar with https://bearblog.dev/
Very cool project as well, I wonder why they don't have any pricing
This is the question with an associate who is against testing with a landing page, whereas I don't want to launch into a big development without knowing beforehand if it can interest people. I made mistakes before dev for months and never released the product or a perfect v1. One word test
That's the excatly one of the most difficult points about starting a business.
Let's be pragmatic, the idea's to know if somebody's willing to pay for what you offer.
You value proposition has to solve a real pain point no other available tool is solving yet.
To do so, launch a small validation campaign #1:
If not concluding, iterate, start campaign #2 !
Hope it helps ! Anyway, persevere: pivoting's part of the job ! You'll be getting there.
Btw, If you need validation help, send me a DM.
Cheers.
I love that this is the first post I see when I login because - same!
Myself and two co-founders are launching an LMS (learning management system) for classrooms . The idea is that everything is in one place - interactive activities and videos, embedded game-play, simulations, assessments, and more. Normally, teachers would have to have logins, accounts and content on a dozen different sites and apps for what we offer. Our platform is called Litmus Learn (www.litmuslearn.com)
The issue - it's been so hard to get real teachers to try it out! We aren't even selling at this point, we just want them to try and to give feedback. The platform is growing in schools in India - where it has a proven track record- and we're bringing it here to the States.
The irony - I just left the classroom in Sept after 20 years as a middle school teacher! I know the ins and outs of classroom teaching. I also know we're facing 2 big headwinds - Teachers are already using platforms like Google Classroom and Schoology
Most teachers don't have much say in which LMS their school uses. This will be an issue once we start selling, but right now we don't need schools to buy, we need teachers to try.
But, maybe one takeaway from your situation is that everything is sales, essentially.
Wishing you get traction in 2023!
Hi, wishing you traction for 2023. The only help that come to my mind for you is suggesting investing time in Facebook. Create a community or join other teachers, engage with the problem your product can solve. Ask in all forum possibles how teachers manage...problem. Turn this question in all forms possible for variation. Hope some responds so you can tell about your own. Word by mouth.
Thanks - That's a good idea. I was a teacher, so I am in a few groups like that. The tough thing is that teachers don't have much say in what platform they use - those decisions are usually made by IT folks or admins. That's where I'm having a block.
I've posted this message on a couple of Reddit threads on LMS's:
I'm helping build and launch an LMS, but it's nowhere near ready and won't be for sail before next year. That said, we've tried to integrate all the pieces of a good 'classroom operating system' - assignments, grades, interactive video, simulations - and put it all in one place, and let you use content in all of those features without re-creating anything.
Right now, we just need feedback, so we're giving the platform away for free in the US, and all we are asking in return is for folks so tell us what works, what doesn't, what they like, and what features they wish it had. We're really scrappy and can be super responsive.
Even if people just use it and don't tell us, it would help us know what users need. It's called Litmus Learn (www.litmuslearn.com).
Thanks for your reply. If you permit me, i think you should have another message. Create a story of a problem you had and the solution you found was your product. Focus on the problem, not on your solution. People don't like "selling" messages. Avoid proposing people a product, it's extremely negative. Don't hesitate if i can say more. Have a good day.
Thanks - It helps to re-frame things in that way. We are looking to solve 3 problems that are related:
Litmus Learn seeks to have a single, unified place where all of their content can be used for multiple applications - and the platform itself is like an operating system for the blended learning classroom.
Wow, I cannot imagine the struggle your project is experiencing. I hope you keep us updated on your progress and that teachers start trying your product.
Here's how to define your audience:
Sometimes (or often?) it is not a matter for finding your audience but rather reaching it.
The markets are super-saturated, and it is extremely hard to get noticed even by those people who would be your ideal audience.
Finding your way to get through the noise might solve a big part of the "finding your audience" problem.
The classic blunder!
Honestly, I can see why you were excited about the idea?! I didn't get it from the barebones description here, but then I was looking at it and I can imagine a certain sect of people this could appeal to (key word: imagine...). It's tough. Appealing is not enough. You have to cross that certain threshold of people really badly wanting the product.
Would be remiss not to plug our own DIY Startup School system which speaks to this urge to get excited, jump into a solution, and skip all the important stuff 😱 It might still be able to help as you figure out your way forward!
Problems aren't worth solving just because they exist and can be solved - someone has to want it enough to sustain the effort required to bring a solution to market.
I do plant to launch multiple products and blogs, I needed a product which would help me to do that with low effort and doesn't cost much. That's why I launched it
Why the F would you do that!?
This comment was deleted 2 years ago.
https://vt.tiktok.com/ZS8kmdhwg/
More than likely, because once you know your audience, how to reach them, and how to get them to buy...you've discovered your secret sauce
I've said it in another post, I think your users and https://bearblog.dev/ users might have a lot in common
Awesome, thank you for sharing this video, I've subscribed to this channel, I'm beginning to draw close frequent experience in product launching
https://garagedoorrepairchesapeake.com/garage-door-spring-repair/
wish you good luck it was really amazing thanks for post it if you need more information about it here is https://integritygaragedoorsrepair.com/garage-door-repair-poquoson/
This comment was deleted 2 years ago.
At least me, as I solved my own problem. There is hey email service which also has similar feature.
What I like about emails is that I don't need to register or go to website and as I use email a lot, it's easier for me just to write an email and get it published.
Carrd and Framer are awesome though, thank you for sharing. They address slightly different need, what I wanted to solve is ability to have unlimited websites for cheap (not paying $10/mo for each) with subscribers lists which are easy to manage.