When I started this page a month ago, I started it with the intention of creating a record of growth. I think that writing is an absolutely incredible tool that everyone has at their disposal, but very few actually leverage. I have written in a journal a few times a week, every week for the last 5 years, and I have gotten so much more out of it than I ever anticipated. I think that we have a way of viewing our lives as somewhat stagnant. Yes, there are big life-changing events (weddings, job changes, college choices etc.) that are identifiable turning points, but in general I do not think we view ourselves as constantly evolving. However, even those “big events” are really just aggregations of thousands of little changes that occur over the course of our daily lives. If someone asked me how much I have changed over the last six months, at first blush, I would probably say not much. I still have the same job, the same close friends, and live in the same city. However, looking back at journal entries from six months ago, the “micro” story is much different. Yes, I have the same job, but my priorities within it are different. Yes, my close relationships are the same, but the conversations and activities that those relationships revolve around are different. So, while I don’t feel like I have changed that much, the reality is that lots of micro-changes have taken place over the last six months. Ultimately, I think that when we become aware of how growth actually takes place, we gain the ability to appreciate the power of small steps. With that in mind, I am going to be adjusting the way I write here. I am going to write a three section post once per week that follows the below format:
1) A summary of something interesting I have read that pertains to the startup process.
→ Valuable because it will force us to find new things to read and ideas to explore.
2) A reflection from the past week on things that worked and things that didn’t work.
→ Valuable because it will give you a live look at mistakes being made and tips for hopefully avoiding them, but if not, overcoming them.
3) A writeup of where I stand in the process of building out my own startup.
→ Valuable because it will show you how I am thinking about each phase of a startup in real time (which inevitably will lead to insights the following week about why my thinking was so wrong).
Of course, this could potentially change, but this is what I think makes more sense longterm, and so it’s what I’m going with. Post 1 is below!
-Andrew
1) Read Something:
About: This is a fairly well known piece, written in the summer of 2013 and sent to the team at Tiny Speck (the makers of Slack).
Key Takeaway: Selling products means selling more than features. A store selling a saddle could tout the nice leather, the quality craftsmanship etc. all of this is valid, but to attract first time buyers, the store needs to latch onto something greater. In particular, it needs to sell what the saddle will do for the customer. It will bring them into the world of horseback riding, of traversing mountains, trotting through streams, and kicking back on the porch of a log cabin after a long day of riding. The writer describes this as “selling the innovation, not the product”.
Broader Discussion:
In addition to “sell the innovation, not the product”, We Don’t Sell Saddles Here, also highlights that customers don’t know what they want. Although this may seem like a rather dull takeaway, it’s actually pretty fascinating. To continue with the example of Slack, the article makes the point that before Slack came out, people did not know that they needed it. At its core, Slack is a tool for large groups of people to chat with one another. Now, to someone who hates long lists of emails, and has a miserable time searching for information, a tool for group chats would not initially appear useful or even relevant. Therefore, what Slack had to do was bridge the gap between what people thought they wanted, and what Slack was offering. In other words, Slack had to recognize that people thought they wanted a way to get rid of the laundry list of useless emails, and then write copy that explained Slack in those terms. I think that is the essence of this piece. Putting innovation into terms that people understand is the only way to introduce new products. For myself at Virbar, I have a product that offers the ability to video chat. On the surface, if you are someone say, involved in a community of NFT artists, you might not think a video chat platform is what you need. Companies use video chats for virtual meetings, you are an individual looking to do something daring, to build a brand of your own, to sell your work, and create financial independence. To you, video chatting doesn’t seem very relevant to that pursuit. However, if I tell you that Virbar is the gateway to becoming a member of a vast community of artists who are selling their works, getting commissioned to make one-of-ones, and giving interviews on crypto podcasts, then suddenly video chatting sounds like something you just might need.
The other key point of We Don’t Sell Saddles Here, is that products ask their customers to change the way they behave, and to compensate them for that, companies must promise a reward of sorts. Critically, that reward does not come in the form of $5 if someone signs up, or 1 month free. Instead, the reward is what the product will transform you into. I am going to diverge from the article for a second, and provide you with my own example, so bear with me. Let’s consider Whoop. For those not familiar, Whoop is a wristband that tracks your activity and sleep, and tells you how much rest you need at the end of the day. So what is Whoop asking of its customers? It is asking them to wear their hardware literally 24/7. That’s kind of a big ask. Yeah it’s a small band, but still, that’s a lot. Okay, so then what is the reward? This is what I think is really interesting. The reward that Whoop promises is a new identity. By wearing a Whoop you become someone that is better rested, and in turn, more efficient at work, stronger in the gym, and smarter in those big meetings. Not only that, the band itself is rewarding you with an image. It is telling people for you “hey, I am someone that takes fitness seriously. I am an athlete.” For many people, those rewards are more than enough to incentivize behavior change. To reiterate, a product has to compensate its buyers with a reward commensurate to the behavior change required.
Finally, I really liked this quote from the piece:
…“innovation is the sum of change across the whole system, not a thing which causes a change in how people behave.”
In other words, Slack itself is not an innovation; group chat software existed well before 2013. However, the organizational shifts that Slack’s application of this software helped facilitate are incredibly innovative.
2) Reflect on Something:
Narrowing My Focus
Narrowing my focus to exclusively focus on building a startup has been incredibly helpful. I used to want to focus on real estate, crypto, startups, learning guitar, and more. However, I realized that I had to cut some things off of that list because it was really easy to switch from one thing to another and tell myself I was making progress, when in fact I wasn’t really getting anywhere. I would liken this to my commitment to become a swimmer full time when I was 12. Before I was 12, I played baseball, hockey, and I swam. I was busy all year round, but I wasn’t actually getting very far in any of my respective sports. However, when I turned 12 I made the decision to drop the rest of the sports and focus exclusively on swimming. Perhaps not shockingly, I started to get really good. It didn’t happen overnight, in fact I would say it probably took six years for me to become a “good” swimmer, but I never would have gotten there if I had kept doing the circle of three different sports. I would have felt busy the entire time, but I never would have broken out in anything. I have spent the last month or so applying this mentality to my life, and I have found it to be very rewarding already. Narrowing my focus has forced me to deal with the good and the bad. Previously, if I hit a snag in startups, I could easily just switch over to reading about real estate. I would still feel busy and productive, but in reality I was just avoiding a problem. Narrowing my focus forces me to address problems as they come, which has been great for promoting progress. Since I have committed to focusing on building a startup, if I hit a roadblock in that process, I am not going to do anything else until that roadblock has been cleared.
3) Detail Current Process:
Okay, so I’ve talked a lot about building a startup, but what sorts of things am I actually doing?
Virbar:
Current stats:
Monthly/Daily Active Users: 0
Revenue: 0
Virbar is my virtual bar startup. It was conceived of during the depths of covid as a way for people to have the experience of meeting new people even though everyone was trapped in their homes. Right now we are looking for product-market fit in a post-covid world. Honestly, the technology is really cool. Our software lets users enter small video chats with their friends, and then gives them suggestions of other online groups to match with. Once in a group chat, we have ice-breakers and would-you-rather questions to make it fun. However, while all of this is great, the problem is we haven’t really marketed it. So right now, the goal is to find small, remote communities, and try to connect them via Virbar.
The way I am thinking of doing that is by targeting various small communities. I am going to begin with NFT artists congregating on Twitter (shoutout to the top NFT community builder out there). It is a niche group that has a desire to connect with one another in a personal way and share their stories. The plan for the week is to:
Rely predominantly on Twitter to identify these groups.
Roll it out for free
Prioritize collecting feedback from actual users
Ultimately, the site right now is sitting dormant on a url (app.virbar.com), which I think is unacceptable. We built this site in a vacuum with no users, and now that it is done we are expecting the users to be lined up asking to start using it. However, that is totally unrealistic. What I have learned is that users have to be included every step of the way because big decisions cannot be made without data, and data cannot be collected without customers. It feels like failure to not have end users, but we cannot count it as failure until we can point to EXACTLY why we have failed.
Okay, that is all for today. If you have feedback please shoot me a note on Twitter or send me an email at Andrew@virbar.com.
Love this Andrew. Your point on being spread too thinly across various pursuits in life resonates strongly, but it's a bitter pill to swallow sometimes I find!
Your last point on the inclusion of the user throughout any product or experience journey is dead-on in my view too. This links the empathetic sales process of your aforementioned "new identity" that innovation provides to one's personal experience in their ongoing relationship with that identity. Empathy and consideration rock are such robust guiding principles in this context. It's exciting when you see it in play!
Loving your writing - staying tuned.
Congrats Andrew! This was a great read