Erik Torenberg Profile picture
Sep 15, 2020 12 tweets 3 min read Read on X
Favorite startup frameworks I've discovered on the following topics:

- Recruiting
- Fundraising
- PM-fit
- Community
Recruiting: It's important to get the first 10 hires right b/c each employee will replicate themselves 10 times. Take ur time

Since you can't compete w/ Google, you want to find ppl Google isn't chasing after but have even more talent & grit

Like drafting Tom Brady in 6th round
Talent arbitrage opportunity:

Find people who are excellent at their craft but struggle at self-presentation or public speaking.

Others will write them off before seeing what they have to offer—and you get to harness them for their skill & either hide or improve that weakness.
These time horizons affect the people you hire:

When you're 3 months old, you need to hire people who can come in and contribute right away. You don't have the luxury of not doing so.

When you're 3 years old, you can take more bets on people who will mature overtime.
When fundraising:

It’s helpful to consider the biggest reasons an investor might *not* invest, and pre-emptively address those reasons.

If you’ve solved for them, point to evidence.

If you haven’t, point to how you’ll address them, and the moat you’ve built to date.
When fundraising:

Ask in the beginning:

"Do you believe there will be a multi-billion dollar co in the space?"

If no —> don’t go further until yes

If yes —> here's our unfair advantage and why now (instead of 5 yrs ago or 5 yrs from now)
When fundraising:

After pitching, one thing you may try—under the context of your improvement—is asking them to role play as if they were pitching your biz to their partnership

If they don’t pitch it well, that may tell you something. Conversely, you may prefer their phrasing
Product Market Fit is the idea that is your product is so good you should start investing in more acquisition channels.

NPS & PM-fit scores can be powerful as they measure intent:

Retention might be best way to measure (actions speak louder than words)
Metrics that matter:

Early on, quality over quantity metrics. (e.g. retention)

50% or 10% long term retention matters more in the beginning than user growth rate.

DAU matters if you require specific use cases

It's less "can this get users" & more "can it keep them...+ paying"
How to build community:

Bring people around *value* - some common utility that solves their problem—

And then hook them with values - get them opening up to each other so they feel connected.

*Value* is acquisition, *Values* is retention.
How to build community:

Vulnerability is huge.

The most popular discussion in forums is often:

"If you knew everything that you knew now, would you do or become X again?"

Onboard all community members w/ friendly self-disclosure rituals

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Erik Torenberg

Erik Torenberg Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @eriktorenberg

Jun 8, 2023
I’m excited to (finally) announce the launch of my newest incubated venture: @TurpentineMedia, a network of podcasts, newsletters, and more covering tech, business, and culture, from the perspective of industry insiders and experts.

Think The Ringer or Barstool, for tech.

We… twitter.com/i/web/status/1… Image
There exist practitioners in every vertical who’d make more money & have more fun being a business creator for their niche, & Turpentine is here to help them do it

Think @lennysan @HarryStebbings @packyM, 7-figure biz creators just off podcasts & newsletters

Just the beginning.
Read 17 tweets
Mar 24, 2023
Hey Everybody. I’m excited to finally release my main interview show that I'll host for the rest of my life.

First episode with @pmarca is out now. Next guests include @DavidSacks, @balajis, @ezraklein, @KTmBoyle, @JTLonsdale, & more

Preview of the episodes below:
Check out the podcast episode with Marc Andreessen below. I'm biased, but I think this interview gives the best insight into his intellectual journey over the past decade.

Apple: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the…

Spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/0bYfnu…

YouTube:
In the first episode with @pmarca, we discuss:

- Marc's intellectual evolution
- Why billionaires think the same
- @elonmusk as the return to entrepreneurial capitalism
- Larry Page on why giving money to Elon is the best philanthropy
- Effective Altruism's blind spots

clips:
Read 8 tweets
Mar 18, 2023
E13 of MOZ w/ @dwr @antoniogm & @ByrneHobart is up. We discuss:

- Byrne's early warnings on SVB
- How banking works
- Whether crypto will reinvent or merely recreate the existing financial system.
Thanks to sponsor @riversidefm. Riverside captures exceptional audio and video quality and makes it incredibly easy for us to record shows with multiple guests.

Riverside offers a 20% discount with code ZEN
bit.ly/Riverside_MoZ
Read 4 tweets
Jan 2, 2023
What's the best podcast *episode* you listened to in 2022? Here are some of my favorites:
Read 17 tweets
Dec 31, 2022
Here are some of the most interesting books and blog posts that changed my mind in 2022:
Ancient City

TLDR: For 99.9% of our existence, Western society has been a fascist-communist cult that joined ethnicity, religion, and culture.

We can see some similarities today: ancestor worship = identity politics; nature worship = environmentalism

amazon.com/Ancient-City-R…
Zeihan's The End of The World is Just The Beginning

Deglobalization combined w/ depopulation changes everything

The idea of global supply chains goes away; the idea of a single price for oil goes away; the idea that we can feed 8 billion people goes away
amazon.com/End-World-Just…
Read 21 tweets
Oct 31, 2022
What makes group chats uniquely good is partly the privacy but mostly the chemistry of the group

There should be a feature where, if everyone opts in, you can seamlessly publish the part of the chat that's appropriate for public consumption
Talkshow founded by the excellent @sippey tried this in 2016, but perhaps now's a better time for it since group chats are more prominent today given how stilted social networks have gotten

theverge.com/2016/4/26/1151…
This blogpost gives an example of what it's like to read a thoughtful text conversation: aaronzlewis.com/blog/2020/08/0…
Read 4 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(