As technical founders, we're supposed to choose the technology that works best for us and our business. But we often let the cargo-culting around the newest, hottest tech stack get to us.
Many technical founders see a new startup as an opportunity to figure out a modern tech stack. That is a dangerous move.
Not only do you have to deal with the inherently hazardous nature of creating a new business, but now there is also the chance that the new and mostly untested tech stack may not be able to solve the problem you're trying to solve.
The central question of choosing one particular technology over another is this: "Will you be able to use this well for a long time?"
There are three components to this question: your technical aptitude as a founder, your ability to use the technology for your particular purpose, and how you can minimize the chance of having to replace it later.
You'll learn all about this in the chapter "Making Tech Choices: Don’t Add Risk to a Risky Business" of the book Zero to Sold. Please check it out!
First impressions matter. When someone checks out your social media profile, and they see a picture of a real human being that's accompanied by a meaningful description and a few well-selected links, they will be intrigued by who you are and what you're trying to accomplish.
If they find a default avatar picture and a half-assed description, they'll quickly move away from your profile.
When you're new in a community, people expect some level of initial effort after you join. Make it easy for people to get to know you. The real you.
Don't hide behind a pseudonym. Own your name and use it for your public work. Some communities might allow pseudonyms, but the chances are high that members expect you to show your face and use your name if you're in a professional community.
Most products that you will see staying on the market have something in common: they do one thing very well—and not much else. Weber sells grills that are fantastic at grilling. The furthest they have strayed into new territory so far has been adding an app-readable thermometer.
Still, that gimmick and anything else about their products is focused on making using their grills a great barbecuing experience. That's what it is about: having a barbecue that grills.
In the SaaS space, Stripe is a great example.
They provide a clean, well-designed, programmer-friendly service that allows you to charge your customers. While Stripe, as a company, offer a few adjacent services, their focus is always on making getting paid by your customers as comfortable and low-friction as possible.
Communities are tribal; they are based on honesty and reputation.
Here are the risks and opportunities that come from that: 👇
You'll get away with certain things in one community that will get you removed from others, but the general rule of every community is this:
Every action taken by a member of the group should benefit all members of the group.
This rule is the simplest version of these variations that you'll find in the wild:
"Don't critique others' work without productive feedback." — If you tear down something, provide the means for people to improve.
Before the internet made transferring large amounts of data cheap and easy, software used to be distributed on CDs or DVDs. For any given application, there was the "Golden Master," a final version of the software, ready to be copied millions of times.
Those days are over.
Every day, millions of software updates get dispatched. For many services in the bootstrapped world, customers will never notice: they'll just refresh their browser pages, and the latest version of the application will just appear.
With updating being so easy, no product is ever finished. Even when you release what you think is a “feature-complete” version of your product, it will only be "done" for a while.