🗞 What's New: How to hit the market faster

Building a successful SaaS takes time:

• The tips below can help you speed up development to hit the market faster. Choosing the right tech stack, reusing code, and setting realistic expectations can all get things moving more quickly!
• Many people talk about Instagram best practices, but what does the data say? These insights can help you kickstart your Instagram marketing strategy. Hint: Post timing does matter.
• Founder Justin Ferriman dealt with a major security breach in his startup. Here's how he addressed the issue, dealt with the backlash, and weathered the storm.

Want to share something with over 100,000 indie hackers? Submit a section for us to include in a future newsletter. —Channing

🏃‍♀️ Speed Up Your Development Process

by James Fleischmann

Building a SaaS takes time, and quite a lot of it. I was curious about how to speed things up, so I did some research. Here's what I found!

Code faster

The best way to code a product faster is to code faster. Crazy, right? Here's how:

• Choose the right tech stack: This will obviously have a big impact. The most important thing is that you feel comfortable with the stack you choose. Also important: Speed, third-party support, and community support.
• Choose the right IDE: What you choose for your integrated development environment really depends on your specific needs and language. Choose wisely.
• Use one repo: Some folks use different repos for the interface, API, infrastructure, etc., but using one repo for everything can simplify development.
• Leverage third-party solutions: Third-party solutions and open source libraries mean that you don't have to reinvent the wheel. Use what someone else has already created.
• Reuse code: Reuse code instead of starting from scratch. There are platforms for reusing code, including Flutterflow, MarsX, and Xano.
• Outsource: How much is your time worth to you? Outsourcing some of the simpler work can be a huge timesaver. Here's an example of an indie hacker outsourcing work when he needed someone to write a small piece of code to scrape data.
• Use low-code and no-code tools: Less coding often means quicker sprints. In this article, I share more information on the best no-code tools.
• Avoid hardcoding: Writing values directly into code can cause hassles down the road. Avoid where possible.
• CI/CD pipeline: If you happen to be working with a team, consider continuous integration and delivery pipelines. Everyone can continuously merge code to a central repo, and releases are automated.
• Avoid technical debt: Cutting corners can work in a pinch, but it'll you cost in the long run. If you aren't good at remembering to fix it, don't ever accumulate debt (i.e. don't cut corners). If you do choose to have some technical debt, keep track of it.
• Slow down: Often, slower is faster. Avoid rework.
• Don't be a perfectionist: Don't forget that good enough is good enough. It's a balance.
• Always be learning: Getting faster comes with gaining more experience. Experiment with new technologies, create new products, contribute to open source projects, join bootcamps, try a hack-a-thon, and just generally be curious. Getting a job or freelancing are great ways to learn, too. Experiment and learn, then build with what you know.

Test faster

• Automate your testing: Automation testing requires some time upfront, but it can significantly speed up the development process.
• Don't use unit tests (maybe): Though it's controversial, some folks don't do unit testing on side projects.
• Shift left testing: Essentially, this just means to start testing earlier in the development process. Catch bugs early!

Plan your scope

• Analyze the market right away: Before you write a line of code, analyze the market to discover what your potential customers want. This will avoid rework later.
• Identify and prioritize features: It's important to identify a finite scope that can be completed quickly. Not sure which features to prioritize? The DIE and RICE methods are both very popular among indie hackers. More on both of these (and others) can be found in this article.
• Avoid scope creep: Your MVP should not change after the requirements are set. Period.

Manage yourself

• Set your KPIs: Figure out which metrics are most important to you. How do you judge your progress? Lines of code written? Features completed? Number of bugs?
• Set realistic expectations: Failing and becoming disheartened doesn't make you more efficient. Neither does becoming overwhelmed. Set goals that are tight, but doable.
• Don't multitask: Studies have shown that multitasking doesn't work. Don't do it.

Change your mindset

• Be okay with doing less: Doing more work isn't necessarily more valuable. Be discerning about what you do and what you don't do. Focus on results, not hours.
• Say no more often: Whether it's bosses, customers, family, and everyone in between...learn to say no when you need to.

Check out more tips in the full article here!

How do you speed up development? Share your advice below!

Discuss this story.

📰 In the News

from the Volv newsletter by Priyanka Vazirani

🏛 Facebook has to sell Giphy, following a UK watchdog ruling.

🎤 Social media's chaotic algorithms are making it more difficult for musicians to become superstars.

💻 Global internet freedom has decreased for the 12th consecutive year.

🌕 The moon has been slowly slipping away from the earth.

🎃 Consumers pay at least 14.1% more for pumpkin spice products.

Check out Volv for more 9-second news digests.

📱 Insights to Kickstart Your Instagram Marketing

from the Hustle Newsletter by Ethan Brooks

The Signal: A lot of people talk about Instagram best practices, but what does the data say? Well, it might surprise you.

Earlier this year, a few of our teammates scraped and analyzed 110M Instagram posts, spying on 1M+ accounts around the world. Their full report offers a fascinating breakdown about what's actually going on.

*Instagram's going to get a lot more interesting now that DALL-E 2 is open to the public. All of these were made by AI. Source: DALL-E 2

Check out these three insights:

1. Carousels:

If you're in the content marketing world, you've probably heard that the future of content is video. The TikTok-ification of the world seems inevitable sometimes, but the data tells a surprising story.

When you look at average engagement, video and carousel posts are virtually tied, with 24.3 and 23.2 average comments, respectively.

However, averages aren't a great metric in this case because viral posts can throw them off. (Consider the old joke about how Bill Gates walks into a bar, and the average net worth of its patrons goes up to $100M+.)

Instead, if you look at median engagements, carousels vastly outperform video, with 70 median comments to video's 46.

The key to great carousels is to remember that they're not a collection of random images. They're a slideshow that tells a story.

Trends member Sarah Weikart recently talked about the BOTE brand and its storytelling prowess. Check out how it uses Instagram carousels to grab attention, build interest, and prompt action for this giveaway:

*Source: Instagram

2. The key to captions:

According to the research, length doesn't matter. Across the board, engagement rates hovered around 6%, so long as a post had any caption at all.

Interestingly, posts with very long captions (over 2K characters) performed just as well as those with very short ones (less than 20 characters).

*Source: HubSpot Instagram Engagement Report

As for what should go into those captions, the debate always comes down to hashtags and mentions. Are they important?

Here's what the data shows:

• Hashtags: Maybe ditch them. Engagement for posts with 11+ hashtags was roughly equal to posts with zero. But all other hashtag uses had lower engagement.

• Mentions: Including one to five mentions seems to boost engagement, with one mention leading to the highest engagement on average.

Similar to building a great carousel, great caption writing is all about the story you tell. For more on storytelling, check out our piece on Sahil Bloom, and the storytelling templates he used to grow a massive audience.

3. Post timing:

Around the world, engagement was highest from 6 PM to 9 PM across any region. This is about the time people are getting off work, finishing dinner, and settling in for the night.

Globally, engagement remained high until about 4 AM, but there were regional differences. Americans, for example, seem to conk out around midnight.

*Sunday is the clear winner for engagement

Interestingly, there were some major regional differences. In Miami, for example, engagement spikes at 9 AM, when the rest of the world is supposed to be working.

So, you may want to run a similar test in your own region to see if anything like that exists.

Check out the full HubSpot report for more!

What are your top tips for Instagram engagement? Let's chat below!

Subscribe to the Hustle Newsletter for more.

🚀 The Spector Report

by Josh Spector

I'm sharing growth tips for creative founders! Here's this week's:

Every creator needs a newsletter.

It’s the only algorithm-proof way to establish a direct relationship with your audience.

Your newsletter doesn’t need to be long...it can be a single sentence.

It just needs to provide value, and be sent consistently.

Subscribe to Josh's For The Interested newsletter or I Want To Know podcast for more.

⛈ How Justin Ferriman Weathered a Security Storm

by Justin Ferriman

Hi, indie hackers! I'm Justin Ferriman, founder of GapScout, an analysis tool that reveals profitable gaps in your market. Before GapScout, I dealt with a major security issue in one of my previous startups.

Here's how I got through it!

The background

I hated my consulting job, so I started a company called LearnDash, a WordPress plugin for creating online courses. I grew it into a seven figure business, and sold it in 2021.

Here's the thing: I don't know crap about coding. I can whip up some HTML to change the color of text, but that's about it.

The security scare

Software is susceptible to security issues, and that's particularly true with WordPress plugins. On New Year's Day, about four years into the business, I experienced my first major security issue ever. Someone wrote into support indicating that they had malicious files on their server because of a loophole in the software.

More tickets began to come in with the same message. My stomach sank.

I called my lead developer to inform him, and he started working on a patch right away to clean things up. After an hour or so, it was fixed, and a new version was ready to go out.

Now, if you know anything about WordPress, it's that you have zero control over your clients' websites. You can push out a fix, but they have to update it. Otherwise, they'll still be exposed to the flaw.

Communication was the top priority

Look, I'm human. Part of me just wanted to push out the fix and call it a day. I just wanted to deal with the issue behind closed doors, so to speak. But I knew that, for something like this, I had to over-communicate.

As soon as the update went out, I sent a very straightforward email to all of my customers. The subject line was:

In the email, I included a tl;dr and a three point summary of what had happened and how to fix it. I emphasized how urgent it was for them to update. Below that, I included more details about how it was reported, why that security issue existed, and a list of FAQs.

In my email system, I configured the settings to resend the email to anyone who did not open it after 12 hours, one day, and a couple of days, just to maximize the chances that it would be seen.

The backlash

There was definitely backlash. Some people just wrote in with snarky remarks. I replied to all of them personally, so they could see that I heard their complaints.

Others demanded money. That was out of the question, unless they were within the refund window. Instead, for a handful of people, I extended their licenses for a full year, free of charge. I realized that we needed to gain their trust again, and this extra year gave us that opportunity. Most people were okay with this.

For one person, I paid for a cleanup service to remove any malicious files on their website. I was prepared to do the same for others, but most people were not yet impacted by the issue. Those that were had taken care of it already.

That said, some customers did push back more. They wrote super long emails saying why my company owed them, not just the price of the product, but more money.

I responded to all of their concerns. A handful of customers simply would not take no for an answer. In this case, I referred them to the law firm that I used for the business. This was not done in a malicious way; I just wanted to give them the option to pursue legal recourse if they believed that more money was owed.

Here's the thing: If someone demands more money, they may potentially sue you, and that's a legal matter that you shouldn't deal with. Let the pros do it.

Ultimately, no one pursued any legal action. The terms and conditions that I had in place were pretty explicit about security issues, and outlining who was liable.

The dust will settle

The first few weeks into the new year were stressful, but I managed to keep most people happy. I listened, wrote emails, provided options, acknowledged the issue, and accepted personal responsibility for what had happened.

One thing you will find is that most people have short memories for this kind of thing. Security issues happen in software, from big companies to small. Naturally, you don't want to deal with it, but if you do, just know that you're not alone. It's not the first security issue that your customers have encountered in their lives, and it won't be the last.

The key takeaway is to just be human! Don't hide behind corporate jargon and policies. Be personable and accessible, and show that you care.

Discuss this story.

🐦 The Tweetmaster's Pick

by Tweetmaster Flex

I post the tweets indie hackers share the most. Here's today's pick:

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Special thanks to Jay Avery for editing this issue, to Gabriella Federico for the illustrations, and to James Fleischmann, Priyanka Vazirani, Ethan Brooks, Josh Spector, and Justin Ferriman for contributing posts. —Channing