MegaMaker - Why do you want to be famous?

Here are a few things I've been thinking about.

As always, if you have something to say – please reply to this email. 👍

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avoid fame if you can

There are some people that think they need to be Twitter famous in order to start a business.
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But I think fame is a trap; you should avoid fame if you can.

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It reminds me of this interview with NOFX (the punk band):

Interviewer: "Do you wish you got bigger in the 90s?"

Fat Mike: "No way. Because once you get really big, you can’t hold on to it. You can’t sustain that level of popularity. Our level of popularity we can sustain. Our crowds have never gone down. We sell out places all the time, the same clubs we always play where if you look bands who did go the MTV way they were big for a few years, but then they were back to playing clubs."

If you're a band, and you can fill a room with a hundred people and play to those fans in multiple cities around the globe, you've made it. That's perfect.
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The same is true in startups. If you can build a small, profitable business without becoming well-known, you should do it. It will bring so much more calm to your life.

Links:

• ​Play this audio clip (with Brian Casel)
• ​Fat Mike (NOFX) interview​
• Tim Ferris: 11 reasons not to be famous​
• ​Full podcast episode with Brian Casel on the Open Threads podcast.

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the secret is to sell what people are already searching for

Most purchases start with a search:

• "gift ideas for my wife"
• "best podcast hosting"
• "top indie games for teens"

So the secret to a successful business is to build/sell products that people are already searching for.

I was reminded of this while I was at the barbershop. The topic of gifts came up. "Where do you guys shop for your girlfriends/wives?" someone asked. Multiple people mentioned Wildflower General Store here in Vernon. If I was the owner of that store, I'd be optimizing search results for "gift ideas for women vernon bc".

While some purchases are impulse-driven (like seeing something cool on Instagram and buying right away), most sales come from intent-based searches.

People already know they want to buy something, and they go out looking for it.

​Arvid Kahl asks:

For existing products (like Transistor), I send an automated email asking customers how they found us. If they respond, I ask for specifics: "Do you remember what you typed into google when you were looking?"

For new product ideas, I observe what people ask for recommendations for on Reddit, Twitter, LinkedIn, Slack, Discord, as well as in real-world locations (like coffee shops, conferences, barbershops).

Ali Abdaal @AliAbdaal Can anyone recommend a good + accurate transcription service for long-form content like podcasts? September 7th 2021 8 Retweets 314 Likes

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I also keep track of the terms people use to find Transistor (and our competitors) in Ahrefs. You can also use Search Console, but only for domains you own.

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cool stuff

📺 Netflix documentary: Stutz. Corbett Barr recommended it, and I watched it with my wife. Really powerful stuff from Jonah Hill and his therapist, Phil Stutz.

🎧 Starry Messenger. Really enjoying this audiobook by famed astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. "A wake-up call to civilization. People no longer know who or what to trust. We sow hatred of others fueled by what we think is true, or what we want to be true, without regard to what is true. Cultural and political factions battle for the souls of communities and of nations. We’ve lost all sight of what distinguishes facts from opinions. We’re quick with acts of aggression and slow with acts of kindness.”

📺 Star Wars: Andor. I found the other recent series' (Boba Fett, Kenobi) to be particularly bad. They made me not want to watch any more Star Wars. Andor changed my my mind.

👩‍💻 How to make people happy. "Openly express gratitude towards others more. Genuinely compliment people you know more. Offer to help people, even if you can’t completely solve the problem.

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Cheers,
Justin Jackson
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🐘 Follow me on Mastodon​

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