Okay. So the next thing I want to talk about is blogging and this is remarkably underutilized and yet really 1
quite successful. 2
Now we were talking about blogging nowadays the predominant way that people go about doing this is using 3
medium.com. Medium 4
if you haven't used it, is just this beautiful minimalistic way of creating content and consuming content 5
that is the written word. 6
So one of the ways that you see founders leverage medium for their launch is by creating a blog that 7
essentially follows the journey of how their app got created. 8
So from the very beginning of idea conception, what are they doing, what are the problems that they come 9
across, 10
how are they selling them. 11
And as humans we're kind of suckers for storytelling. We really really like a good story. 12
We want to know you know what challenges are the hero facing, how are they fighting it, how are they getting 13
over it and every step of their journey. 14
So there's a few good examples for you to check out 15
and the first of which is a Mac app called Desk and the guy who created it essentially documents a timeline 16
of how he went about creating this thing. And and even in the very beginning, you know 11 years before 17
creation, he started blogging about the idea. 18
I know a lot of us are suddenly going to tense up and say you know "Oh my gosh. You know my great idea if I just 19
release it out there into the internets, what's going to happen? Somebody is going to steal it and then 20
it will be lost." 21
So my answer for those people is that you vastly underestimate how much people procrastinate. 22
There are so many people that I've met over the years either through running London App Brewery or working 23
in tech that have had amazing fantastic ideas and yet they lack that internal little hand that pushes 24
them beyond the idea and getting them to actually work on it and pour their blood, sweat and tears into 25
this project. 26
So I really wouldn't worry about people stealing your idea. 27
And I can bet that if you go around telling every single person you meet your grand idea, one in a 28
hundred of those people will be tempted to steal it but then they go home 29
and then there's Game of Thrones and then there's ice cream and then they'll forget about it. 30
And also if your idea is really truly that great, then you can bet that at least five people right now 31
on earth are working on it. 32
So don't worry about it. Instead 33
be transparent. Blog about it. 34
Tell people what you're doing and how it's going. 35
And one of the great benefits of that is that you a) build up a following. 36
And this is a slightly different following to those people that you have on your email list because 37
you ask them to take action once only and they might have declared that they're interested in downloading 38
your app. 39
But when you have a group of people who are following you along your journey of creation, those people 40
really care and that is the difference between a fan and a customer. 41
So there's a really great blog by the guy who created Looseleaf. 42
And again all the links are in the text below 43
if you want to have a look at them. 44
But basically what he did was he documented his journey for creating this app and every step of the 45
way he face problems or issues and documented some of his solutions. 46
Now some of those solutions are technical regarding how he coded certain things and other ones are more 47
related to the product or getting it out there. 48
And at the end of the day, he had a whole bunch of followers who were really really vested in the success 49
of Looseleaf. 50
Like people who cared about it, myself included. 51
The emotion is very different because you really want that guy to succeed, you really want the app to 52
succeed and you care so much that you're willing to shout about it, you're willing to tell your friends 53
about it even though it doesn't benefit you at all and you're probably paying for it. 54
That is the difference between a true fan and just a customer. 55
So I highly urge you to start writing about your journey of creating your product and gather your fans 56
around you who will support you, who will help you spread the word, 57
who will care about the success of your product. 58
So have a look at some of the examples in the text below and see how you can start emulating it. 59
And I would highly recommend just starting out with Medium. It's really low effort. You 60
sign up and you get your own beautiful blog. Writing in it is as simple as writing in Word and adding 61
pictures is pretty much just drag and drop. 62
Forget about all those high effort ways of you know buying a domain, setting up hosting, getting a WordPress 63
theme installed on it, 64
fiddling around with the settings, changing the layouts blah blah blah. 65
You don't need to do any of that. Just get a Medium account and start posting. The content is what matters.