Rob Walling

There are literally dozens and dozens within the TinySeed portfolio, 192 companies, and I would guess there are 40, 50, maybe more, probably even more than that, maybe, is it even 100, of founders who

There are literally dozens and dozens within the TinySeed portfolio, 192 companies, and I would guess there are 40, 50, maybe more, probably even more than that, maybe, is it even 100, of founders who

who learned enough about a domain, and whether they learned about that working a day job, whether they learned about that on their own by doing cold calls and interviews, whether they had a brother-in-law or their aunt who had this issue at work, They didn't just hear about that and go build it and, hey, everything worked. They had to decide to work on it.

who learned enough about a domain, and whether they learned about that working a day job, whether they learned about that on their own by doing cold calls and interviews, whether they had a brother-in-law or their aunt who had this issue at work, They didn't just hear about that and go build it and, hey, everything worked. They had to decide to work on it.

They had to learn enough about it to get to the forefront of the knowledge. And they had to notice the knowledge or the positioning or the market gaps. All of these things take time and patience and skill. And when I say it takes time, maybe it takes you three months to get there. Or maybe it takes you a couple of years.

They had to learn enough about it to get to the forefront of the knowledge. And they had to notice the knowledge or the positioning or the market gaps. All of these things take time and patience and skill. And when I say it takes time, maybe it takes you three months to get there. Or maybe it takes you a couple of years.

You know, if you think about the first line of code that Derek wrote for Drip was December of 2012. We had our first paying customer, I believe, June of 2013. So it was about seven months later. We launched to the world in November because we did a staged or phased launch across our 3,400 emails that were on our list. And then we did not...

You know, if you think about the first line of code that Derek wrote for Drip was December of 2012. We had our first paying customer, I believe, June of 2013. So it was about seven months later. We launched to the world in November because we did a staged or phased launch across our 3,400 emails that were on our list. And then we did not...

find what I would consider product market fit until August or September of 2014. So it was almost two years from the first line of code until I would say week plus plus product market fit. Product market fit is not a binary, it's a continuum.

find what I would consider product market fit until August or September of 2014. So it was almost two years from the first line of code until I would say week plus plus product market fit. Product market fit is not a binary, it's a continuum.

But we found that after a couple years because it took us a ton of time to learn about the space and the market to get to the frontiers of knowledge and to notice the knowledge, the positioning and the market gaps. So am I saying you have to commit to an idea from day one and it's going to take you two years to get to product market fit? No, none of that, right?

But we found that after a couple years because it took us a ton of time to learn about the space and the market to get to the frontiers of knowledge and to notice the knowledge, the positioning and the market gaps. So am I saying you have to commit to an idea from day one and it's going to take you two years to get to product market fit? No, none of that, right?

The story is just to illustrate that oftentimes if you want to do great work, if you want to build something interesting and ambitious, and again, ambitious for us, what is that? 5 million? 25 million ARR? It's different than Paul Graham's definition.

The story is just to illustrate that oftentimes if you want to do great work, if you want to build something interesting and ambitious, and again, ambitious for us, what is that? 5 million? 25 million ARR? It's different than Paul Graham's definition.

But if you want to do that, you're not going to do that by building a bunch of small projects and throwing them against the wall to see what sticks because you don't have... the knowledge and the understanding of where to take it. And you do have to put in hard work and develop skills and maybe get a little lucky to build great things.

But if you want to do that, you're not going to do that by building a bunch of small projects and throwing them against the wall to see what sticks because you don't have... the knowledge and the understanding of where to take it. And you do have to put in hard work and develop skills and maybe get a little lucky to build great things.

My second topic for today comes from an ex-Twitter conversation. Looks like it happened back in August of 2023. So it's still relevant. Alexander Schnebel asks, do you believe someone with X plus years of experience as a software engineer has an unfair advantage when bootstrapping a business compared to someone who doesn't?

My second topic for today comes from an ex-Twitter conversation. Looks like it happened back in August of 2023. So it's still relevant. Alexander Schnebel asks, do you believe someone with X plus years of experience as a software engineer has an unfair advantage when bootstrapping a business compared to someone who doesn't?

And I responded to Alexander and said, And that exchange got me thinking about, is there a hierarchy? Like, would I put one skill set at the top? And specifically, he says when building a business. I mean when building a SaaS company. And so I started thinking, you know, there's engineering skills where you can build software, there's marketing and sales, right?

And I responded to Alexander and said, And that exchange got me thinking about, is there a hierarchy? Like, would I put one skill set at the top? And specifically, he says when building a business. I mean when building a SaaS company. And so I started thinking, you know, there's engineering skills where you can build software, there's marketing and sales, right?