57: Finding the Right Marketing/Product Balance

Ben recently returned from an entrepreneur retreat that featured sessions and activities focused on various topics, from projects people were working on to troubles with cofounders. Attendees were able to be honest, open, and transparent with each other. Ben had the opportunity to demo Tuple during the retreat. Feedback was that there are too many people working on its development, so he should focus on marketing.

Derrick emphasized the importance of keeping in mind the cost of getting someone caught up to speed on a project. He has thought about hiring a contractor to help with the development of Level, but decided that his single brain was enough.

Today’s Topics Include:

• Ben is working on a website to host the best pair programming guide on the Internet
• Not getting on the content marketing treadmill, but coming out with 1 or 2 solid, comprehensive pieces of content that draw in people
• Cascading style sheets (CSS) make your website site look good; should you hire a designer or learn the basics on your own?
• Create a good network; know people who know about things, and ask for help
• Derrick pushed a license update for Level’s code base; justified reasons why he should or shouldn’t make it an open source product and garner legal protection
• Derrick’s original end-of-October people testing goal for Level is still possible; using Trello to list and clarify tasks
• Finding a balance between making progress and doing other things that keep a product in people’s minds
• Tuple’s team is starting to adopt more foundational processes to address tasks
• Feedback from Listeners: More interaction and question-asking between Derrick and Ben, as well as bring people into their podcast process

Links and resources:

Derrick Reimer Website
Derrick Reimer on Twitter
Ben Orenstein Website
Ben Orenstein on Twitter
Level
Tuple
Thoughtbot
Big Snow Tiny Conf
MicroConf
Julian.com
Tailwind
Redis
Trello