The Exchanges

Q there's a million people who can post about Reed Hastings, and there's weird rules, but only some people can post about the ideas piece of it. So I think that a sub point could be sometimes the biggest opportunities aren't in fixing problems, they're in making people feel better about having them, and that's kind of a prompt For people to come up with startup ideas. Does that make sense?

A Yeah, it does. So this is where, you know, my, my years as a ghostwriter, that part of my brain is kicking in, right? Because if, if we sort of change the lens for a moment, let's pretend that what we're doing, you are a client and I'm a ghostwriter. It's very similar. This is exactly what I would be doing with a client anyway, right? And you just said something really smart. And so I go, okay, that's great. I just don't know where to put that yet. So I think of it like a Lego block, right? You're like, that's a really great Lego block. I just don't know where it fits yet. Okay. So we, we put that there. Now we've got some ideas swirling around and in some way we can, let's summarize sort of our, our goals here. Our goals are, we want This piece to be, um, connected to startup ideas. We want this piece to in some way be actionable because a lot of the, a lot of the value that you provide is like how to, how to get started, how to do something, right? And ideally we want this piece to be connected to our Reed Hastings, you know, strange rule during Netflix's early days. Fair, fair enough?

AI assessment note: “Yeah, it does. So this is where, you know, my, my years as a ghostwriter”

Q If you want to write a paid newsletter, what framework for new categories do you have? Like what makes a good category? Versus, you know, a not good category.

A Um, we wrote up this little checklist. We create so many things now. I'm like struggling to remember the specifics, but the, the big one is like a, it has to be a very tangible asset. So a lot of people are like, I'm going to start a paid newsletter and they think that they can write about whatever, but something happens when they make it paid. That's not really what's happening. A paid newsletter, the way to think about it is it's a book that never ends. So it has to be a topic. That you want to repeat infinitely, the reader wants to consume infinitely, and every issue has to feel like a tangible object. So how do you make it tangible? Like our Write with AI newsletter, every issue is, here's a framework, but then here's the ChatGPT prompt. So every time I give you a prompt, it feels like I'm giving you a box, like an object, you know. So how do you make every issue a recipe or a You know, some sort of, like, designed framework, or a prompt, or a checklist. Like, it has to feel like a thing.

AI assessment note: “it has to be a topic. That you want to repeat infinitely”

Q How much do you think about competition of ship 30 for 30 and your whole empire? With other writing programs, ghost writing programs? Like, do you think about it a lot?

A Not, not really. I mean, so, one of, a cool business concept that I, that I got, that I've learned and been introduced to over the past couple years, and I learned this from, uh, Christopher and Eddie, who I started, uh, Category Pirates with, which was a separate paid newsletter. It was all about category design, and one of the cool, uh, Uh, category design, not even principles, but just, um, like mathematical takeaways is that when you're the leader in a category, the best thing that you can do is grow the category. The more that the category grows, the more that you benefit, you know? So the more that the smartphone category grows, the more Apple benefits, the more the electric car category grows, the more Tesla benefits. So I look at other writing programs and, and other writers and other people talking about the A net positive because they are growing the pie and the bigger the pie gets, the more that we grow as well, you know? And so through that lens, like that's why it's a bit of a contradiction because on the one hand, I am a highly competitive person, but it's really not competition with someone specific. It's just within myself. And then on the other hand, I'm very aware of these category dynamics where Business is a little bit of a winner take all in the sense that the category King captures the majority of the category and the upside. But the reality is it's also n…

AI assessment note: “Not, not really.”

Q You know, there's an argument to be made that you need, you need top of the funnel content. That goes viral to get attention to then build a niche or audience. What do you think of that when people say that?

A No. I mean, ship dirty is a great example of how not true that is, you know, super niche. A lot of the things that we write around writing don't go crazy viral at all. And I also think that a lot of creators have it backwards. Like it's not, you build attention and then you build a business because if you build a ton of attention, posting memes, and then you try and go launch a business, like it's it, people aren't brain dead. It's not like just because they followed you, they're just going to miraculously buy the thing that you sell. You know, and so it's not audience, and then, oh, now I have something to sell. It's like, who's the person that you want to help? Build the thing that you know helps them, and then go sell the mixtapes out of your car. You know, then go get attention for it.

AI assessment note: “No. I mean, ship dirty is a great example of how not true that is”

Q you're running a SaaS business. Technology company called TypeShare. I just went to the website. Obviously that the, the first thing I see is everything you need to, and this is like, you know, in red versus everything in black, everything you need to start writing online and they're emphasizing start, uh, shocker. Um, why did you decide to start a SaaS business and what are your hopes for it?

A Well, I think it's worth recognizing that, uh, Dickie and I didn't start TypeShare. Um, TypeShare's original founder is Sam Shore. Um, he built basically the first version of it on his own. Uh, maybe after like two or three cohorts of ShipThirty, it was very early, and we saw him do this on Twitter, and we're like, wow, this is really cool, and reached out and basically said, hey, if you're gonna build this, You know, as an indie developer, why don't we partner up? We'll bring all the customers, and you continue to build the platform. We'll, we'll obviously help build the platform because we know how we can turn our education into SaaS, um, and let's just create a separate company. So we did. We created a separate company, and me, Dickie, and Sam are co-founders in that company, and it basically plugs into ShipThirty, and so the idea is, right, you take ShipThirty And then everyone in ship 30 is basically getting educated on how to use the SAS platform thereafter. And I remember Greg, the first time I explained that to you, your brain just exploded. We were like, that is genius. Um,

AI assessment note: “we know how we can turn our education into SaaS, um, and let's just create”

Q don't forget to mention the where it happens pod. Thank you. So if you're listening to this and you want to double down on, on writing, you know, what do you recommend the first steps are? So for example, I didn't know that Blake Basically wrote about a bunch of things and then narrowed in on Excel and Google sheets. Like to me, he was just always the Excel guy.

A So this happens with anything, right? Writing is just, it's a vehicle, but this is true for wanting to improve or get better at anything in life. And when you first start trying to learn how to do anything, you are operating from a lot of assumptions. You're operating from the assumption that you'll enjoy it. You're operating from the assumption that you know what you want to do with it. You're operating from the assumption that you have the patience to get through the first three steps, you know. And so a big focus of ShipThirty and why we've constructed it as a writing challenge is because the goal is to accelerate essentially two years, three years, five years of learning into 30 days. And so, for example, one of the biggest assumptions that someone makes at the beginning of Deciding I want to start writing is they assume they know what they want to write about. So you walk into the whole thing and you go, I want to write about productivity. And then you write about it for three days and you realize that's not actually what I want to write about. And part of the learning process is accelerating through those moments so that you can figure out, is this what you actually want to write about or no? And then the other side is, is this what people find valuable? Right? So you write about productivity for five days in a row, 10 days in a row, and like very lukewarm. And then you g…

AI assessment note: “part of the learning process is accelerating through those moments so that you can figure out”