This appears to be long-form ad copy. It's characterized by extremely short paragraphs (often one sentence), one after another, and a winding story the reader must wade through to get to the payoff promised in the headline.<p>I can't stand this format and associate it with scams. But many prominent marketers consider it the key to their success. The authors of the OP appear to fall into the latter category.<p>After 1/3 of the way into the article, I don't know:<p>- what RocketChart is or what it does<p>- how the authors got 150 beta signups<p>I have, however, gained numerous insights into the emotional state of the author, friends, and family, and have been blasted with memes from here to Timbuktu.<p>If the article isn't long form ad copy, then it could use a thorough edit. Start with the actionable part and give me a high-level view of it in the first paragraph.<p>However, I strongly suspect otherwise.
This is a prime example why people don't trust people in finance, and more recently, in tech.<p>Imagine signing up for a service like this and the first interaction with it is a lie. How can you trust some of your company's most important financial data with a "partner" like this?<p>Disclosure: I run a financial modeling software company.
“We have a SaaS that is running well (staff scheduling) since a couple of years”
…
“I hadn’t a SaaS "running well", nor a real product ^^”<p>"Just before turning off the light, I sent a message to my brother. I asked him to like my post to get a bit of visibility."<p>Ultimately, I don't think these things make a lick of difference. But it seems so common for "growth hackers" to do kinda sleazy crap like this. Why's this type of behavior so common?
Definitely I am way too old (and grumpy) for this kind of stuff, so I will refrain from commenting on the ethics of the procedures reported, but I would be curious on how the "plan" is to get to the $10k of Monthly Recurring Revenue.<p>I mean is that 1 customer billed 10,000 bucks per month, 10,000 customers billed 12 bucks per year or (more likely) something in the middle?
Making a one page site to 'validate your idea' by getting 'sign ups' is more a measure of how willing people are to hand over their email address than any proof that your startup could work. How many of those people will turn in to actual real money sales is the only metric that counts.<p>If you can get 150 people to preorder and pay an actual fee based on an idea and a mockup then I'll be impressed. And it is possible...
A lot of negative comments here, so I'll offer my 2c.<p>I agree that their initial post was deceptive, and inexcusably so. But the spammy tactic I think is outweighed by their total devotion to understanding their customers. Maintaining over 300 simultaneous conversations, just to get an insight into their users is a herculean, and praiseworthy, effort.<p>The takeaways and tips are useful too, if you're thinking about starting a bootstrapped company. They're not pitched as "do this and you'll succeed", they're pitched as "here's what we did, you do you", which I appreciate. I'll borrow some and ignore others when I start my own venture.<p>EDIT: curious why I'm being downvoted
At first I thought it was sort of a minor thing to lie about having a company that has been in operation for years but I think it's actually pretty significant here. He's pitching a product that doesn't exist yet by saying that it's worth everyone's time and money because his company has already been using it with success. That's just not true and not really fair to do to your would be first customers.
I wonder if having a name so similar to RocketChat will be problematic for you. Currently, Google even suggests correcting searches for RocketChart to RocketChat.
Seemingly well funded UK cashflow management tool
fluidly [1] also validates the concept I suppose, although I'd guess that they (Fludily) are solving for what the user _needs_ and not what they _want_ (cashflow predictions vs cashflow charts)<p>[1] <a href="https://fluidly.com/" rel="nofollow">https://fluidly.com/</a>
Someday a savvy generation of consumers are going to catch on to these scammy “validation” schemes and it will only get harder and harder to actually get people’s attention as they grow to ignore anything that doesn’t demonstrate something more than a screenshot or video or a slick website.
I am surprised people are disclosing their financials to third party that easily. plaintext accounting isn't very hard to use, yet it is much more powerful and safer.