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Back to EP26 - Don't wait 18 months.

How Does Donovan Say You Fail a Launch?

Donovan, a front-end developer in Dublin and a reader of Amy Hoy's book Just Fucking Ship, tells Alex Hillman that a launch does not score points for perfection. There is always something to improve next time, and seeing those flaws is useful. The only way to fail, he says, is never to pull the trigger. He had hinted at the launch for a week or two, then spent the day itself spreading the word. He was nervous that it might work, because he had never had to handle success. Once the offer was live, he counted that as the win and kept learning as he went.

Transcript

EP26 - Don't wait 18 months ·

Stacking the Bricks - Real Entrepreneur Confessions

More from this episode

  1. What Is JFSWritten by Amy Hoy in 24 hours, Just Fucking Ship is about 21 principles for people to get their creative ideas out of their head and into the real world.
  2. Who Is Donovan HutchinsonHe is a front-end developer, working full-time in Dublin at a company that helps athletes avoid injury.
  3. What Is Shop IrelandDonovan describes it as a basic affiliate site that works like Amazon, but shows the prices in euros.
  4. Why Should Someone Read JFS by Amy HoyFollowing along to tweets by Amy, Donovan states that the way that she approaches branding and launching things, and it resonated with him.
  5. How Does Blogging Help a BusinessFor Donovan, it was a way for him to test out which topics worked and gained traction. It encouraged him to write certain posts that people would like.
  6. What Are Two Types of Post That Donovan WritesDonovan has noticed that the posts people like tend to have a clear, visual goal. He writes two types of posts.
  7. How Can You Handle Negative FeedbackDonovan says that the less positive feedback is still helpful for him.
  8. How Can You Go From Writing Blog Posts to Creating Your Own ProductDonovan first had an idea to collect his best posts to create into a book that talks about CSS animation, but he wasn't ready to commit to the project.
  9. How Do You Create a Landing PageInspired by a book that he read over Christmas, Donovan followed the structure and aligned with the goals of a landing page, which are: describe the pain…
  10. Why Was Donovan Nervous About His ProductHe was nervous that it would work. Donovan says that it was a little easier to think if it didn’t work, then it woudn't be a big deal.
  11. Why Did the Weeks After Donovan's Course Launch Go Quiet?Donovan tells Alex Hillman on Stacking the Bricks that the first week of his course launch brought more signups than he expected.
  12. How Do You Get Past When Your Product Has Plateaued in SalesFor Donovan, he looked at the first week and viewed it as a success, even if he didn’t have any more sales the rest of the month.
  13. What Is One Piece of Advice to Individuals Who Aren’t Ready to Launch a Product YetDonovan says that rather than jumping straight in and build something big, if you really want to get some momentum started, the best thing that he did was…

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