The Minimalist Entrepreneur

The one book I will recommend to aspiring founders who think the only way to raise funds is through venture capital.

This book is nice and has a variety of insights. After reading it once, I found I couldn't remember exactly the insights, so I read it again and wrote down some notes. That is what it takes as most of the “insights” are rather banal and only interesting in a small “i” way. Nevertheless, added together they do make sense. I'll put these into a didactic list:

- educate, don't sell
- share stories to reveal self and product
- focus on profit, not growth
- start, then learn (not reverse)
- creator first, entrepreneur second
- time + vulnerability = relationships + growth
- “community first”
- “find your people”
- work in public, share the work
- teaching results in more learning
- Goldilocks-size problem that only you have a solution to
- should have inevitable pricing/purchase in the product (vs. “give it away for free to get eyeballs”)
- build as little as possible to gauge interest
- build process/automation
- ship right away / early / often
- are you helping the customer?
- can you make a profit?
- mom test
- cold email, calls, messages (outreach)
- keep learning
- build an audience
- marketing funnel (top, middle, bottom)
- social media
- educate, inspire, entertain
- spend money last
- “look-alike” audiences
- raise money from community / crowdfunding

We can see that the author simply reverse engineered what worked for him. This is the problem with a smattering of success, which is that it doesn't really tell what doesn't work, only what has. While it is nice to see this in a narrative, and is worth the read, there are so many more books that provide a lot more detail, and offer a much deeper set of resources. A few come to mind:

- Traction by Weinberg and Mares
- Traction by Wickman
- Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey Moore

Essentially, much of these insights are a poor guide in any other kind of business, other than online services. Yes, the author has effectively leveraged his agonizingly slow slog toward profitability, the network effect of running an online marketplace, and his basic humanity. Good on him. Unless you are running a direct competitor, parts (perhaps many/most) of the plan must change.

That said, Gumroad just raised its fees from 9% inclusive to 10% exclusive of transaction costs. As Bezos has said: “your margin is my opportunity”.