Where I share my learnings building a $1M/year startup from scratch, in public as a non-technical founder.

Keep It Simple

Your mind will trick you into choosing something more complicated because it feels like the more creative option.

We want to build a product that has every feature not one really great feature.

We want to get to $100k/mo before hitting $1/mo.

These complexities make us lose sight of our vision and end up making us burn out - we’re worrying about tomorrows problems before solving todays.

The best designed product is not the one that has every feature its the one that removed all the features that are unnecessary.

Make that one feature as best as you can, get that first client before you move on to the next thing.

Stack your wins.

Founders Podcast

If you haven’t listened to the Founders Podcast you are missing out. This is one of my favorite episodes about Steve Jobs maniacal attention to detail.

Get to $100k MRR

Behind the Scenes

How Every’s new product Monologue was built

Oboe (oboe.fyi)

The Easiest Way to Learn

Thanks for reading!

- Dimitri

(P.S. you can reply to this email and it will go directly to my email)

Where I share my learnings building a $1M/year startup from scratch, in public as a non-technical founder.

Delayed Gratification

Real world concepts don't always translate when you move them into business.

When we think about delayed gratification we think about giving up desserts for abs - reduce now for more later.

Delayed gratification in business works in the exact opposite - your putting in more work now for more results later. This is why business is so difficult.

It’s easier to reduce our habits for a better future but it takes significantly more effort to increase our habits for the same result.

Go from 1 to 100

This is my first time hearing Chamath talk about business. There are some good insights growing Facebook. He covers key metrics FB tracked, core product value, and how simplicity beats what experts say.

Don’t Have a Business Idea?

There’s tons of YouTube videos on the topic but no one has a comprehensive employer focused program. Companies want to move forward with AI but don’t have the resources - become that resource.

Tool of the Week

OpenSesame: Add AI Anywhere

I wrote about this idea here:

Searchepreneur

AI: The Next Chapter

The Operating System died years ago; we just never realized it because the Internet Browser hid it from us…

Read more

a year ago · 2 likes · 1 comment · dimitri trembois

Thanks for reading!

- Dimitri

(P.S. you can reply to this email and it will go directly to my email)

I share my learnings building a $1M/year startup from scratch, in public as a solo founder.

Learn to Sell, Learn to Build

One of the biggest startups killers is unclear product messaging. Last week we went into depth on product positioning and how to improve your pitch.

This may seem contradictory but you must sell your product before you build it.

Naval said learn to sell, learn to build not learn to build, learn to sell.

Why - you want to be crystal clear on what your building and who your building it for.

How - reach out to who you think could use your product and ask them to sign up. This will determine if your product is a nice to have or a must have.

If no one signs up you either need to fix your pitch or ask your customers what would actually solve their problem.

Once you have a few customers who have committed to use your product then you can start the building process.

This will motivate you to work fast and stay on track solving your customers pain.

The last and most important reason why you must sell before you build is to overcome any limiting beliefs around being able to start a business. The theory is simple but not easy - getting your first customer is much harder than building the product even if you not technical (teaser for an upcoming edition)

Weekly Standup

Get Paid

This week the goal is to make our first dollar.

I will be A/B testing 2-3 different sequences to see what copy and messaging lands with our ideal customer.

I’m also exploring Reddit which I am still getting used to.

Going from 0-1 Building AI Automations

This guy makes $400k/mo and he did it by selling his services before he even had a product.

Become a Distribution Engineer

Once you have distribution you can share and test ideas instantly. Having distribution is the biggest advantage you can have in the new AI world.

Tool of the Week

maxly.chat (maxly.chat)

a better way to visualize your ChatGPT conversations

Thanks for reading!

- Dimitri

(P.S. you can reply to this email and it will go directly to my email)

I share my learnings building a $1M/year startup from scratch, in public as a non-technical founder.

Into the Void

The internet is a blackhole. You cant expect to post and instantly get traction.

You have to hack the system: hack the algorithm, hack attention, hack creativity.

The secret is to find what works for you.

To find that hack you have to try many things and see what works. Most will land in the void but some will stick. Double down on the ones that work for you.

Put in the sweat equity, if that’s too much work for you don’t start a business.

Try posting 10x a day, try paid ads, try commenting on posts, try spamming forums until something works.

Move Fast // Break Things - don’t get fixate on one method that you want to work, find what actually works.

Weekly Standup

Make a Mark.

This week I ran a test ad on X for the newsletter, I’ve never ran ads before so I wanted to practice before launching a new product. Here’s the Ad

Started running outbound email sequence to sales leaders in the industry. I like the idea of positioning the outreach as an“interview” vs pitching the product. That’s something I will try next. The product is young and malleable so we can make changes to fit their needs.

Product Positioning

Shaan, host of MyFirstMillion, drops some sauce on how to position/pitch your product. I can’t believe this only has 600 views - must watch if you plan to raise funding, improve your website & marketing copy, or want to increase sales.

Tweet of the Week

I love simple and useful tips. Jacob from Creme gives us the 80/20 on best marketing practices. The first thing he mentions is exactly what Shaan covers in the video above.

Tool of the Week

Kuse (kuse.ai)

Context is Key: put all your files in a canvas to research, create assets, or come up with new ideas.

Bonus

Download YouTube Collection Vol.1 👈 click link

• bullet point summaries of my favorite YouTube videos from this week

Thanks for reading!

- Dimitri

(P.S. you can reply to this email and it will go directly to my email)

Where I share my learnings building a $1M/year startup from scratch, in public as a non-technical founder.

The Content Trap

Writing out your ideas is not producing content, it’s just writing.

Content isn’t content until you press “Publish.”

As important it is to get your ideas on paper, it’s even more important to get those ideas out to the world.

Pick a topic, write about it, edit it, and publish it. That’s all you need to do.

Starting out you won’t have a huge following so don’t worry about perfection.

Your writing will improve as your audience grows.

This Week

Starting from Scratch.

Sticking with the theme of my previous company MeetingIQ - the goal is to talk with sales professionals to understand what processes they want to automate.

Actions:

1. Instantly Email Warmup

2. Apollo Target List & Email Sequence

Goal: enroll 10 contacts per day in sequence to book meeting time - discover process pain points, solution proposal, and budget.

Claude Design

I just watched a video with three awesome ways to make your websites stand out using Claude Code. If you want to build sites that actually look great (not just generic AI stuff) you should give this a watch.

Tool of the Week

Prase (parse.bot)

Obsessed With..

Thanks for reading!

- Dimitri

(P.S. you can reply to this email and it will go directly to my email)