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In this episode, I interviewSimon Høiberg, an active software engineer, founder, and YouTuber. Simon shares his strategies for balancing his roles as a creator and maker, and discusses the importance of incorporating personal experience into his content. He also delves into the power of intrinsic motivation and joy in entrepreneurship, and how he gamifies his life to prioritize these elements. The conversation touches on topics such as productivity, mental health, team management, and burnout prevention.
Join me and Simon for an insightful conversation on entrepreneurship, content creation, and personal growth. Be inspired by Simon's passion for empowering entrepreneurs, and learn how you can incorporate joy and intrinsic motivation into your own entrepreneurial journey.
The podcast episode: https://share.transistor.fm/s/05f2d837
You'll find my weekly article on my blog: https://thebootstrappedfounder.com
Newsletter: https://thebootstrappedfounder.com/newsletter
My book Zero to Sold: https://zerotosold.com/
My book The Embedded Entrepreneur: https://embeddedentrepreneur.com/
My course Find Your Following: https://findyourfollowing.com
- (00:00) - On not burning out
- (04:53) - Coding mindset for entrepreneurs
- (09:38) - How to pick the right social media management tool.
- (14:14) - THe power of community
- (21:18) - What does a good lifetime deal look like?
- (24:53) - Allow customers to leave your product.
- (31:58) - The funnel and the web.
- (37:24) - Sharing your journey and success.
- (42:07) - How long does it take to build a youtube channel?
- (45:38) - A day in the life of an entrepreneur without burning out.
- (50:52) - The importance of having an empty calendar.
Creators & Guests
Host
What is The Bootstrapped Founder?
Arvid Kahl talks about starting and bootstrapping businesses, how to build an audience, and how to build in public.
Arvid Kahl: Welcome to The
Bootstrapped Founder! Today, I'm
talking to Simon Hoiberg. He
shares his strategy for running
two businesses and a YouTube
channel without burning out.
We'll talk about business
validation, building reusable
processes to stay sane and
creating sustainable businesses
while maximizing your founder
productivity. Here's Simon.
You're building two businesses
and you're operating a huge
YouTube channel at the same
time. I think you're a writer,
you're a teacher, you're always
part of the conversation on
social media, at least in my
sphere. I see you that all the
time. For most people doing any
one of these things would be
enough. And you've been doing
this for what, five years now?
How do you do all of this
without burning out? How does
that work?
Simon Høiberg: That's a great
question. I get this a lot. I
think it's something that mainly
builds up over time since I
started. It's actually not more
than two years ago. I started
this whole thing on social
media. I quickly got into an
awareness about making my
efforts. Can you say compound
and I've been doing that by
focusing on sort of using
building blocks, that's the kind
of like the way I'm thinking
about it. So every time I build
something, every time I put
something out there, there needs
to be something more to it than
just the result that that thing
can give me right there and
right now. I always try to do
this with anything. So in the
beginning, my first two, three
YouTube videos as an example, it
took forever to build. Then I
started getting into the habit
of every time I finished a
YouTube video, so strip that
video apart and see is there
anything in this video I can
turn into a reusable building
block that I can use to make the
next video even faster? Or is
there anything in this video I
can turn into a process in a
checklist I can make that will
make the whole thing go faster?
Once you start doing this over
time, it's as if these building
blocks and this whole ecosystem,
it's sort of compounds and it
makes you way more productive,
then when people see me doing A
then B then C then D. They think
about themselves and how much
time it will take them to do A,
B and C and D. And it also did
for me in the beginning. But I
also didn't start out with A, B
and C and D all at the same
time. I built on top of what I
already had. And slowly let that
evolve. And now it's I always
think of it as like when I'm
working on one thing I'm working
on it all. And that way, if
we're putting one thing also
reflects on another and enables
me to do a whole lot of things
that appears as if it's a lot
that's getting like the output
is really big.
Arvid Kahl: That sounds like you
have a process for building
processes, you know. Like you
approach every activity as if it
were a process in the making. Is
that something you just came up
with? Or did you find
inspiration somewhere else for
this?
Simon Høiberg: I think I have
inspiration for this from the
coding world. Being a software
developer for many years, this
is something that you were
taught early on that contribute
to open source. If you have
something you built, turn it
into an NPM packets or Gradle
packets or anything that you can
put online and let other people
use that as well. And if not,
use it for yourself. You have
that piece of code. You spent
time making that very elegantly
and make your future self happy
and make this easier for you.
And even in the software world,
I actually saw very few even
senior developers with many
years of experience, actually
doing this, actually stopping up
every time they built something
taking that little bit of extra
time to making it into a modular
solution that they can use for
their future self. And that's my
inspiration came from there. I
actually in the software world
got really good at that. And it
enabled me to produce software
really, really fast. I've been
working as a freelance
consultant for many years. And
this was obviously very
beneficial when I had new
clients. I would never take code
from another project with
another client that they'd been
paying me for. But there are
certain generic solutions and
software that you can generalize
and then use for something else.
And it enabled me to produce
results way faster for my
clients. And it's the same kind
of thinking that I took and put
into my entrepreneur life. And
it's funny because when it comes
to content, especially YouTube
and content in social media,
there's such a level of
creativity going into that so
that I think a lot of people
they don't really think about
how operational it actually can
be behind the scenes and how
much you can actually streamline
and make processes out of all of
this. And that's basically where
my inspiration came from.
Arvid Kahl: Interesting!
Interesting to see the coding
mindset translate into something
that is immediately useful for
an entrepreneur or a creator. I
very much agree. I think I have
the same mindset. And that makes
me approach my content creation
that the podcast and my very,
very, not yet mature YouTube
channel, you know, like makes
this more of an extra structured
approach instead of just hoping
for inspiration to strike,
right? If you approach this as a
process based thing, then you
try to figure out what steps can
I actually take reliably and
meaningfully every time? And
then that turns into a process.
You know what you just said? I
find that interesting because if
you say many senior developers
don't have that mindset, I
think, if I remember my work
experience for enterprise
businesses as a salaried
engineer, somebody who's paid to
be there, they didn't track for
things that are reusable, right?
Like they didn't measure my work
in terms of can this be used
again? They measured it, is this
useful now? Am I like fulfilling
the scope? Great. And if not,
then I did too much work on
this. It's not immediately
apparent in many ways that this
could be useful at a later
point. I think freelancers they
have that. They have the
opportunity to reuse these
components where salaried
engineers may not even
understand that this is
something that they might be
reusing at a later point. Some
might, obviously, it depends on
the position, right? What's your
opinion on that?
Simon Høiberg: I totally agree.
Now, I don't have a whole lot of
experience as an employed in the
software world. I've been a
freelancer most of my career as
a software developer, but I
totally agree. And it also makes
perfect sense that if you're a
company, and if you are
imploring, if your managers
aren't really rewarding you for
that effort of because it does
take a little bit of extra
effort like pushing something
now that's useful now is one
thing. But it does take a little
bit of extra effort to actually
polish that up and wrap it up in
something that can be used
later. And if you're not
rewarded for that, I totally get
that it's not something that the
worst incentive. It's not
something as a senior developer
that you would do. As a
freelancer, it's not like your
client is paying you for that
either. But it just pays off in
the fact that you will be
dealing with multiple clients at
a time or from month to month or
three month period to three
month period. Yes, so I agree. I
never thought about it,
actually. But I think it makes
perfect sense.
Arvid Kahl: I think for
entrepreneurs that come from a
software background, this
becomes very apparent that it's
very useful to build reusable
things like this. And
particularly, and you're a
serial entrepreneur too, right?
You build one thing and then you
build another thing. Let's say,
maybe talk about your software
as a service businesses because
I find that super interesting,
not only the kinds of businesses
you build because they are very
close to what I like to use
being a Twitter creator and
somebody who's writing uses
links and stuff. So both
FeedHive and LinkDrip are things
that I find very interesting
just as products. How did they
come to be? Because I have this
distinct feeling that LinkDrip
is a consequence of something
that you need it along the way.
Is that right? Like how did
these two businesses come into
being?
Simon Høiberg: Yes and no. And
it's one of those, to start off
with, back when I started
building FeedHive, that's a
little bit more than two years
ago now. And this was actually
the same with LinkDrip. I had,
just prior to building FeedHive,
I tried to build another tool.
It was called Sigmetic. And it
was a tool you could use to
integrate with your GitHub
account and let software
engineers on teams track the
performance among their team
members. Horrible idea. I come
from a background in sales. And
I thought that this idea of
having these like big monitors
on the wall and sales
performance and everyone wanted
to kind of have this like
fireworks going every time
someone made a sale. I thought I
could transfer that directly
into the software world.
Horrible idea! Software
engineers don't work like that.
It was me being polluted from
having my thinking, kind of like
very influenced from another
industry that I had been in
before. But the essence here was
that back when I was doing
Sigmetic, I was trying to
innovate. That was my the core
feeling I had. I'm gonna go into
the SaaS market and I'm gonna
really try to innovate
something. And it went horribly,
failed epically. My second
attempt with FeedHive, it was
very deliberate that I wanted to
try to go in the complete
opposite direction and then say,
I'm gonna try to be going into a
market that is as well
established and pre validated as
I possibly can. And there are a
few things you can pick from
here, email marketing, social
media, marketing, project
management tools and I realized
that project management tools
they've been here for a long
time and yet, Monday pops up and
then come new like click up pops
up out of the blue. There's
still room for having an
alternative to some of the other
established tools that are out
there. And that was my approach
with FeedHive. So it was
actually very little about
trying to come up with a new
clever way to solve a pain point
that users have, rather than to
give users yet another
alternative. And it's dangerous.
It's a risky way to start. And
it's a risky foundation of
building a business. But my
thinking back then was that if
the market is truly huge enough,
there will be a tiny portion of
those many, many, many users out
there that have this pain and
need to have a solution for it,
that will prefer it exactly your
way with those tiny small
differences that you were told
to have. And that was really my
approach with FeedHive. It was
also the approach with LinkDrip.
I saw some of my competitors in
the social media management
among social media management
tools, also building link
shorteners and making more
sophisticated versions and build
them into their tools. And
rather than building another
system that could give like
build UTM parameters and add
upload thumbnails and have
custom audios and things like
that. I thought I would try to
engineer it a little bit more
and see is there interest in
having something that is going a
little bit further down the
street of Airtable and Zapier
and these kind of like
automation tools where you can
start customizing the behavior a
whole lot. And it seemed like
there was a lot of interest in
that. And that was the way I
went, but nothing inherently
neither innovative or a huge
problem that I had to solve for
myself. Back when I was starting
to do social media, there was
definitely some things that I
wanted from a social media
management tool that I thought
the market was missing. But it
wasn't quite frankly, that I
couldn't have just picked Buffer
or HootSuite or some of the many
others and just went with that,
by the end of the day.
Arvid Kahl: Interesting. So how
did you validate then that
people needed it if it wasn't
your specific need? But how did
you look into the market and
figure out if there was an
audience of potential customer
base for these products?
Simon Høiberg: Yes. And it's a
great, great question because
this is crucial. When you're
building something in a market
that's this well established,
it's not that you don't know
that there's a market. It's how
to actually fit in there and how
to stand next to some tools
that's been around for plus 10
years. I did this on Twitter. I
reached out to I had been
building my audience for about
six months at this time. And
they were in some closed chat
groups on Twitter. I reached out
to a bunch of them and asked,
why are you not scheduling your
tweets today? And a bunch of
them, they mentioned that there
were this tool and then there
were HootSuite and Buffer, they
were bad to use. They didn't
like them. They were old and
they didn't seem very
maintained. Then there were some
specific tools at the time hype
theory, which was like from a
software perspective, really,
really high standard. They have
like excellent UI UX, but it
wasn't quite what they were
looking for. And there was some
things that they wanted in a
different way. I remember back
then they mentioned they wanted
a queue. Like many of these
social media scheduling tools,
they have like this list of
queues, they wanted that in a
calendar view instead. So I
thought like, okay, there's like
this tiny little thing that I
can jump into the market. And
now when users are going to look
at these, like 15 social media
management tools and pick, I'm
going to be the one with the
calendar queue rather than a
list queue. And let's just let
that be it. That's that tiny
little preference things that's
going to win some, like a tiny
little portion of users over and
I started building with these
users that started mentioning
this. We made a Twitter group
chat group for just this. And in
two months or so, I built in
secret with these 30 so users
and it was literally fully
community driven. I was in there
talking to them daily asking
them questions daily, how should
this be? How would you like
this? And I was not trying to
guess in any way. I was really
trying to say, okay, these 30
people, they're going to be
representing a bigger group of
users, yet a small customer
segment in the bigger hole,
that's gonna be my future fee
type users. And that was my
approach.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, that sounds
like a very, very specific group
of people that you like, zeroed
in from the beginning. Also
makes makes sense that you would
do this kind of behind closed
doors, like figuring out what
these specific people need,
instead of just pushing, you
know, questions into your
audience. Because I see a lot of
building in public founders ask
every single question about
their product into a very
diffuse audience and then get a
lot of different answers back.
So this sounds like a very
reliable approach. How did you
get into these groups into
these, you know, private
conversations? Because I guess
that's what everybody wants to
know. How do you get into these
private Facebook groups or
Twitter groups or these LinkedIn
things? Like what was your
approach for that?
Simon Høiberg: Well, it
actually, this actually started
six months or so earlier when I
started being active online. And
at the time I started building
FeedHive, I already had around
30,000 something followers on
Twitter. So this all started six
months earlier from me being
active online. And I think once
you start appearing and showing
up and once you start getting
some traction on your profile,
you're getting followers fast.
People really resonate with your
content. They engage with your
content a whole lot. These small
Twitter groups, they form
naturally. I actually didn't
start any of these myself until
the FeedHive specific one. But I
got invited into a bunch of
these where I saw other
influencers. I'm not sure how
much I liked the word, but you
know what I mean, like content
creators with a certain amount
of followers. They were already
in these groups. And I was
invited by these other people.
They saw that let's get Simon in
here. It seems like he's got
like a good amount of traction.
And he's saying some things that
resonate with the rest of these
people here. So it actually
happened quite naturally. I wish
I could say that I had to
strategy and I did this and that
and this and that. I actually
didn't, it did happen quite
naturally. So I think that what
comes before that is really
being active online and starting
to build your audience.
Arvid Kahl: I guess that that is
the strategy, right? Like
building this opportunity
surface by just showing up and
allowing people to invite you
into these groups.
Simon Høiberg: Absolutely
Arvid Kahl: I think that's
wonderful advice for anybody who
wants to build a community
driven or an audience driven
product or service or whatever
is to actually go into that
community, surround yourself
with those people and then give
them the opportunity to make a
connection with you, right? And
then take it from there. That is
really cool. One thing that I
found interesting about, let's
just talk about LinkDrip for a
bit because I just love the idea
of a link engagement tool. I
have an account and I logged
into it and it's a lot of
opportunity. I love this no code
approach that you're taking. I
think that is a wonderful idea
kind of marries the idea of just
pure links, like the technical
thing with the applicability of
many, many marketing strategies
and tools that come from the no
code field that just plug and
play. One thing that I saw in
your process of building this in
public and I generally love the
idea that you're doing this,
that you're not just building
these things in secret. Now
you're also building them in
public and sharing the whole
story and the journey. One thing
that I saw is that you're doing
early adopter lifetime access.
That is something that you did
with LinkDrip. Can you talk to
me about this a bit? What
considerations went into it? And
if you set any limits or
anything like that because
lifetime access, that is a lot,
right?
Simon Høiberg: Yes, it is. And I
think that the whole idea behind
selling lifetime deals is it's a
bit controversial. There's a lot
of there are these sites like
AppSumo and Dealify and these
big marketplaces where you can
go and sell lifetime deals. And
to me, I think it is worth
underlining that it is something
you should do on a limited
basis. I don't think that it's a
way to build a long term
sustainable business, especially
if you have ongoing costs,
ongoing support, cost, ongoing
server costs and a lot of other
things. But that's one thing. I
actually think there's a bigger
problem with lifetime deals
right now. And that is that it
has a certain reputation, that
if you're selling lifetime
deals, you're in some sort of
financial trouble or you're just
scraping by. And I think this is
probably the most problematic
part of it. Because quite
frankly, when you look at the
numbers, like if you spin up an
Excel sheet and start grinding
numbers, you will notice that
servers and hosting, it became
really, really affordable. You
can engineer your server and
your cloud solution to pay
almost nothing. And when it
comes to support, you can
continue your solution in a way
that is fully self served. You
can do a lot of things to ensure
that even though it sounds like
lifetime, you're offering a
lifetime deal lifetime users
also churned. They also at some
point wants something different.
They leave your platform, they
don't stick around for an extra
lifetime. And it's in a lot of
cases, I believe you can strip
down the math of this and say
like this is even if I was never
selling a subscription, I was
just going to go full on
lifetime deal for the entirety
of this whole business. I still
think you would come up with a
financial model where that was
actually possible and doable.
However, I actually think the
biggest problem is the
reputation that it has right
now. Selling lifetime deals to
me, first of all, my best advice
would be make that Excel sheet
first of all to make sure that
your finances can actually
support this if you have for
some reason very high server
cost. I've seen some lifetime
deals do this with AI and with
open AI access and pay. And
that's a horrible idea because
it can really become very
expensive very fast. So that
will be the first thing to kind
of strip down the finances and
see if you can support this. But
I also really think that it's a
really important part of it is
communicating while you're
running this lifetime deal. You
need to somehow justify. With
LinkDrip, I was very clear that
this was an early access
lifetime deal that we were
selling and that this was a part
of validating if there was any
interest in the product that we
were doing. And that we haven't
built it yet at this point. We
had like a quick POC to verify
that the things that we were
advertising on the web page
could actually be technically
done and carried out. I think
that's the most important part
of doing a lifetime deal today.
I do think that it's a great
option. It can really, really
benefit you in a lot of ways.
There's a lot of money you can
get up front and is a great way
to validate that there's extra
interest. Nothing beats having
people pick up their credit card
and extra pay. But it does come
with some considerations. I
would never launch a lifetime
deal without very, very
carefully expressing and
communicating that this is a
limited time offer and that
we're doing it for good reason.
Otherwise, people start talking.
That's my experience, at least.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah. Mind you, like
a lot of the deals that I find
as soon as I see that there's no
limit to this, it's like, why
are they doing this, right?
Because my mind as an engineer,
I go to well, this will cost
them something in the future. So
do they expect me to not use the
product after that? Or will they
then try to convert me into
something, you know, you have
all these things? And I do
wonder for you like a lifetime
dea, that is such a hard thing
to even define. What does
lifetime mean to you? Because in
my experience, lifetime can mean
lifetime of the person using the
product, lifetime of the
business that is offering the
product, lifetime of the version
of the product in the business.
It can mean anything, right? So
what do you consider a lifetime
deal to look like?
Simon Høiberg: It's a great
question. To me, I think it's
simply boils down to them having
access to the product as long as
the product lives. I don't think
that anyone out there hopefully
believes that any product, any
SaaS product on the market is
somehow immune to fail, go
bankrupt, go down. So I think
most people are aligned with
that idea that it's a lifetime
deal that exists as long as the
product exists and that there's
not going to be, yeah, I don't
even know how that would work.
If you go bankrupt with your
company, you're going to somehow
make a version of that product
still run somewhere. I think
most people are aware that
that's just not feasible or even
technically possible.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, that is an
interesting point, generally,
for any SaaS business, doesn't
even have to do with lifetime
deals. Just like if there is an
end of business somewhere, what
do you do, right? And maybe
that's something we should talk
about because maybe with
FeedHive, not so much that if
that is over, if that ever were
over for whatever reason, right?
People would probably find an
alternative to deal with their
scheduling needs. But with
LinkDrip, I find it it's very
interesting because links are
something that is hard to change
in some capacity, right? If the
moment they're printed in a
book, you have a problem. You
will need to make it happen. And
you will need to be able to
transition the data into another
format if people need to. Is
that something that you've
actively put into your business
model or your service offering
for LinkDrip?
Simon Høiberg: Absolutely,
absolutely. And that's a part of
the platform that people can
take their links and export it
in a format, either JSON or CSV.
It's not something we have fully
in place yet. But that's
definitely something that's
going to be available for all
our users. It is as you say,
it's such an essential deal a
part of the offer that we have
on LinkDrip besides to creating
QR codes. And it is something
that people do a lot than they
print a ton of QR codes and hang
them offline around the city and
in different places just to
figure out that the link is
somehow broken. And now they
might have printed 1000s of
these and it's a big pain. With
LinkDrip, you can change the
destination of the link and it
will in the second start
redirecting to a new place. And
you can even automate this to
add AB testing capability. So it
goes to two different places on
a dice roll. Or you can program
it to change after a certain
thing has happened, certain
amount of clicks or at a certain
time. All of these things, I
think, to make sure that printed
links stay alive in any way, you
need to offer something that is
flexible, like the product
itself, but you most certainly
also need to give people the
option to export the whole thing
and take it to any other link
shortening redirect service that
can do the same.
Simon Høiberg: Absolutely,
absolutely. And I think that's a
Arvid Kahl: You know what? I
love that. I love the fact that
crucial part. There are certain
technical challenges to
as founders as software founders
now at least you and me too, I
guess, and the things that I do,
we actively allow our customers
solutions like this. In certain
cases, exporting data and moving
to leave, which for many
customers is something that then
makes them decide to buy the
product because they know
there's a way out if I need to, right?
it to other either competitor or
into another service is one
thing with LinkDrip, there are
certain issues with the actual
domain name of the link, it says
are laid out to. We recommend if
you print links in any type, you
do it with a QR code because
they can actually be transferred
and moved. There are certain
issues with offering to, as you
say offering to the user to take
their database with them might
be a determining factor for some
people actually signing up for
the product. There is some sense
of safety in knowing that the
data that you produce in this
tool belongs to you. I totally
agree.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, I would assume
that particularly if you try to
reach out to bigger companies,
to enterprise businesses that
have some kind of static links
that are printed off or put on a
DVD, you know, those kinds of
technologies, you need to have a
guarantee that this will be
usable if they change vendors.
So that might just really be a
service level agreement on that,
like you provide as long as you
can. And if you ever off board,
there's a way out. I find these
kinds of things, there are
specifics. I mean, not every
business will have to deal with
it. But I think for people who
are building businesses, this
stuff is interesting to
consider. Because it's a mindset
on how you approach your
customer, right? If you think
your customer is somebody that
you want to lock into your
business, that's the way that
some people do it, right? But if
you give the customer the option
to move away on their own
volition, now all of a sudden,
you have a very different
relationship with them. And I
think more and more as we build
our businesses in public like
you are doing and as you kind of
align your business identity
with your personal identity,
trust is such an integral part
of this whole thing, that you
can't just lock people into your
product anymore. That just
doesn't work, right? The balance
is off. I really liked that. I
want to talk to you about
building in public here because
just kind of came to my mind.
You're building, I guess, your
software product in public. And
you're creating YouTube videos
around them. This is happening
in a very competitive space,
right? Both social media
scheduling and link marketing. I
guess they're both very
competitive. How do you make
sure you're not oversharing when
you're building in public?
Simon Høiberg: It's actually a
great question. And I think this
is a matter of being a little
bit deliberate on a bunch of
levels with what it is that you
want to teach your audience. If
you are the kind of building in
public person that run one
particular thing. And you're
kind of like all in on one
business, you might even own a
brand that you're building in
public from or doing your whole
audience building from your
actual brand, I would be a
little bit more hesitant. I
think one of the things that
come from building a personal
brand as I do myself and having
a product offer of multiple
things is that you don't
necessarily need to worry too
much about compromising one
specific part of your business
or one specific product that
you're offering. I see
everything that I do online a
little bit as an ecosystem. I
tried to go away from the kind
of classical funnel thinking. I
see a lot of a building in
public people that still adopt
this idea of I'm going to go
online and post and everything
is a matter of moving people one
step down a very specific path
that I want them to take. And
that ends with them buying this
one specific thing that I'm
offering. And it's not that that
can't work. I think the way that
I'm doing it, I'm thinking about
it a little bit more like an
ecosystem. I try to invite
people in. If people they
discover me online, either on
YouTube or on Twitter or
everywhere, first of all,
there's going to be hours of
content that they can start
consuming. They can go on
YouTube and they can literally
binge watch a bunch of things
that I teach, the values that
I'm trying to advocate for and a
lot of other things that I have
to say. But I actually rarely
try to push people down a
specific part or try to kind of
think, lock people down in this
kind of funnel sort of thinking.
It's an ecosystem. It's a
playground, it's sort of like a
museum. They step into it and
they can find various things in
here. Like there's a bunch of it
that's free. And then there's
going to be some of the things
that are paid. But they will
stumble on my products in one
way or another whether that be
in FeedHive or LinkDrip or now
we just acquired another small
SaaS called Tiny QE. And I have
info products that I sell as
well. There's my YouTube
channel, which is free for the
consumer, but I still get paid
for that behind the scenes. So
there's a lot of ways that this
can work. And this is also what
I mean by when I work on one of
these things, I actually work on
this entire ecosystem. And I
like this idea. That's why I'm
not really that hesitant with
sharing certain things about
either FeedHive or LinkDrip that
other more all in type of
audience builders, they might be
a little bit more hesitant with
sharing something they find
either business critical or that
put them in a too vulnerable
position. I don't really mind if
something comes, puts FeedHive
or whether that being revenue
numbers with our amount of users
put it in a disappointing light.
Either those users aren't for me
or they will find another
product or something else in
this ecosystem that I'm building
that is more for them. And this
is also why in a classical kind
of marketing funnel, it's a big
problem when people drops off
and people will drop off. That's
like the whole idea about a
funnel. And people that drops
off a funnel, they're typically
wasted. You don't really do more
of them. You just try to aim
broad and then get as many
people down to the very bottom
of it as you possibly can. When
people drop off in my funnel,
there are other places they can
go. They can stumble upon other
products that's more for them.
And I think about this in this
way in everything that I do. I
don't really worry that
something I say will put any of
my products in a bad light. I
also don't try too hard to make
everything about that particular
thing. There will be other
things. And yeah, I hope that
sort of answered your questions,
just a little bit about like
maybe at a philosophical level
how I roll with everything I do
mainly.
Arvid Kahl: I think the
comparison between the funnel
and what I can only kind of
visualize as a web, right?
That's the thing you're actually
do. You have a web with all
these different nodes and
they're all interconnected. I
think like, not only are we
wearing almost the same color t
shirt today, we also have the
same approach to business
because I feel I do the exact
same. I have my books. I have my
also, you know, tiny little
YouTube channel. I have my
podcast. I have my Twitter
presence. I have software
products as well and all of them
are connected in a way where
nothing is ever pushy. I never
tried to push anybody anywhere.
I want people to find my
universe where I am in, right? I
want them to find my solar
system with all the different
planets that surround me as the
sun. And then I want them to
trace back from wherever they
found me to where I am right
now. It's kind of I call this
like leaving evidence of
ambition and of just being
present and allowing people to
trace that back to where I am
right now. And then they can
find everything else. And I
think you're doing a great job
at the same thing. I found you
in many different locations,
right? I've seen you on YouTube,
I've seen you on Twitter, I see
your products and all of that
creates this whole universe of
Simon, Simon's universe. And I
kind of love that. I think that
that is an approach that as a
maker, as a creator today is so
much more involving and powering
in the community that you're in
than just trying to put people
through the funnel. I love your
explanation of people dropping
off the funnel because if they
drop off in the web, well, they
just go on another strand of the
web. They find you somewhere
else, right? And they might be
something even more useful
there. That is a great analogy.
I feel this. I love this. The
words. That's cool!
Simon Høiberg: I absolutely use
that and I love thinking about
Arvid Kahl: This is also why I
consider the personal brand that
this as a universe with planets
and a sort of web because that's
exactly what it is. And it also
comes back to the fact that as I
started talking about earlier
that I always think about making
things reusable, they should
somehow be giving something else
than the exact result that
they're giving right now. But
this is a way of making your
customer segments sort of
reusable. So you turn your
people the audience into a form
of building blocks as well that
if they don't fit in, in
specific place, they can be
reused in something else. They
don't just drop off the funnel
and then they're never good for
anything. And this is also why
not only am I not afraid of
being a little bit putting some
vulnerable numbers of my
businesses, but I also try to
talk about some things and
include my audience in something
that might not actually have a
benefit right now. It doesn't
really fit any where in my
ecosystem or in my universe as
it is today. But I'm also
thinking a little bit ahead. If
my businesses go down tomorrow,
there's going to be no LinkDrip
or FeedHive. Is there any way
that I can still include the
audience that I have built and
make them invite them into a new
branch of this universe that
then can offer them something
some value of some sort and then
make me wait list lkely to go
out of business just now? It's
at least easier to rise from a
situation like that.
you have as a creator, to be the
most valuable thing that you
have. Even though you may may
have a business, right? That is
making, I don't know, if you're
lucky millions a year, right? If
you get it to that size, that is
valuable in a financial sense.
But if the business falters, the
business is gone. But your
personal brand, that is just
going to grow over time. If you
break your business along the
way, which many people do, just
learning from that, it's gonna
increase your personal brand,
right? So that's a very valuable
asset to have.
Simon Høiberg: It is. And just
to add on top of that, it also
adds an element of feeling more
safe to fail. And I know that
there are many different schools
of thoughts, especially in the
Twitter verse with all some
indie makers and builders.
There's the kind of classical
all in kind of like Andrew
Gazdecki style, like go all in
and then there's the super small
bits, the best way to make
something feel failed to save is
just making it as small as
possible. So it's not really
that much time wasted, the
Daniel Vassallo kind of style of
small bets. I understand the
idea of both. Mine is a little
bit in the middle. Whenever I
tried to put out a bet, my way
of feeling safe to fail is that
that bet even if it fails, still
somehow contributes to the
ecosystem. So say LinkDrip
failed, I can still make content
from that that's still
contributes to my YouTube
channel. If I do a YouTube
video, something, it still
contributes to the product that
I do if I put out an info
product. The whole thing is kind
of intertwined. And here's where
the whip analogy was really
great again. Whenever I put out
something new, my first question
that I asked myself is, does
this fit into a web in any way?
Or is this just going to be
completely independent me trying
to shoot something out there and
then see if it works? Because it
needs to fit into the web. There
needs to be an element of it
doing some kind of cross
pollination between that and my
other products. That's, for me,
is the best way to not go all in
because I'm not that kind of
person. But also to still feel
safe to fail on a little bit
more than super tiny bits. It
allows you to bet a little more
and still feel somewhat safe.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, there's always
something meaningful that might
come out of this even if the bet
itself doesn't work out. I love
this. And I think as a creator,
as somebody who's sharing that
journey, no matter what you do,
if you try and find some aspect
of it that relates to the other
things that you've been doing,
there's something in there,
right? And particularly for you
as a YouTuber, sharing the
lessons learned, also your
strategies and all that. I see
you use everything for that good
or bad because that is always
relatable, right? People fail a
lot. People succeed a little.
They both relate to a failure
and success. And you can
incorporate that into your
YouTube channel, which I want to
talk about because I'm a big
fan. I'm a subscriber, of
course, because you teach
various interesting things. And
I often wonder that particularly
as you are an active software
engineer, as active software
founder and a YouTuber with a
pretty sizable YouTube channel
and a high quality production. I
mean, I'm looking at your and
your fancy YouTube studio right
now, how do you balance being a
creator who talks about things
and being a maker who does the
things that the creator then
talks about? Do you have some
kind of balance that you
actively seek? Or does it just
happen as it happens?
Simon Høiberg: At this point,
it's fairly planned and
scheduled. And this is a matter
of, it's time consuming. YouTube
in itself can quickly become a
full time job, easily. If you go
down a path where everything
becomes too arbitrary, I would
say, there's always an element
of me trying to include
something in my YouTube videos
that is something first of all
that people can't find anywhere
else. So I try not to just take
information read on the internet
and give my version of that
because that can be valuable.
Sure. But it's super important
for me that this is something
that is inherently my
experience, something that
people just can't find anywhere
else. So it needs to be
experiences from my own journey
or at least what I'm trying to
teach should be heavily tied up
on experiences from my own
journey. And then I think
there's always, for my YouTube
channel, it is a marketing
channel. And that's not
something that I'm like I can
easily admit that it serves a
purpose of being a marketing
channel for my products and I do
actually create a quite
significant amount of leads for
both FeedHive, LinkDrip and Tiny
QE on my YouTube channel alone,
but by the end of the day not
really the purpose. It is always
when I start making content for
YouTube, it is to empower
entrepreneurs and people who are
intimidated by the whole idea of
SaaS. That's why the things that
I'm preaching on my YouTube
channels is so centered around.
You don't have to take VC money.
You don't have to go out and
seek investors. You can actually
roll a micro SaaS from your own
home. You can do this alongside
your work. You don't have to
quit your job. And I truly
believe that this is true, first
of all, and that's not to
neglect that it's still super
hard and super challenging. But
the purpose, the main purpose of
my YouTube channel is mostly to
empower people who want to try
to build their own SaaS, but
have no intentions or feel
extremely intimidated by the
idea of investors, big teams,
the whole Silicon Valley style
of model. It do happen to, it
creates leads as I go along
because my channel is growing
really fast on this model. And I
think compared to other channels
I have seen, again, a little bit
too much funneling to my tastes.
And it does prohibit their
growth when every single video
they come to this channel and
watch, somehow have this
ulterior purpose or motive
underlying that they need to go
and sign up somewhere or do
something. And when I do it like
this, because that the path of
doing entrepreneurship like we
do it here, it just it will feed
you with so many lessons
constantly. So for me, it's not
ever a problem coming up with
constant ideas or things that I
want to talk about. It basically
produces itself. Then on top of
that, there's the whole
production, the actual
production of it. And I have
quite rigorously nailed down and
add a pipeline inside my
companies for for doing this as
efficiently as I can. Otherwise,
it becomes very time consuming.
But I think the thing with
YouTube that a lot of people
struggle with is what should I
talk about and I let this be
listened driven 100%.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, that's the one
of the biggest benefits of
building anything, both just
building it yourself and
building it in public. Like
there's always this kind of
dynamic of, well, this is
useful. I can teach this. I just
learned this. Now I can teach
it, right? That is just stuff
happens every single day, that
there's this never ending well
of interesting topics. I love
that. And I see you very
actively take these lessons and
immediately share them. And that
is something that I value as
somebody who follows your
journey because I'm invested in
your success. I want to see you
succeed. And I also want to see
how you deal with challenges
because you have something to
teach. So I think you're doing a
wonderful job with that. Just
wanna say that as a subscriber,
good job.
Simon Høiberg: I'm very happy to
hear that.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah. No, it's just
something that I love this.
Because you can see this in your
videos in particular, they're
very well edited. And they have
a very consistent style that is
teaching focused. It's not
conversion focused. You don't
want to convert people, at least
that's not the message that I
see, to do anything. You just
want to teach them. And if they
find anything that you do
interesting, they will go there
by themselves, right? They don't
need to be encouraged to buy or
anything like it. What I do
wonder as a creator myself in
the video space, how long do you
plan these things ahead? Like
how long does it take for you to
turn your idea your learning
into a video, particularly
knowing that you have a process?
So how long does it take you?
Simon Høiberg: Good question
because how it works right now
is mainly in bulk. So I script
and write for five videos at a
time, then I spent typically a
weekend and I shoot the whole
thing along with maybe 10-12
sort. So I just make a video,
shooting weekend out of it. And
then I shoot a lot of content.
And then I plan ahead and
schedule ahead almost three
months into the future. So going
from an idea to an actual video,
it's hard to pinpoint exactly
because I'm batching it like I
do here. And sometimes I also do
run into problems with certain
lessons that I have been
outdated. I have had to kill off
videos in my schedule that I
ended up spending a lot of time
producing because I learned
something new along the way. And
I realized that this is just not
updated knowledge. This is
actually poor advice. I don't
want to be the person extra
saying this now. And this can
happen sometimes within a three
month period because you learn
so rapidly. I think I spent on
average, around 10 hours a week
at this moment on my YouTube
channel alone and this includes
everything from thumbnail,
researching topics, writing the
scripts, filming editing, and at
this point, I do the whole thing
myself. I'm still a little bit
embarrassed to say but I still
do everything in this whole
production pipeline. But I think
around 10 hours a week, but
that's given that I'm batching
it and that I have now a huge
library of stock videos that I
can just drag in and they
somewhat fit. I have filmed
hundreds of small clips of me on
a computer, me with a mouse. I
have a ton of these thumbnails
starters that I can just click
and then it's a Photoshop
project. And I can start
building a thumbnail out of it,
tons of building blocks that
allow me to push these things
really fast. I wouldn't expect
someone else to only spend 10
hours a week on building YouTube
channel like mine, if they're
just starting out. I certainly
didn't. It took longer in the
beginning for sure.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, you built it.
These 10 hours, they exist on
top of hundreds of hours of work
that went into it.
Simon Høiberg: Absolutely!
Arvid Kahl: I love this and your
stock videos, if we just do
stuff and hold things up or
whatever. I love these two
because they just give the
videos very nice character. And
there's one particular scene
that I really liked. I want to
talk about you about one
particular video you made. And
that's called A Day in the Life
of a Tech Entrepreneur Without
Burning Out. That was the title
of the video. And I really
enjoyed it because it kind of
intersects almost everything
that I am about, software
entrepreneurship,
entrepreneurship in general and
mental health. And these are
important things. And I was
very, very happy to see that one
little stock video where you
were holding up one of my books.
It was just really adorable to
see my work reflected in it. But
it was a scene that where you
were like, well, I wanna take in
all this knowledge, but I don't
have time for it, right? I have
other things to do. And there
was this very dramatic scene
where as a founder, you were
just screaming out in horror
over error messages and business
problems. And I remember feeling
this myself when I ran a SaaS
company before I sold it. And I
wonder how you prevent these
moments from happening in your
own life right now because you
look busy. So how do you deal
with the mental challenges, the
pressure of all of this?
Simon Høiberg: That's a great
question. I think for me and it
might kind of it's often when I
say this, it comes out a little
bit techie or a little bit like
the corner, you know, but the
way I do everything is joy
driven. And that's also really
the message of that video that
you're mentioning here. I make
sure that passion and joy is on
top of everything else. And as
soon as you do that you have, in
my experience at least, you will
experience an almost unlimited
amount of strength to handle
these extremely difficult
situation and where you're
mentally being very challenged
with a lot of things. I hear a
lot of people talking about
discipline, as if that's the
key. That's what you need to
develop. That's motivation comes
and goes. Discipline is what
you're gonna fall back on. And
it's not that I'm going to sit
here and say that no discipline.
I agree that you should have
some discipline. But I try
personally to gamify my entire
life around joy. I think joy,
motivation, intrinsic motivation
for the things that you do is
the most powerful fuel that you
can put into you and it will
give you superpowers in terms of
handling certain obstacles that
are super hard. And I have
certain tricks that I do in my
life to enhance this sense of
joy. First of all, as you
mentioned right now I look busy.
And I think a lot of people get
this experience. And it's a long
time since I tried to count the
hours I work but it's up there.
Now in this video, I say 85
hours that's back then it's
probably not 85 hours. Today, I
just became a dad and we're
doing a bunch of family stuff,
but it's up there still.
However, one thing that you will
notice is that my calendar is
empty. While I have a huge to do
list of tasks that I need to fix
and things constantly rolling in
and it's never ending. If I
wanted to spend 100 hours of
this every week, I could. My
calendar itself is close to
empty. We have a podcast right
now. That one was scheduled full
disclosure. We didn't just kind
of like randomly pop in here. So
there's a few things every once
in a while that I do have
scheduled but one of the things
that really intrinsically
motivates me and brings me joy
is the fact that I can do things
in my own flow, pick the tasks
that I'm excited about that day
and do it in as I try to make my
task as little dependent on each
other as I possibly can. My
entire team, we were five
members of my team right now. We
have an excellent culture of
doing async written work. We
never have meetings. I don't
ever barge in and take a
specific hour out of my team
members time. And I found team
members that really love this
way of working as well. I hate
that. And I know they hate that,
it's way to interrupt the work
and in my experience, there's
never, I guess sometimes I never
ever say never. But there's
rarely things that are so
important that it can't be
written down and published in a
Slack channel. And then my team
will see it at some point of the
day and they will address it.
And to me, that's a way of
gamifying my life and setting it
up for joy and excitement. And
it really does allow me to
handle some really critical
situations, like sometimes you
do need to go into firefighting
mode. And then I don't have
anywhere else to be. There's
nothing scheduled, there's
nowhere that I have to kind of
like, I can drop everything, I
can put everything aside and I
can jump right on board on
something that's either critical
or I can allow myself to feel
tired and exhausted about a
certain thing and not continue
doing that by force but just
shifting to something else that
I'm more excited about at that
point. That's one of the ways
that I do that.
Arvid Kahl: I really like it,
like the empty calendar in
particular is something that I
very much relate to. Like our
conversation right now is the
only thing I have scheduled this
week. That was always my goal,
right? To have the calendar so
empty, that nobody else could
tell me what I can't do. You
know, because it's not really
about them telling me what they
want. That's just how you
interact with people, right?
They have their needs, you try
to help them and then you render
them with service and they pay
you. That's kind of how we live
our lives, right? But to not
have them control my time was
the biggest thing that I ever
wanted. And I'm fortunately at
this point that having this
amazing conversation with you,
that is the only thing where two
people are involved. So I'm
really, really happy about this.
And I think your mindset that I
hear right now is A, two things.
It's like nothing is so urgent
and important that it needs to
interrupt everything else. So
you have this very clear focus
on prioritizing things in a very
sane way. Because if everything
is urgent, then nothing is
urgent, right? If everything
needs to happen, then there is
no priority anymore. And I see
you having a very, very active
priority since there. And a
delayed communication being as
the central mode of a team is
also wonderful. I think now that
most people, even solopreneurs
that are growing their teams,
like the first employee or first
contractor, we mostly do this
remotely. We mostly do this on a
global level, right? I have two
people that helped me. One is in
Denmark. The other person's in
the Philippines. Obviously, I
won't ever be able to talk with
them at the same time because
I'm in Canada. So no, we're all
over the world, right? So this
needs to be, I've tried to
establish myself, like a
standard operating procedure,
like a process based
communication and very async,
back and forth emails. Nothing
is ever so urgent that I need to
call them. That was always the
plan. And that's how I set it
up. I'm happy to hear you're
handling this the same way.
Because in many ways, you are
somebody I look up to in terms
of being a creator because you
handle it in a wonderful way.
And you talk about the things
that I care about in a very
aligned way as well. And yeah,
that's kind of what I really,
really like about your approach
here. And this stopping whatever
you want on the thing that is
bothering you and going to
somewhere else is also a great
approach. I do wonder now that
your businesses are growing and
you have more and more people,
do you see this becoming harder,
like to kind of stop doing the
thing that bothers you? Because
maybe there is a dependency with
somebody else's work. Have you
found a way out of that?
Simon Høiberg: Yeah, sometimes
it does become harder. And it's
like playing down, it isn't
always possible. Sometimes you
do need to kind of fold and say
like, there's something that's
urgent or important enough or
there's certain I'm not gonna I
don't wanna put my team through
stressful situations. So
especially we have on FeedHive,
in particular, because it's
running. It's a social media
management tool. And we are
dependent on these third party
API's. It's our entire product
and they fail notoriously. It's
very annoying. And our users
aren't always aware that this is
just the name of the game. It
produces a lot of support
tickets. So we have a support
team on board and I don't always
want to sit to put them in a
stressful situation handling
some users that can be very,
very frustrated, let's just say
it like that and downright like
impolite and not very nice to
talk to. So there's some times
where it's not always possible.
And that's where I as the
business owner, jump in and make
sure that their work is nice and
pleasant and not because I think
as like it's not their business.
First of all, they're also not
entrepreneurs. They didn't sign
up for this. That kind of crisis
management and discomfort is
what I signed up for. So
sometimes of course I put my
calendar or whatever I'm doing
at that time aside and then I
just kind of do and solve
whatever problem I need right
there even though it can be a
little bit annoying sometimes. I
think the essence of it is that
I think people don't burn out
from working a lot. I think
people burning out from be
feeling forced to work on
something that is either not
clear to them how this would
benefit their lives or they're
forced to do it either by their
employer or by salary situations
or other. I think that's what
burning people out. And I have
tried my very best to make sure
that there are a minimum number
of situations where I have to
push myself to keep working on
something that I really, really
dislike. And every time these
situations happen, I do sit
down. I carefully reflect and I
tried to come up with processes
to prevent this from happening
in the future, both for myself
and for my employees that's
working with me.
Arvid Kahl: That closes the
loop. Here's another process to
make the life of your business,
your employees and yourself
better, easier and more
manageable. I love this. And I
love the kindness that I hear in
your voice right now. Because
you're talking about your
employees and trying to protect
them and making sure that they
get what they sign up for. You,
just an awesome guy. And I'm
really, really glad that we
Simon Høiberg: Thank you, Arvid!
Arvid Kahl: Had this
conversation today. That was
really nice. If people wanna
find out more about you and I
bet they do wanna find out more
about you, where do you want
them to go?
Simon Høiberg: I think YouTube
is probably the best place to
get like an in depth glimpse of
what I'm doing. Otherwise, I'm
very active on pretty much
everywhere: LinkedIn, Twitter,
Instagram, TikTok. You can find
me around the internet on most
social media platforms.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, you are
everywhere, which is good. Well,
thanks so much, Simon for being
on the show today. That was
really, really kind of you to
share everything that you shared
today. That was wonderful. Thank
you.
Simon Høiberg: Absolutely. Thank
you for being here. It was a
pleasure.
Arvid Kahl: And that's it for
today. Thank you for listening
to The Bootstrapped Founder. You
can find me on Twitter
@arvidkahl. You'll find my books
and my twitter course there as
well. If you wanna support me
and the show, please subscribe
to my YouTube channel, get the
podcast in your podcast player
of choice and leave a rating and
a review by going to
(http://ratethispodcast.com/founder).
Any of this, will truly help the
show. So thank you so much for
listening and have a wonderful
day. Bye bye