Marie Poulin and Aaron Francis join us to discuss the realities of building creator-driven businesses. We talked a lot about YouTube (they describe how each got traction there) and their current video making process. They also challenged conventional wisdom about sticking to one niche. For them, pivoting between projects keeps them fresh and prevents burnout, even when the traditional wisdom is to "just focus."
Why is open source software important to be involved in?
What is the marketing flow for Marie and Notion Mastery?
The power of YouTube to find new people
Personality as a brand vs a studio brand name
The tensions of being a creator
What is your month to month routine for your business?
When does creative work feel like a grind?
What negative attention have you recieved creating content?
Marie Poulin and Aaron Francis join us to discuss the realities of building creator-driven businesses. We talked a lot about YouTube (they describe how each got traction there) and their current video making process. They also challenged conventional wisdom about sticking to one niche. For them, pivoting between projects keeps them fresh and prevents burnout, even when the traditional wisdom is to "just focus."
Building software products at Instrumental Products.
Host
Justin Jackson
Bootstrapping, SaaS, podcasting, calm companies🎙️ Co-founder of Transistor.fm
Guest
Aaron Francis
Sincere poster. No cynicism. Dad to two sets of twins!
Guest
Marie Poulin 🇨🇦
🔮 Notion ninja at notionmastery.com🧱 Product maker at weareokidoki.com🥬 Permaculture-inspired gardener🌮 Food + culinary nerd👨💻 Building bridges for ADHD brains🇯🇵 Currently learning 日本語
Earlier today I was literally going to find the last episode and ask when the next one is dropping, but now I know.
Will be adding it to the next in the queue—once Apple Podcasts picks it up!
One of the most interesting parts of this podcast for me is learning how many folks are:
- amazing public speakers,
- really active at conferences,
but are actually quite introverted!
Man. I should listen sometime to see what they say. But just what little you shared here resonates with me. Toward the end of me doing regular conference speaking I was staying in my room until the last possible minute and making a beeline for my room right after my talk.
I started to feel really bad about it. Like, why was I even doing it? All the energy and joy it brought to me meeting people and being actually THERE for the conference was waning.
I've since been diagnosed with ADHD and learned a ton about myself. Things clicked for me like why I could go from zero energy to 120% and back to zero again in the blink of an eye.
I also learned people sometimes limit the distinction between introvert and extrovert to simply "liking the I be around people or not." I've since seen it reframed as energy flow. Extroverts get energy from being around people vs introverts expend energy being around people.
When it comes to bootstrapping and building software, there's rarely one right answer. We want to dive into the nuance. In every episode, veteran founders Justin Jackson and Brian Casel bring together a panel of sharp minds from the indie tech world to tackle thorny topics – from pricing and product strategy to work-life balance. No gurus, no easy answers – just real conversations we'd normally have behind closed doors.
Justin Jackson:
Welcome to The Panel: where smart founders discuss the realities of building better products and better life. I'm one of your hosts, Justin Jackson. I'm the cofounder of Transistor.fm.
Brian Casel:
I'm Brian Casel. I build things at Instrumental Products. Right now, I'm building a thing called Instrumentl Editor over there.
Justin Jackson:
And we just got off the phone with two incredible guests. In a moment, you're gonna hear from
Marie Poulin:
I'm Marie Poulin, and I am the founder of Notion Mastery.
Aaron Francis:
And I'm Aaron Francis, and I am the co founder of Try Hard Studios.
Justin Jackson:
How can we introduce these two guests? If you don't know Marie Poulin, she
Brian Casel:
Have you heard of Notion?
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. Have you heard of Notion? During the call, I asked ChatGPT who are the top 10 Notion influencers, and her name was number one. She has created a whole brand around Notion Mastery. And that's the name of her course.
Justin Jackson:
And we didn't get into numbers in this episode, but I remember her sharing her numbers with me. And I was like, wow, like, this course does some serious revenue. And I actually have a great conversation with her over at the on the Build Your SaaS podcast about how in some ways, like, being a course business can be better than running a SaaS. And I think she's proven that out. Her and her husband, Ben, work on this together.
Justin Jackson:
And it's just a dynamite business. Yeah. Was great to have her on the panel.
Brian Casel:
For sure. And, you know, Aaron our our friend Aaron Francis on the show. You you probably know him if you follow us or this podcast. But, you know, same thing. Like, I really love to learn about these creator driven businesses, like Aaron's and like Marie's.
Brian Casel:
And we had a really great conversation like we always do here. I think we we went a level deeper than just how do you use YouTube. It's like, what does it actually mean to personally and professionally be a creator, be introverted, be extroverted, and then use that to to actually power a business. And and like you said, like, these these can be incredible businesses, like, more than you might expect on the surface.
Justin Jackson:
And I think as folks are listening to this, maybe that's the lens to be considering whether or not you wanna be in front of the camera or what whether or not you wanna be, you know, doing a course or or some sort of creator business that revolves around a personality. I think a lot of folks preclude themselves from that because they're they feel like they're too shy or too introverted. And we're like, we went through all four of us. And I think you'll be surprised who considers themselves, you know, introverted and shy and not good in front of the camera or not, like, naturally maybe not good in front of the camera, but not naturally comfortable in front of the camera.
Brian Casel:
I thought that was one of my favorite parts of our conversation. Sort of near the end Mhmm. We really did compare and contrast the four of us, and we all have very different views and personality styles when it comes to how we think personally, introverted, extroverted, and how we how that applies in our business life and, like, on camera or on microphone. Yeah.
Justin Jackson:
So let's let's not hesitate anymore. Let's get into the conversation.
Brian Casel:
Let's roll it.
Justin Jackson:
Alright. We've just been holding ourselves back here waiting for Aaron to join the call.
Brian Casel:
Alright. So now we can stop talking about Aaron.
Aaron Francis:
Yeah. And for for the listener, it is 216, and the call started at 02:15. So don't don't impugn my timeliness.
Justin Jackson:
But we were asking Marie if, you know, Notion Mastery is still the main driver of her business, and she was starting to get into it. So so Marie, what's kind of going on in your world? I know that you have Notion Mastery, which is a course. And I know you have a YouTube channel, which I think is your main marketing channel. So yeah.
Justin Jackson:
What's going on with is it still Notion Mastery? That's still the big thing?
Marie Poulin:
That's the big thing. It's been five just over five years, I think, October. Oh, wow. The the five year mark. So it's been the thing that's been paying the bills for five years.
Marie Poulin:
So grateful for that and also, like, what's gonna happen next? So I feel like I'm sort of in a, like, a maturity phase of the business where it's like we've, we did the COVID bubble, and we didn't even have to kind of make any effort on the selling side of things. Things were pretty easy. Now things have kind of leveled off a little bit. Still very profitable, but also, like, okay.
Marie Poulin:
We've been doing this for five years, and Notion changes all the time. Do we wanna keep up with those updates? Like, how much do we wanna be tied to a software? So there's a lot happening there. Happy to to dig into.
Brian Casel:
I do wanna get into, like, all those questions. Just sort more of like a high level. You know, when I click through your your stuff and I've been following your work for so long, like you're you're the Notion person, right? What is like the landscape of all of your product offerings and like where do you focus most or what so, you know, there's, like, Notion Mastery. I'm seeing, like, smaller workshops.
Brian Casel:
I'm seeing stuff for business, stuff for individuals. Like, how does it all sort of, like, break down for you?
Marie Poulin:
Yeah. So loosely, I'd say I tend to focus more on the personal use cases. Ben so it's just my husband and I that that run Notion Mastery. It's just the two of us. And so Ben tends to handle more of the team, really scalable experiences inside of things.
Marie Poulin:
So he does a little bit of consulting with teams, not a lot anymore since we're still pretty focused on the course, and we're trying to kinda keep keep the consulting down. Because a lot of the challenges that come up are the same. So we're like, where can we standardize on this? And so Ben's working on an architecting workspaces that's like the team opinionated version of kinda how to set up your Notion. So Notion Mastery is the place where we deliver the curriculum.
Marie Poulin:
It's an online course, self paced. People can sign up anytime. And then there's live live workshops, like once a month, and there's weekly office hours every week that people can join. Sometimes one of those workshops is popular enough that we're like, know what? This actually is kind of a stand alone workshop.
Marie Poulin:
What if we made it available so that anybody could purchase this even outside of Notion Mastery? So that's kind of Notion Mastery is a bit of a test bed where we get to say, what if we did a workshop on x even if it's only tangentially related to Notion? And then we kind of deliver that as, like, a lower priced way of getting used to kind of what our teaching style is and kinda how we think about things, and then they can apply the cost of that to the course. But really, the course is still kind of, like, developing curriculum, developing those workshops. That's kinda where most of our time, energy, and attention goes.
Brian Casel:
Super interesting. I wanna come back to, like, the workshops thing because that's something I've been trying to learn a lot about in terms of that model, like, small, low priced workshops and then having more of, like, a flagship offering, like, after that. But anyway, like, Aaron, how are doing, buddy? Oh
Aaron Francis:
oh, great. So awesome. Good to be here. I won't I won't do this to her now, but Marie and I have been friends for a long time, and I used to always ask Marie, what's Notion? Every time she would tweet or be like, is that?
Aaron Francis:
I gotta do Notion workshop. I'd just be all lowercase. No question mark. What's Notion? And it was funny, like, the first thirty times, but I haven't done that in a few Yeah.
Aaron Francis:
Thanks.
Brian Casel:
It is kind of amazing to me, though. Like, us here on, like, on the Internet, in our circles, everyone knows what Notion is. But still, like, my brother, my wife, my parents, like, they've never heard of Notion.
Marie Poulin:
Mhmm. Still a pretty tiny bubble. Yeah.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. That's my favorite my brother works up in the oil rigs in Alberta, and I love, like, asking him stuff. Like, have you heard of this? He's like, what are you talking about, brother? Like, Different language.
Aaron Francis:
Yeah.
Brian Casel:
Basecamp... what's that?
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. No idea.
Brian Casel:
Aaron, what what is the what's happening at Try Hard Studios these days?
Aaron Francis:
It's probably easier to say what's not happening. It feels like we're doing we're doing a little bit or we're doing a little bit much, aren't we? So yeah. So me and my friend Steve have this company, Try Hard Studios. And last year, we released two video courses both on different database flavors.
Aaron Francis:
Right now, we are working towards a reboot of screencasting.com that is new, improved, and much expanded, which I think will be interesting. And I am doing some open source work. I'm in the Laravel community, and so I'm doing some open source work over there. And so we have a few different a few different legs to the stool of our business, and open source database courses and screencasting are probably the three major ones.
Brian Casel:
Very cool. I mean, there are so many different branches we can go down in this conversation, I feel like. But, you know, again, just kinda high level thinking about, like, the landscape. If I think about TryHard Studios, I know that the company is still pretty young at this point, but Yeah.
Aaron Francis:
Not even a year old.
Brian Casel:
Not even a year old. Right? So it it seems like courses are the bread and butter, obviously, as a developer audience. It's interesting to hear you'd say that you you do invest your time in open source software. How how do you think about that?
Brian Casel:
Like, purpose does that serve for you or for the company? Is it about just staying fresh that, like, you're teaching technical topics, be be in it, credibility, being part of the Laravel community. Like, where does that piece fit in for you?
Aaron Francis:
Yeah. All of the above. It keeps me in the game, which I think is important for an educator to, like, actively be a practitioner as well. So it keeps me doing that. It also like, it's it's top of funnel.
Aaron Francis:
I mean, our whole our entire business is built around developers being aware of us and our offerings. And we could just continue to tweet about courses all day long, or we could do something that is far more interesting, in my opinion, which is a lot of this open source work. And then people come into the Orbit, become aware of paid offerings. And so it's it's definitely a marketing angle. It keeps me active in the Laravel community, which I really like that community.
Aaron Francis:
And it also lays the groundwork for future courses, like Laravel course, like getting started from scratch with Laravel. And so the purpose the purpose is is many fold. I think the probably the most business purpose is top of funnel, but there's also, like, a personal cathartic purpose. Like, I enjoy it. It keeps me fresh.
Aaron Francis:
It's a lot of fun to, like, hack on stuff that is totally bizarre because it is like a it's almost like my my hobby slash side project, but it serves the business.
Justin Jackson:
Is YouTube the primary channel for you, Aaron? Or is it YouTube and Twitter?
Aaron Francis:
Yeah. I would say it's YouTube and Twitter. At the end of last year, the YouTube kinda fell off as I was producing the Postgres course. And so it's real hard to do, like, you know, a 20 videos on a course and then also do a weekly yeah. A weekly video.
Aaron Francis:
Erin. You are an animal. It's tough. And so, like, last year
Brian Casel:
I do, like, one in
Aaron Francis:
a week. Yeah. Yeah. The high performance SQLite course had a hundred videos, and I think the mastering Postgres had, like, a 20. And we did those, you know, back to back within six months.
Aaron Francis:
And so the YouTube fell off a little bit. But, yeah, I would say that I would say that YouTube and Twitter are probably the main drivers of of purchases to those courses.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. And and for you, Marie, we we talked about YouTube. Is that is YouTube the big one, or is there another channel that is working for you?
Marie Poulin:
I'd say YouTube's the big one for sure. It's where, yeah, most people it's a search engine. Right? They're just how the heck do I do this in Notion?
Justin Jackson:
And Yeah. What what's the flow? Like, they watch your video, then do they join an email list? Is there free off like, how do you get people to buy? What's the order there?
Marie Poulin:
Yeah. And it it's tricky too because, obviously, Notion Mastery is at a slightly higher price point. And so usually, the flow might be someone watches a video, then they're like, oh, wait. This video is helpful. Go down the rabbit hole, maybe watch a couple other videos.
Marie Poulin:
And then in the descriptions, there's always some kind of, usually a link to a template. And there's often like, hey, in this video, I'm gonna show you how I did this, or you can buy the template. So it's either make it yourself, and I'm showing you how to do that, or buy it premade for you, and that work's already done. So it kinda gives people some options. So there's a combination of free templates, paid templates at kinda different price points, and then people can always apply the cost of the template to the course.
Marie Poulin:
Now, of course, the course is, like, $800. The templates are, like, $20, 30 dollars, and that sort of thing. So it's not you know, it is a big jump to go from, you know, a $30 product to an $800 product. But so the idea is there's lots of free ways for people to kinda serve themselves and get their questions answered before, you know, joining the course, and then those workshops as well. And the workshops are still pretty cheap too, like $39, you know, for like, we've had some people say, like, that workshop save like, would have saved me months of time if I had done that before.
Marie Poulin:
And so it's a no brainer sometimes for those workshops to to kinda get people in the door.
Justin Jackson:
Does more of the purchase flow go through the search query? Like, people are searching for Notion stuff? And how much of purchases are people just knowing of you as a personality? Like, how much is because I'm wondering about Aaron too because my guess is that for Aaron, more of it's based on personality, but I don't know. Maybe there so for you, Murray, is it more search based?
Marie Poulin:
And I'm sure it's hard to I'm it's really hard to even quantify this too. Right? And and, Aaron, I'll be curious, you know, your thoughts on that. But, like, there's a lots of people who've never heard of me. I can go on the Reddit.
Marie Poulin:
I'll answer questions, and people are like, who are the top Notion people? And, like, Thomas Frank will get mentioned, tons of people will get mentioned, and my name doesn't show up in there. Wait. Like, no problem. That's that's totally fine.
Marie Poulin:
You send me to
Aaron Francis:
that thread, and I will make sure that it gets mentioned.
Marie Poulin:
I know. I need to, like, yeah, send send my my fellow
Justin Jackson:
friends there. Right now. Who are the top 10 Notion people?
Marie Poulin:
So that's another point. We actually get a lot of people in their intake form saying that they searched ChatGPT for Notion courses, and they found us. Interesting. We've been around long enough. We've got enough, like, SEO juice and kind of, you know, enough blog posts on there and and notoriety, and we embed our YouTube videos in our blog posts.
Marie Poulin:
So I think we've just we kind of been around the longest that there's there's sort of like that search engine juice that we still get from
Justin Jackson:
Oh, you're number one. I just searched. Who are the top 10 Notion influencers? Number one, Marie Pullian, a prominent Notion ambassador known for her comprehensive tutorials and courses that help users maximize.
Marie Poulin:
Maybe it's because you're in Canada that I'm showing up. I wonder if it's still the same.
Justin Jackson:
This is this is just pure. Yeah, pure ranking right
Marie Poulin:
here.
Brian Casel:
You know you know what's so interesting to me about YouTube right now? And so I of the four of us, I I definitely have, like, the, like, the the the least amount of reach. Right? Like, the three of you have much larger audiences and and been around longer and developed your your audiences more. But I what I'm actually seeing on YouTube now for for me with a relatively small audience, especially on YouTube, is that it's like the one platform that seems to work for me to reach totally new people Yes.
Brian Casel:
Who are interested in the things that I'm building. Like like right now, I'm sort of like building and pre launching this like Rails components library. And I've been creating some YouTube videos on it. I have a survey on the site after the early access. And one of the questions is, like, where where are you finding me?
Brian Casel:
Like, all of them right now are coming from YouTube. And the and these are, like, new names, like, not followers of mine on Twitter, not people who've been listening to my podcast over the years. It just seems like, of all the platforms, if you're new or you're or you're building an audience or you're sort of earlier in that stage, it still seems like it's the algorithm that can actually put you in front of new people at like, pretty efficiently.
Marie Poulin:
Absolutely. I'd agree with that.
Justin Jackson:
Is that how it's working for you, Aaron? Like, I said earlier, I think a lot of people are coming to your courses because of you, the personality, but you must be that the algorithm must be helping you a lot in the PHP world. Like, I think your first video that really popped that I remember was that PHP is cool again, or or or maybe it was that one with the meme where you were looking back. Is am I right? Am I in the
Aaron Francis:
Yeah. Both of those both of those popped off. I think it was PHP doesn't suck anymore. And then the other one was PHP on the front end. It was a LiveWire video.
Aaron Francis:
But honestly, the first one that popped off was the first video I ever did, which was like a tour of Laravel. It was like a thirty minute video. I had never done YouTube before, and it got like a hundred thousand views. And it just was like it just totally took off. And I think there are a few reasons.
Aaron Francis:
One is I do have at the time, it was much smaller, but I do have a following on Twitter. And so I'm able to bring people over and maybe kick start some of that. Mhmm. I don't think there was a ton of PHP content out there, especially not, like, kinda newer stuff. So, yeah, I don't know.
Aaron Francis:
I mean, it's of course, you know, since then, it's been hard to replicate, you know, a hundred thousand views, you know, in in a day or something. But the the algorithm giveth and taketh away. But I do think, you know, for our business, Steve and I have kind of decided that, like, yes, we have a company that has a great name, but we're still we're gonna double down on Aaron is the brand because we've built that. Mhmm. There's a lot of trust there, and it makes it like, people wanna connect with people, and so, like, building a try hard studios brand feels like a exercise in futility.
Aaron Francis:
And so we have both we have both leaned into, alright, the brand is Aaron Francis. And that was like, I didn't want to do that because I have a partner that I'm 50% onerous with, and I'm like, man, I kinda want like, I kinda wanna push you out there. And he's like, listen. I do not care. If we make money,
Marie Poulin:
I am happy. And I'm like,
Aaron Francis:
oh, okay. Great.
Marie Poulin:
Well, let's do
Aaron Francis:
it then. Because I you know, there was one time I felt so horrible. I forgot to say, like, me and Steve in a tweet. And I called him, and I was like, dude, I'm so sorry. I know that we both worked on this.
Aaron Francis:
And he's like, listen. You've got to stop. I do not care. And I'm like, oh, well, great, because I forgot. So, yeah, we we've doubled down on that personal Especially
Brian Casel:
year one. It's like this is this is you're just laying the foundation and
Aaron Francis:
There could be properties that it makes sense to be a little more nameless. Like, Screencasting.com is a pretty good standalone property. The the database courses, it does rely a lot on the individual, the teacher, the person. And so, like, I think a big reason Kent C. Dodds does so well in courses is people know, like, and trust Kent C.
Aaron Francis:
Dodds. And so Yeah. That's kind of the pattern that I'm I'm after as well.
Justin Jackson:
I also wonder if this is why this is not a slight. Uh-oh. But the
Brian Casel:
Now get ready for a slight.
Marie Poulin:
Yeah. The
Justin Jackson:
official, like, YouTube channels for some well known, like, programming things have don't have very high views. Mhmm. So, like, they're covering the same material as you. But I sometimes go there. I'm like, what?
Justin Jackson:
Like
Marie Poulin:
They're just not Aaron Francis.
Aaron Francis:
I mean, it's it's just not a person. But Yeah. Wonder if
Justin Jackson:
it's because it's not under that person or, like, people just aren't as interested in following a corporation. You know?
Aaron Francis:
Yeah. I mean, when I did it for the previous company I was at, it worked really well, but it was just me. I was the whole channel.
Marie Poulin:
Mhmm. And we
Aaron Francis:
would, you know, we would, from time to time, have other people on, and the videos did fine. But there's there was a very clear difference between when I did a video and when we put out some other, you know, corporate whatever whatever. And I think it just goes back to people want to feel connected to people. And so if you're trying to make your channel, like, very corporate or sterile, I just don't understand why that would ever work. And that's a huge risk for a company because it does require a personality.
Aaron Francis:
And, like, when I got laid off from PlanetScale, people were like, wait. I thought Aaron owned PlanetScale. It's like, I wish, brother. No. I don't.
Aaron Francis:
And so there's there's, like, a risk there.
Brian Casel:
I think we were saying on on a previous episode of this, like, it does seem really difficult to sort of, like, outsource the person on the camera on on YouTube for your company if if it's not one of the founders or one of the key people in in the company. But and also, like, it goes back to that algorithm thing. Like, I'm not usually one to to really want to, like, rely on an algorithm or trust these algorithms, but it does seem like YouTube is unique. Like, what you're just saying that, like, people on a on a personal level, on a content level, they connect with other people. So that works just on a human level, but that also seems to be like what YouTube wants to push on on their algorithm.
Brian Casel:
Like, they're they're not gonna, you know, push these, like, kinda generic corporate explainer video type stuff. You know?
Justin Jackson:
Is it the same for you, Marie? Like, your YouTube channel is under your name. Right?
Marie Poulin:
Yes. Duke it is? Yes. Because I had that debate where I was like, okay, if I'm going all in, like, do I need to, you know, kinda choose a new handle and what's that gonna look like? But so I, you know, created playlists that were Notion Mastery and kinda changed up the header and stuff, but it's still under my brand.
Marie Poulin:
And I think in the beginning, I think one of the reasons the course sort of exploded the way it did is I was just sharing the way that I was using it to help me manage the chaos of my life. I didn't know at the time that I have ADHD. Like, I wasn't diagnosed yet, but I was like, why is there an exorbitant amount of people with ADHD signing up for the course? Yeah.
Aaron Francis:
And I Probably nothing probably nothing there. I don't mean Just a coincidence.
Marie Poulin:
And it was like, oh, there's something about the way that I approach information. And so a lot of my early videos are just me, like, describing my own personal challenges. I'm like, I might do it this way, or this is just the way my brain works. So I was being really honest about the weird quirks or sort of the way I would approach things or the fact that I really need visuals for comprehension. So the ability to make my data visual in a way that kind of clicked for me was a very common challenge with other people with ADHD.
Marie Poulin:
So I just had this flood of people being like, you get me. Like, there was an instant connection where people felt like I was talking about my brain in a way that, resonated with the way that that they thought as well. And they didn't feel so alone. So I think there was, like, a personal connection piece there that got made very, very quickly that I didn't realize that that's what I was doing or what was gonna happen, but it was just very honest, and people were like, damn. Yes.
Marie Poulin:
I feel seen.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. That authenticity is hard to to duplicate, I think.
Brian Casel:
Is is that one of those things that, like, over because you've been at this, you know, several years. Is that one of those things where you started to, like, really lean into that angle of your content? Or, like, what were some of the the things that started to click where it was, okay, if I if this becomes more of a part of the workflow or part of the playbook on YouTube that that seems to work. Can you look back on, like, any milestones where, like, things start to started to really click when you did this or that?
Marie Poulin:
I mean, definitely getting diagnosed for me was like a massive, like, holy shit, everything clicked into place, like even why I chose Notion, why I was really good at it. Like it was being able to bring my, like, web design UI, UX background or obsession with design and how things work and workflow. Like it all kind of made sense that Notion was the right tool for me and my brain. So just understanding that it was like, oh, my brain works a little different. But now that I know why and I had words for it and understood kind of how the symptoms can manifest, I stopped kind of fighting against my nature.
Marie Poulin:
And I was like, what if I were more honest about the struggles? And I could name it even in the course and say, hey, your brain might lean a little more toward this fashion. And you might want to see more data on the page, because that gives you comfort where other people are super overwhelmed. They're like, I wouldn't like, just looking at your screen gives me anxiety. But we have to acknowledge people need different things.
Marie Poulin:
And so I brought that into the course to to really consider, there's a reason I'm not taking you through one specific journey in this course. Like, people wanna know what they're gonna build at the end. Like, that's what they want, this perfectly already designed system. Mhmm. I'm like, if I taught you my system, it would probably feel crazy.
Marie Poulin:
Like, it it's designed for an ADHD brain, you know, female in tech with an ADHD. Like, there's so many
Aaron Francis:
Who loves food prep.
Marie Poulin:
Exactly. Who who wants big visual inspiring images at the top of my pages that for other people are like, you're wasting space. So I'm getting people to almost, like, self journal, and I think of it as a self discovery process. Do you need this information? Is this even helpful to you?
Marie Poulin:
If not, just delete it. Cut it out. I really leaned into that idea of forget trying to build an all in one system. Build a system that works for your brain. And that's gonna require feedback loops.
Marie Poulin:
That's not gonna happen overnight. You need that that process to happen, and that takes time.
Brian Casel:
I love that. Like, it and, again, like, this topic that I've been thinking lot about lately is the creator and, like, that tension of being a creator and being a business owner. And what you're just describing, it sort of makes me think of, like, like, stand up comedians. You hear them talk all all the time about, like, their career took off when they when they leaned more into themselves and on on stage, you know, More honest, more more personally honest and and all that. And like that's what starts to really click with audiences.
Brian Casel:
But I've been thinking a lot about this this week. I I just wrote a post the other day or the other night when I couldn't sleep about, like, as business owners, especially in SaaS and software, like, we're constantly taught minimum viable products. Like, just just do enough to ship. Like, good enough to ship or, you know, run lean, you know, and all these things. But then I find myself spending hours and days and weeks just hacking on something to make it just right or get it the way that I want it.
Brian Casel:
And it's like it's this tension between, like, I wanna create something that I'm really proud of that has, like, creative integrity versus, like, building a business. And it's like the I'm starting to think that these sort of are at odds with each other. Do do you guys think think this at all, like, when it comes to what you're building, what you're creating in any of your work?
Aaron Francis:
Yeah. I think they're definitely at odds. I don't think they have to be as at odds as some people on Twitter like to make it out to be. So there's this whole contingent on Twitter that's like, just ship anything as fast as possible. Who cares if it sucks?
Aaron Francis:
The goal is to ship. And I'm like, I get like, I directionally, I understand what you're saying, and that may be helpful advice to somebody that's on one side of the perfection ship fast spectrum. But in my opinion, I think that conversation has gone a little too far to just, like, ship it, lol, see what happens, LMAO. It's like, okay. We have to, like for for Steve and I specifically, we have a lot of pride in our craft.
Aaron Francis:
And we could, I think, do things a lot faster if we did them a lot worse. But I think those I think that quality compounds over time. And so we can put out a new course, and people will say, oh, this is a try hard course. It's gonna be pretty good.
Brian Casel:
Mhmm. It comes with that brand, that quality built in. You know?
Aaron Francis:
Yeah. If we're talking about building a brand, which includes a personal brand, I want that brand to be Aaron does really good work and tries really hard, and the things he puts out are good. And so there's definitely a line that you have to cut it off at, but I think I think the line is much further into quality than the average indie hacker on Twitter would have you believe.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. I always laugh at these these Instagram ads I'm getting where it's like, you can have your own AI video avatar and push out a hundred posts a day. And they're like, that's the extreme version of this, which is like Yeah. Dude, that's like terrible. Who wants to watch that?
Justin Jackson:
You know? And the opposite side is somebody who really cares about what they're producing. I mean, is my argument with AI, like building an app with AI. Sure, you can get an AI to build an app, but it's not going to be the same as a craftsperson who is thinking through each section and the transitions between each section and having that as a cohesive, well thought out experience and unit. Whereas if you're on the totally automated side of this, this thing could just crank out like apps and features and videos of it's like I think people are getting tired of that already.
Brian Casel:
And it it does seem like in this kind of business, whether it's courses or content and YouTube workshops, all this kind of stuff, it's like, it's so hard to break through Mhmm. Today. Because there there's so many people doing everything, whether it's this or or SaaS or anything. And that I think at a certain level, like, the creativity and and your unique voice and your unique take on it, that's what gets people's attention. Like, when I think back to all the years of, like, when when I sort of, like, tried to, like, I don't know, like, hammer on some, like, business marketing funnel versus when I'm just creating something that I think is awesome.
Brian Casel:
Like, that's the thing that people start to latch onto or or that that I might even be surprised that people latch onto because I was just sort of just having fun making it. You know? It it's like they they're sort of at odds until it's like, oh, that's actually what resonates with real people, real humans.
Aaron Francis:
That that's true for the types of businesses that Marie and I are running. I don't think that that is necessarily true for a b to b SaaS, you know, like Transistor, for example.
Brian Casel:
Like Mhmm.
Aaron Francis:
You know. So I think different different types of businesses require different strategies. And for the one the the type of business that Marie and I are in, in my opinion, relies a lot on, like, integrity of the person. Like, people go to Marie because they trust her to teach them the thing. Mhmm.
Aaron Francis:
And that comes after a long time of not crapping out AI avatar videos. Right? That comes after a long time of Marie saying, this is how I work. Oops. This didn't work for me.
Aaron Francis:
Let's change it. This is how I work now. And people get to be there for that journey. Whereas with Transistor, it's like, you know, you go to Google and you're like, podcast hosting. And you're like, okay.
Aaron Francis:
I don't know, Justin. Don't really care. This looks great. I'm gonna sign up and use it. And so there are just there are different strategies for different businesses, I think.
Justin Jackson:
Although, I keep revising my opinion on this because for a while, like Rob Walling had always said, his personal brand didn't affect his SaaS at all. And sometimes I think I just like naturally kind of fall in line behind people's opinions. Like, oh, yeah. Like, that must be the way it is. And then Tyler Tringes started challenging me on that.
Justin Jackson:
And I started paying attention to these emails we send out. Like, why did you sign up? And there's a surprising percentage that say, I've been following Justin's work forever. Mhmm. Or I heard Justin on a podcast, or I saw Justin's AMA.
Justin Jackson:
And so at least for us, I think, like, search is definitely a big part of it. But I'm always surprised, like, it might be as high as 20% of people come because of the personality behind the brand. Believe it. And I I think that's been downplayed in and maybe because we're not everyone likes to say we're not a b to b SaaS or whatever. So maybe that's why.
Aaron Francis:
But Yeah. So maybe you're kind of on that spectrum, but not all the way over to, like, Salesforce or something.
Justin Jackson:
But even then, like, we've had we've had government people in the US government that have signed up for their department. And they've it's amazing how people are like, it could be something as like, I read your article on Hacker News ten years ago, and you I've just been following your journey since then. So these things can show up all the time.
Brian Casel:
Yep. The SaaS thing built on an audience, I I get the the point. I think it's true to an extent that, like, personal audience is not gonna drive the growth long term for for a SaaS or b to b or even a b to c SaaS. But I do think that folks like you, Justin, or or Rob, or or any of these any like the few people that we know who have an an audience and a SaaS, I do think that it's a jump start in the beginning, especially in the first year, that can get you to whatever zero to to 10 to 20 to 50. Yeah.
Brian Casel:
And that is enough to start the flywheel of word-of-mouth and search and and all the rest of it. You know?
Justin Jackson:
I think this is the the narrative I'm challenging, though, because I believe that in the beginning too. Like, our first hundred customers were largely from my audience. But I've just now seen like how long have we been around? Since 02/2018. So now it's what is that?
Justin Jackson:
Six years?
Aaron Francis:
Some number of
Marie Poulin:
years. Number of It's
Justin Jackson:
working. Working. Like, there's still a big percentage, and all of these things are additive. Like, it's like, where do you get your customers? Well, you know, we wanna say it's all from search, but really it's like, no.
Justin Jackson:
It's this, And these things interplay off each other. So someone could be searching podcast hosting and then see a video with my face and go, I recognize that guy from somewhere and then sign up because of that. So I think it can be more it can again, this is what's so great about this format. I think every situation is different. But for whatever reason, that personality behind the brand, that authentic person is still working for us.
Justin Jackson:
And it can work against us too, you know, that some people don't like my opinions on things and probably don't sign up for stuff.
Marie Poulin:
But Sure.
Justin Jackson:
Overall, I think it's been a net positive.
Brian Casel:
You know, for for both of you, Marie and and Aaron, I I always like to sort of, peer into, like, what it's like to work in your business.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. Can you show us around the room right now?
Aaron Francis:
Just Don't. You can't you don't want you won't you don't want that.
Justin Jackson:
I I literally have on my floor out of out of the frame here, I have probably 20 envelopes that I need to open, like mail that I it's just on the floor.
Brian Casel:
Mail I never open. It's like
Marie Poulin:
Mail is my nemesis. Paper, just no.
Brian Casel:
Yeah. Exactly. Oh, is that a tax thing? No. Yeah.
Brian Casel:
Yeah. No. But I like, what especially for a creator style business like like yours, what does it look like from a routine standpoint or or from a month to month? Like, which projects are you focused on? Are I because from the outside looking in, I'm picturing a lot of jumping around.
Brian Casel:
Like, alright. We got this course. I'm gonna focus on that for two months. And then I'm gonna focus on the YouTube channel. And I'm gonna focus on this workshop.
Brian Casel:
And then this this or that. Like, how do you think about, like, projects?
Justin Jackson:
This will
Marie Poulin:
be fun because I feel like Aaron and I probably work so differently.
Aaron Francis:
You What's Notion? Yeah.
Marie Poulin:
So what's Notion? There's a I mean, there's a lot of bouncing around, and certainly, like, both Ben and I are very much, like, what is interesting to me in this moment? Like, it it's, like, a nervous based nervous system based interest, what's catching my attention right now. We do have to be very careful about being clear. Okay, this month, what is our focus?
Marie Poulin:
Okay, we want to revamp these old lessons that have been hanging out. Okay, great. We know that every week, we want to hit at least one lesson. So there are some like general targets that we want to hit, and then we sort of have a weekly cadence. So Monday mornings, there's always some kind of sync, and we're checking in this week.
Marie Poulin:
What's the one thing that you've got to get done this week? What's the one thing I got to get done this week? And we're sort of trying to hold each other accountable to that. And then each day, we sort of have like that one thing that we want to get done. Tuesdays, Wednesdays tend to be some sort of content creation, and that might be within the course.
Marie Poulin:
So designing the workshop, it might be a YouTube video. I'm super inconsistent with my video creation. You know, even Notion will have times where they're like in a in a season of building a feature, and I'm like, it's broken. It's beta. It's not working.
Marie Poulin:
I try to record a video. It's broken. I'm like, I'll come back to this because, like, this is just gonna frustrate me. There is aspects of that where I can't always depend on a plan, so I have to be able to to kinda pivot week by week, day by day, and that sort of thing. So the the flow of the week tends to look similar, but what we're focusing on is generally it's the course or some kind of workshop within the course or some kind of YouTube video, some kind of blog post.
Marie Poulin:
Newsletters, again, super inconsistent. Some I'm happy if I can get a YouTube video and a newsletter out once a month. If I can do that, I'm like, yes. I have made it. Anything more than that is is gravy.
Brian Casel:
But again, I I come back to that, like, you know, you're talking about, like, well, follow where your energy is is leading your or interest or mood. Right? But, like, that's, like, actually strategically the way that this business works. Right? It it does depend on you and and where your mind and energy is at, and that's good for the business.
Brian Casel:
Right?
Aaron Francis:
Absolutely. Mhmm. Okay. Marie, we're not that different after all. You know?
Aaron Francis:
You know? I expected I
Marie Poulin:
It's very different. It's very different.
Aaron Francis:
I expect it a lot more. Like, I go to the Notion. I, you know, live by the Notion, die by the Notion. It's, you know, it's alright. I'm also very vibes based and vibes based within a project usually.
Aaron Francis:
So, like, example, tomorrow, we're releasing this open source library. And so I've just been, like, working on whatever I want that pushes that forward this week. And then, you know, that'll that'll get out there. And then Steve and I talk a lot about, like, alright. What's our what's our next big thing?
Aaron Francis:
And for us, our next big thing is screencasting.com. And so my portion of that is rerecord the flagship flagship course, and Steve's portion is record, you know, four or five adjunct courses for each major editor, because Steve is an editor by trade. And so I know that, like, before March 1, I have to have that course done. Now, when I walk in the door, you know, Monday, am I gonna start on that course? We'll see.
Aaron Francis:
Who knows? No idea. And that doesn't you know, this is not a recommendation. This is this is merely observing what I do because there are times where it's like, you know, last year, we were working on these two big courses. Each of them had a corporate sponsor, and so we have these external commitments.
Aaron Francis:
Right? We will finish Postgres by 10:15 by October 15. And it turns out, it was very, very difficult, and I ended up working way too much, way too hard because I didn't have not maybe I not that I didn't have a good schedule, but I would come in and, like, in the in the morning and think, okay. I've gotta record a bunch of Postgres videos today. And I would sit around until 02:00 just, like, almost depressed thinking, I can't do this.
Aaron Francis:
Who am I to do this? I can't do this. What am I gonna do here?
Marie Poulin:
And then do a lot. Crisis first, and then you record the videos.
Aaron Francis:
Yeah. All morning and into the afternoon is existential crisis. And then at 02:30 or three
Justin Jackson:
If that was me, I'd still be sitting there.
Marie Poulin:
Oh, it's brutal.
Aaron Francis:
It's brutal. And then you gotta, like, well, I'm going home at 06:30 to, you know, see the kids and put them down for bed. I guess I better record some goddamn videos. And then you just, like, power through them. And so I wish there was a better way.
Aaron Francis:
Maybe there is, but I haven't found it yet. So far, it's just kinda like vibes.
Brian Casel:
I run into that a lot. I I I you're I'm glad you brought that up. I do wanna ask about sort of like like sort of like the dark side of all this a little bit. Like, when does it feel like a grind? And and maybe in the past, when
Aaron Francis:
have we fallen? Always. Yeah.
Marie Poulin:
Was gonna say. Grinding. There's a
Aaron Francis:
lot of grinding. Yeah. Yeah.
Brian Casel:
Like, lately, I've been working on this this instrumental editor, like a block editor, a Notion style editor for for Rails, like a component.
Marie Poulin:
What's Notion?
Brian Casel:
I miss this Notion thing.
Justin Jackson:
I don't know.
Aaron Francis:
That's my joke.
Brian Casel:
But it's this thing that I like, the more I work on it, the more time I spend on it, the harder it gets. Like, it's a really technically difficult thing to build. But I'm I'm constantly, like, 70% of the way there. I can't just give up now because then the whole thing just gets shelved. So then I just keep pushing to try to get to a milestone where it's like, this is almost releasable.
Brian Casel:
Oh, but then there's this other thing and it takes me three more weeks. And it's like Mhmm. You know? Like, how how have you and maybe Justin too. Like, how have you guys thought about, like, burnout?
Brian Casel:
Or when does this feel like a grind? Can you think back to times where you had to make certain adjustments?
Justin Jackson:
I mean, I'm interested to hear what you guys think first. I I I personally because I I did courses for a period of my indie business life, and I found it exhausting. I just it felt like every launch, I'd finish the launch, and then it'd be I'd have to immediately think about the next launch. And it's launching is Have
Marie Poulin:
you tried not launching? Well,
Justin Jackson:
that's why Notion Mastery seems so great. It's like one thing. I just I had to keep relaunching, especially marketing for developers. I just felt this constant, like and finding new channels for it. And I did a, you know, I did a version just for what's Noah Kagan's thing?
Aaron Francis:
AppSumo.
Justin Jackson:
AppSumo. And I just found it really tiring, personally.
Marie Poulin:
I'm designing the business model to match your vibes and energy. Knowing that all the energy it takes to go into a lunch and be on and teaching, I was like, I can't do that, but could I commit to one live event a week on office hours? Yes, I could do that. So we actually restructured Notion Mastery. I mean, it's kind of always been a bit self study with with live components, but one of the major changes we made when Ben came back to the business was Ben is so good in the moment, like, turn on the camera and troubleshoot in real time.
Marie Poulin:
And we we were like, why are we spending all this effort planning and prepping workshops and, like, making slide like, it's so much work to do a good workshop. And so we thought, what if we restructure things so we don't have to always do a monthly workshop, but Ben will do a demo day once a month, and like, doesn't barely need to prepare. All you have to know is whatever new features Notion has launched or whatever, and he can tinker. He's a tinker, and he'll tinker in real time being like, oh, interesting, that seems broken. And people are learning from watching him do that on the screen.
Marie Poulin:
So it's like, how can we make use of the most sort of low effort, low energy, but still actually really useful and educational to the other person? And so I tend to take on more of the workshop development. Ben does the demo days, and then that way, we're not having to do these sort of, like, perfectly crafted curriculum. Like, the student doesn't need more curriculum to consume. It's like they need to know how to solve those challenges quickly.
Marie Poulin:
So we sort of Mhmm. We ask ourselves, like, how can we make this 10% more fun and take less effort? Like, could we actually be more useful while reducing the workload? There's usually some, like, restructuring that we can do. So I'm always thinking from, like, the structure and the model, how could this actually be easier and more fun for both of us and more useful for the student?
Marie Poulin:
And I think it does take a bit of creative framing, but it's it's usually something.
Brian Casel:
Do you find that, you know, most people come into your ecosystem, like, they come for Notion, but then maybe they're staying for community or they're staying for connection with with
Marie Poulin:
%. We get that all the time. Like, I did not expect what what I signed up for for sure. I think right off the bat, like, one of the projects that we did was a onboarding revamp because we get people coming in hot. They're coming into a it's a year long program, right?
Marie Poulin:
And they're, like, ready to, like, get my system ASAP, and then you're, like, hold the phone. Like, there's a lot of decisions and, routine changes, habit changes. Like, if you don't have your workflows defined, no new tool is gonna do that for you. And so there's this reality check that's very confronting. And so we'd have people join, and then they'd panic and leave.
Marie Poulin:
And we're like, we need to make sure that the the very first touch points of the course are less depressing and less like, you're in for a shit ton of work Mhmm. And more like, hey, we're
Aaron Francis:
here with you Thanks for all your money. Get to work.
Marie Poulin:
It's very, very confronting. And so I was like, how can we make this more approachable, more fun, treat it like a journey? So we actually revamped that content to talk about what does it mean to approach something with a beginner's mind. You're actually learning adaptive skills and technical skills at the same time, which is super challenging. So how can we make sure that those feedback loops and making mistakes is actually part of the process?
Marie Poulin:
Get into an office hours as soon as possible. Like, do not treat this as just like a course you're gonna consume behind the scenes. We know that if people join us in a live call in an office hours, like, they can speed up their their process so much more quickly. And so there's all these things that when you see where people are struggling and even where us as teachers are struggling, we're like, how could we actually bake that into it? Like, how could we name the thing?
Marie Poulin:
Name that that thing that's confronting them and make it part of the course and kind of, like, hey, we're in this together. We know that this is challenging. That's why it's a year long. But you have so much access to us along the way.
Brian Casel:
It's super interesting how it's like Notion is sort of just like the surface level thing that attracts the audience, but but really what you're teaching is like organizational habits or ways to think about this or that or project management or whatever. And and it's like you you know, if your if your course was just like general project management course or organizational course, that wouldn't be as interesting. Right? But it's sort of like Notion is sort of like the thread that brings everyone.
Marie Poulin:
Sell them what they want, give them what they need kind of thing. Yeah.
Justin Jackson:
What about you, Aaron? Do you ever get tired?
Aaron Francis:
Am I ever not tired is a better question. I am only tired. I feel like I feel like the Hulk. Like, that's my secret. I'm always mad.
Brian Casel:
The pro tip is to have a bunch of kids and, you
Aaron Francis:
know Yeah. Have a bunch of kids back to back, multiples if you can. So, yeah, I think back to, like, the burnout grind question. This is something I get criticism for. I have another podcast with Ian, and Ian's always telling me, like, oh, why are you doing that?
Aaron Francis:
Don't do that. Just focus. And I'm like, man, if only Just
Marie Poulin:
focus. Yeah.
Aaron Francis:
And so the thing the thing that Ian has correctly identified but mis mischaracterized as lack of focus is after, like, for example, after Postgres, I couldn't do another course. I couldn't pick up an I couldn't pick up my SQL and be like, hooray. Let's do another 20 videos on the esoteric of databases. Like, I just can't do that. Fortunately, I have a Steve who kind of feels the same way, who's like, hey, we have a lot of opportunities here.
Aaron Francis:
Let's do a database course, then let's do an open source project, then let's do a screencasting course, let's bring in a guest instructor. And so our goal is always we we coin it as, like, having the vectors aligned. So, like, when we're doing a new project, is it totally pointing the opposite direction of the rest of the projects that our company is doing? And if it is, it's like, well, that that one doesn't really make sense. But if it's like, no, this open source stuff can feed into these courses, and this database podcast that I do can feed into those courses, and, like, all of those things are generally pointing the same direction.
Aaron Francis:
And so that helps us that helps us that helps me stay fresh because I haven't, you know, I haven't read database documentation since I finished the Postgres course. It's like, well, that's a relief. It's kinda
Marie Poulin:
like momentum building. Right? You're, like, stacking, like, oh, it injects this little excitement, and it sort of
Justin Jackson:
Yeah.
Marie Poulin:
You need a little bit of that.
Aaron Francis:
It's nice to have, like, a fresh project. I think the the danger is, like, the next thing will save us. But, like, we don't we don't really think that way because the courses have done well. They're doing fine now. Of course, they fall off.
Aaron Francis:
They're doing fine now. But, like, it is more of a, like, stacking the bricks. Let's have a bunch of assets. We don't wanna be, like, we don't wanna just I don't wanna just be the database educator forever. There's an existential threat there because, you know, I think people think they don't need education anymore because AI exists.
Aaron Francis:
And so we're not, like, we're not ignorant to that. And so we're trying to make sure that, like, we have a product offering that is, you know, AI proof. And then one one way that Marie and I are actually different is we focus a lot on launches. Like, Steve and I are very, very good, in my opinion, at making a spectacle. And so we can we can make a launch spectacle pretty well.
Aaron Francis:
Thanks, you know, in no small part to Steve's video capabilities. Like, he can make a killer video, like a hype video, like a trailer. And so we have found those we have found those to be incredibly, incredibly successful on both on Twitter and LinkedIn and Blue Sky. And so, like, when we I did I did a I did a talk at Lyricon EU just last week. When I walked on stage, I simultaneously tweeted a hype video and released a YouTube video.
Aaron Francis:
And so, like, the people live are tweeting like, oh, I'm watching air. And the people on Twitter are like, oh, what is this thing? And the people on YouTube were like, oh, what's going on here? And so, like, that is an orchestrated, let's create a spectacle. And I think I think we're very good at creating spectacles.
Aaron Francis:
I think where we could improve is, like, long term durability. And that's something that we're working on, but we do we do like a launch.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. I I think the the burnout thing is is a big thing, especially when you're on camera. Like, I remember I went through a bout of depression while I was having to release course videos. And I just remember thinking like, dragging myself in front of the camera and being like, I knew that people were used to this sunny version of myself and having to, like, put that on as someone that was not doing good was, like, probably the hardest thing. Yeah.
Justin Jackson:
I think that's, like, the one thing that's difficult in all of this is, like and I'm I'm maybe you haven't felt that, but, like, sometimes it's hard to get in front of the camera, I find, personally.
Marie Poulin:
Yeah. This is why I don't have that many YouTube videos.
Brian Casel:
It's almost
Aaron Francis:
always hard. I mean, I wrote I recently wrote my twenty twenty four year in review, and it was just, like, the worst, hardest year of my life. And and and for many reasons, one of which was 250 database videos. I mean, there were, like, there there were times where I would go home and put the kids to bed and then just sit on the stairs and cry. Like, it's not it's not all, you know, sunshine and rainbows.
Aaron Francis:
It is very difficult. Yeah. But my and I've I've never been shy about saying that, but my external the thing I want to encourage people with is it's hard for me too. So, like, when you feel when you feel like, boy, I would rather lay on the couch for seven hours than record one three minute video. You are not alone.
Aaron Francis:
I have felt that. I have broken down and cried. It is just it's just very difficult. And I don't think that's necessarily video work. I think that's just creative work.
Aaron Francis:
It just requires a lot of the person that is producing it.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. There is something a bit more personal about the video, though, because you're on screen. Like, it's just like, blogging, I could you know, it it takes a lot of energy. But man, like, when you're the person on screen, as much as it's an act, I I still feel like vulnerable. You know?
Justin Jackson:
They're they're seeing me. And it just takes one person going in the comments like, Justin, you seem kinda off or tired or something. It's like, oh, shit. Like, fuck. Mhmm.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. Yeah. I was.
Brian Casel:
And it's like an impostor syndrome, like, multiplier. Right? It's it's like
Marie Poulin:
Oh, yeah.
Brian Casel:
Getting the energy up just to be on camera is, like, hard enough, especially if you're not not feeling great mentally. But Mhmm. Then then it's like, you you're supposed to be the expert. You're supposed to be the the person with all the experience who's who's sharing here, and and it's just sort of a multiplier,
Aaron Francis:
you know. I will say, and this is something Marie mentioned in passing earlier, there is a different form. I think YouTube is is is very amenable to this form where something like a mastering Postgres course is not. And that thing is, and Marie mentioned this earlier, she would share what she was doing. And I think that lowers, like, that lowers the bar so much because I feel like a lot of people think if I'm going to put anything out there, blog posts, package, video, whatever, I have to be the expert.
Aaron Francis:
And if I'm not, I'm going to pretend I'm the expert because I think that is what is required. And that just creates all this cognitive dissonance, and it creates all of this pressure. Whereas if you go out there and you say, like, this is what I'm doing, no one can argue with that. No one can say, you're not doing that. Then so you can turn around and say like, this works for me.
Aaron Francis:
Here it is. And people can't say this is not the way you're supposed to do it because you're not saying that is the way you're supposed to do it.
Brian Casel:
I'm I'm really glad you said that, Aaron. This is something that I've been sort of battling and and trying to work through, especially this year, especially on YouTube. Because a lot of my my videos lately are actually showing code and and building software and and that's something that I've been really, really hesitant to do in my I've been doing podcasting and video stuff for over ten, fifteen years at this point, but almost never sharing my code style and how I actually put things together behind the scenes because I'm constantly thinking about that imposter syndrome, especially for software developers. And I know that there are many that are so much more experienced in different areas. You know?
Brian Casel:
But, yeah, like trying to battle through where it's like, I'm gonna show my unique style. Like, I just I just did a video on I think it's called multiline c Tailwind CSS. And I organized my Tailwind CSS in a really unique and kinda strange way where I put utility classes on different lines to organize, like, the small, medium, large screen size and everything. And that's actually doing pretty well on on YouTube, and I'm getting a lot of positive comments about it. But that's something that I've been wanting to share for many years, but, like, don't wanna share because it's so different from how most people do it.
Marie Poulin:
Mhmm.
Justin Jackson:
You know? Yeah.
Brian Casel:
But it's it's the kind of thing that, like, it just really works for me, and it's actually worth sharing, you know. So it it it's like one of those these lessons that I just keep constantly have to read
Aaron Francis:
and best types of content.
Marie Poulin:
Like Yeah.
Aaron Francis:
Totally. Really works for me. I love it, and it's a little bit weird. Just lean into that as much as you can. Yeah.
Aaron Francis:
Lean in.
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. I think one of the things that helped me get out of depression was I started doing these live streams called dumb programmer questions or something. And it was just so nice to be able to. And I always knew more than I let on, but it was so nice to kind of just play somebody that didn't know anything and livestream it. And it was so vulnerable, and people were so helpful that it was it was just this really healthy experience of because you kind of let there's two versions of myself probably.
Justin Jackson:
There's the one where I'm like, I know what I'm talking about. And then there's the other one that's like, yeah, but I don't know what I'm talking about. You know? And that sometimes the even it's like the difference between holding your breath and letting it out. And it was so nice to just let it out.
Justin Jackson:
And
Brian Casel:
And there's something really valuable content wise, like what Marie was saying earlier about like watching someone else learn live or watching someone else run into a a snag or a bug and fix it live or figure it out live. Like, that just just the process of figuring it out live is valuable to the viewer. You know?
Justin Jackson:
How much do you guys all like attention? Oh,
Aaron Francis:
what are we supposed to say? Not very much? Is that is that is that the correct answer?
Justin Jackson:
Aaron and I like attention, and and Brian and Marie are not as predisposed to it. So that's why I'm curious. But, yeah, how much how would you answer that question?
Aaron Francis:
Marie, you go first. All attention's on you.
Marie Poulin:
Yeah. Not comfortable with attention. When I was first doing this, the Notion Mastery course, it was Joel Hooks that was like, you gotta start a YouTube channel now. Like, this is a lightning in a bottle moment. You gotta start a YouTube channel.
Marie Poulin:
And I was like, oh, YouTube? Are you kidding me?
Aaron Francis:
Joel Joel is so good for that.
Marie Poulin:
He knew exactly. Like, of course, it makes sense if you're doing software demo. Like, you need a video format. Of course, it makes sense. So I was really resistant to the idea at first, but I committed to doing video every week for twelve weeks.
Marie Poulin:
And I, like, the views were so fast and the the list growth was like it grew my list like 10,000 people in a couple of weeks. And I was like, okay, I get it. Like, YouTube is is the way. But it took a long time to even know, like, my voice was very quiet and soft. Like, I was very scared.
Marie Poulin:
Like, when I got asked to speak at MicroConf, I was, like, shitting my pants. So I was, like, sleepless nights for months, like not a natural place. But it's been a thing I've worked on over the last ten years consistently to just get comfortable sharing your ideas, sharing what works for you. So it's it's been a journey and I can do it now, but it's still a lot of lift to like, okay. Gotta prep myself to do this YouTube.
Marie Poulin:
But, like, it takes a lot out of me. It's not a natural process.
Justin Jackson:
Is is the most of the friction before you get into it? Like like, do you like it when a video gets a bunch of views and comments? Like, do you like that attention? Or how does it feel for you?
Marie Poulin:
I love feeling like it's had impact. Like, oh, man. Yes. Someone's like, thank you. That's exactly what I needed.
Marie Poulin:
I'm like, yes. But it's not like
Brian Casel:
I don't know how you guys think about this. I I completely resonate with that. Like, in in the real world, in real life, I'm the quietest person in the room. And and also, like, speaking on stage at conferences is something I'm terrible at. I like, seeing people live is I have a real problem with it.
Brian Casel:
But being on a podcast with thousands of listeners or being on even, like, a live webinar or something, like, with thousands
Marie Poulin:
of people. Eyeballs. Right? It's fine. Yeah.
Marie Poulin:
You
Justin Jackson:
know? You
Brian Casel:
know, I I don't know if you think about this, especially like, I have a hard time when people I know, even my family and, like, friends who are not in our industry, when they, like, find my YouTube videos or even, like, see my my tweets and stuff or or find my podcast. Like, I don't want them to to tune into that stuff.
Marie Poulin:
Like Look away. Don't look
Brian Casel:
at me. Like, look at the photos of my kids and and the vacation stuff, but, like, this is for our people. And, like, I I wish there was a total separation. I don't know if you guys think the same way.
Marie Poulin:
We have a severance chip for that
Justin Jackson:
if you think
Marie Poulin:
Exactly. Yeah. How
Justin Jackson:
have you dealt with attention, Aaron? Like, I because I like it, but there are times where it can become you know, there's even I have my limits. So how do you what how do you deal with attention in general, do you think?
Aaron Francis:
I I don't mind the attention at all. I think there's a difference between, like like, when we get together with friends, I don't feel like I need to be the center of attention or be, like, the funny guy. I'm very confident in in being quiet or being, you know, the funny guy if the situation calls for it. But when I get on stage, I feel so comfortable. I feel like this is Can you give me some of that?
Marie Poulin:
Can I
Aaron Francis:
just take
Marie Poulin:
a little little Awesome?
Aaron Francis:
I love it. So, like, being an emcee at a conference and, like, having to just think on your toes, love it. Going to a Wow. Wedding reception and giving a toast, you know, without really expecting you were gonna give a toast, love it. I think it's great.
Aaron Francis:
Wow.
Marie Poulin:
Standing up in front
Aaron Francis:
of a bunch of people and, like, trying to corral the masses, love it. Think it's so fun. So Yeah. Those things, like, I super duper love. But in terms of wanting to be the center of attention, I don't actually like that too much.
Aaron Francis:
I am, in fact, an introvert and would so much rather be alone. Like, I would just rather be alone by myself all the time. But when, you know, when duty calls, I'm like, hell yeah. Let's get on a stage, man. This sounds great.
Brian Casel:
You know, Justin, to your question about, like, how do we feel with the results or or the or the numbers or what we see after publishing something, I think it's like, yeah. I get kind of excited when something I post gets a lot of views or likes or retweets or whatever. Like, I think that's good, but it's not so much about the attention. It's about something I created resonated with
Marie Poulin:
Mhmm.
Brian Casel:
Some other people. Whether whether that's a piece of software, whether it's an idea that I shared in a tweet, or a song I wrote or or something that, like, I created. Like, I was excited about it because I created it. So somebody else feels the same. Like, that's interesting to me.
Brian Casel:
The the audience numbers don't really matter. But from a marketing standpoint, it's it's nice if if it can be distributed, you know, somehow to the to the right people. You know?
Justin Jackson:
I think another thing that, you know, people that are thinking about doing content that keeps them from doing content is they're worried about the negative attention. Has there been experiences with negative attention that that you've had?
Marie Poulin:
I mean, definitely when I started my my YouTube channel, and, like, I don't know if guys experienced this, but, like, you'd often get comments about your appearance as a as a woman on YouTube and that sort of thing. Like, I couldn't take this video seriously because her hair is ratty and, like, just, like, rude, just, like, stupid comments. And it it took a lot to you kinda have to have a bit of a thick skin, I think, when you're when you're on a platform like YouTube. And I do think that sort of thing keeps people from putting themselves out there. But it's, like, in any business that relies on scale, like, you are going to get feedback and you're gonna get people that there is no resonance there.
Marie Poulin:
There's the opposite of resonance, but that's important too. Like, you do need to kind of repel the people that are not your people. Mhmm. So, like, to some extent, it's you need a bit of practice, and you need to kind of acknowledge that you're you almost have to ignore the highs and the lows. You have to kind of, like, shave off the edges and be like, you're gonna get the extreme super fans, and you're gonna get the people that are just not into you.
Marie Poulin:
And, like, you kind of have to not let either one impact you too much, so it starts to wash away into a general vibe.
Justin Jackson:
I think that's the hardest part. If you're putting out content with any point of view, there are gonna people that don't like you.
Marie Poulin:
Yes. You have to get comfortable not being liked. Yeah.
Justin Jackson:
And I find that difficult. I really wanna be liked. And so when there's that feeling of, like, these people don't like you. And then also people that are public personalities, there tends to be a lot of meta conversations about you, where people are talking about you in a kind of a third person kind of way. Like
Marie Poulin:
That's when you know you've made it. I know. Yeah.
Brian Casel:
Yeah. Actually, Justin, I wanted to ask you about the the same question. Like, how do you think about the things that you put out there? From from what I can tell that, you know, the the content when it's sort of like either on your personal newsletter or YouTube or something like that, it seems to me, correct me if I'm wrong, it's like you're going for like conversation starters. Right?
Brian Casel:
Like you put one out the other day about like AI and software and and like, let's start a debate almost or let's have a let's let's fire up this conversation. Is is that how you think about it?
Justin Jackson:
It's almost all driven by curiosity, which is which is hard because sometimes people think like I'm, like, creating stuff to get views or whatever. And I'm like, dude, like, my stuff is almost anti popular a lot of times. Like people a lot of people are just not curious about the same things. And some of it's upsetting. Like, I had that realization the other day.
Justin Jackson:
I was I don't know if you guys remember. Was talking about that fluid versus crystallized intelligence stuff, like getting old in forties. Mhmm. And I was with my sister and my brother and their partners, and we were talking about it. And I I think I have a thing with myself.
Justin Jackson:
Maybe it's I don't know what it is. But, like, it really upsets people to talk about some of that stuff. And I do not have that that barometer. Like, for me, I'm just like, this is so interesting. Like
Marie Poulin:
Why wouldn't we talk about it?
Justin Jackson:
Like, why wouldn't we talk about it? It Why don't we
Brian Casel:
talk about how old we are?
Marie Poulin:
I couldn't
Justin Jackson:
Nobody wants to talk about that weird. Like, it was surprising to me to be in the midst of people and see them like, oh, wow. Actually, this topic really makes people upset. And then it made me second guess maybe sometimes the way I put stuff out there. So a lot of it for me now is curiosity driven.
Justin Jackson:
That was like once Transistor was making money, and I could write my newsletter and make videos not because to make money, I found that very just a relief. Like, was so nice to just be able to write more. I almost wanna do more of it. Like, people still want mostly business content for me, but I wanna talk about more stuff, you know, that people well, like, well, politics. People don't wanna hear me talk about that.
Justin Jackson:
Parenting.
Brian Casel:
I mean, Justin, like like some, you know, like, meta for this podcast. But, like, we we definitely gotta do some episodes, like, not about business. Just talking about what we're into away from the screens. You know?
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. I think so. I think so too. I I but there's limits even to that. You know?
Justin Jackson:
Yeah. But it's nice in a way that I don't I don't really think about it too much. I'd like my email newsletter list to be bigger, but it's just so so all over the place that it I I know why it's not growing. So
Brian Casel:
I think for both of you, Aaron, and and especially Marie, like, I'm I'm always jealous of of folks like you who have these audiences who've been so focused in one topic area for so many years. I I I mean, I'd imagine that, like, most of the people on the list for Notion Mastery obviously came in around Notion and something related to that. Like, I think about my email list. It's gone through so many iterations over the years. I've had to, like, completely nuke my my list, like, multiple times because it's, a totally different audience or people have dropped off and lost interest, you know.
Marie Poulin:
I've had to do that too. Right? Because, like, Notion Mastery was built on my personal email list, but now we have a separate Notion Mastery list. Before that, it was digital strategy school. Before that, it was web design.
Marie Poulin:
It's like, I've also gone through several iterations too, and I've always struggled with that. Like, oh, if I start talking about too much Notion now and these people followed me during this other era. So that's definitely been something I've struggled with over the years is like, they following what I'm up to? And if I start talking about permaculture, like, is that way off into left field? So I definitely struggle with that too.
Brian Casel:
I mean, like, eight, ten years ago, like, I was known as, like, the productized services guy. Like, all my content, I had a course on it, and, like, people were coming in for that. And, like, web designers and copywriters turned productized services. And, like, now in the past five, six years, like, really, I'm just mostly talking about software and UI, UX design and stuff like that and bootstrapping. And, like, a lot of my audience is like, well, that that's not interesting to me.
Aaron Francis:
So Which is great because you don't wanna get captured. Right? You don't wanna get captured by your own audience and then do something that you don't wanna do because you have a big mailing list. So You feel like you're supposed to. Yeah.
Aaron Francis:
For me, I just kinda YOLO everything. It's like, I wanna do this, so I'm gonna do it. And if the audience wants to follow along, that's great. If they wanna unsubscribe, that's great. Don't really care because I have to do this for the next however many years, and I have to want to do this.
Aaron Francis:
And so you may have followed me for database stuff, but you know what? We're gonna do screencasting next, and then we'll come back to databases. So
Marie Poulin:
I love that.
Aaron Francis:
Sorry. Like but this is this is my You know? Yeah.
Justin Jackson:
I think that's the one thing that's because we we should wind down here. But I think that's the one thing that's really come out of this conversation is that idea, Aaron, of the small view is like, yeah, you got to be known as the database guy. But the bigger view is, well, I've got to do this for a long time. And there's there's a danger of, like, finishing that Postgres course and then jumping right into another database course for yourself. And I think the advice that's kind of out there is like, no, you want to be known as the database guy.
Justin Jackson:
Like, when I think about database education, I want to think Aaron Francis. And I think the danger in that is that, yeah, this is I gotta sustain this for a long period of time. Mhmm.
Brian Casel:
I I just like how Tryhard Studios, the brand yeah, of course, people know you, Aaron, but it's still, like, generic enough that this is a company that just creates awesome learning resources across a variety of, like, technical developer topics.
Justin Jackson:
Mhmm.
Brian Casel:
And it it I feel like you can definitely keep expanding the circles and and the areas that you get into.
Aaron Francis:
That's why we went with the the studio's suffix because our goal is to, like, have a collection of both courses and hopefully, this year, products as well. And so it's not like we don't want to just be pigeonholed. We want to, like, continue to explore, find new things, and exploit. So, like, we're always out there looking around for new stuff, you know, exploring. And if we find a good one, we'll mine that vein, and we'll see what's there.
Aaron Francis:
But the fact that, like, you know, the even some friends of ours have had the same business for a super long time, and you can just tell sometimes because they say it out loud, I don't wanna do this anymore. Like, all the Tuple founders that we really like are like, you know what? I don't wanna do this anymore. And you know what? I can't blame them.
Aaron Francis:
I feel the same way. Like, finish a course and I'm like, I don't wanna do this anymore. The good news for me is we can do anything else we wanna do. It's not like I have to, you know, walk away from Tuple. I can just like, hey, that was a product.
Aaron Francis:
Let's do this product, and then we'll come back to that product. And so having that variety is very helpful for me to continue doing this for hopefully a long time.
Brian Casel:
I've always loved that model of like a sort of like a portfolio model for a company. You know?
Justin Jackson:
Alright. You two. This was awesome. We got we wanna have the people back that have been on the panel. So because this this feels very much like we're at a conference, and we're now entering, you know, hour two of hanging out at the bar.
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