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Colleen and Michele discuss Colleen's marketing to-do list, and all things conference workshops.
Show Notes
This episode of Software Social is brought to you by Bento. Bento is an email marketing and automation company for more technical-minded marketers. If you're using drip MailChimp or Active Campaign, but wish it was a bit more developer-friendly, Bento's the email product for you. With libraries for Ruby, Laravel, Node, and JavaScript, Bento can help you create your dream customer journey.
Plus, you get access to an amazing community on Discord where you'll get direct access to Jesse and his team. You might say it's friendly developer-friendly email marketing, and Jesse's happy to help anyone tighten up their marketing in a free session. Just go to bentonow.com, hit book a demo, and mention Software Social.
Plus, you get access to an amazing community on Discord where you'll get direct access to Jesse and his team. You might say it's friendly developer-friendly email marketing, and Jesse's happy to help anyone tighten up their marketing in a free session. Just go to bentonow.com, hit book a demo, and mention Software Social.
Creators & Guests
What is Software Social?
Two indie SaaS founders—one just getting off the ground, and one with an established profitable business—invite you to join their weekly chats.
Michele: Hey, welcome
back to Software Social.
A couple months ago, I did two interviews
with Jesse Hanley, founder of Bento.
You probably remember his incredible story
of going from bodybuilder to SaaS founder,
and the heartbreak that he and his wife
experienced last year with their daughter,
Leah, but we didn't talk too much about
what his company, so let's fix that.
Bento is an email marketing
and automation company for more
technical- minded marketers.
If you're using drip MailChimp or
Active Campaign, but wish it was a
bit more developer friendly, Bento's
the email product for you with
libraries for Ruby, Larval, Node,
and JavaScript, Bento can help you
create your dream customer journey.
Plus you get access to an amazing
community on Discord where you'll get
direct access to Jesse and his team.
You might say it's friendly developer-
friendly email marketing, and Jessie's
happy to help anyone tighten up
their marketing in a free session.
Just go to bento now.com, and hit book
a demo and mention Software Social.
Hey Colleen.
Colleen: Hey Michelle.
Michele: We just got back from
and amazing week in beautiful San
Diego, California visiting you.
Colleen: Yep.
Michele: So much to like talk about
after that, I feel like we have so
much like, we have so much wind in our
sails after that, um, have some kind
of big things happening for both of us.
That, to a certain extent, we
kind of like haven't done before
or like really need to focus on.
I'm kinda excited to
talk about that a lot.
Colleen: Yeah.
me too.
It was so amazing to have you
here and see you in person.
And there's just something
you can not replicate about
seeing your friends in person.
Michele: Yeah.
Oh yeah, absolutely.
Um, okay, so the first one,
and so we've been talking about
how you have now four months,
Colleen: oh, wait, what did I lose,
wait.
Michele: April now, so far, you know,
till till August right to get Hammer
stone, which is actually called Refine,
or is it, is it Refine or Refine?
Colleen: I mean, I, I say.
Michele: Refine.
Okay.
Colleen: Cause you're refining.
Michele: Monies, you don't
have to go back to consulting.
Um, and so that's four months from now.
And so we were walking in beautiful San
Diego, and you mentioned how there is
a Refine plugin thing for Laravel Nova,
so like we could use it, which like Nova
is like the admin basically for Laravel.
And I like didn't even know about it.
And honestly, I'm kind of mad like that.
Like, I, you had this thing, I
didn't even know about it and I
like could have bought it from you.
And I'm like, dude, tell people about
Colleen: Yeah.
Um, it did not even occur to me that
we should be telling people about
it, which sounds so ridiculous,
now that I say the words out loud.
Michele: If you want to sell stuff,
you have to tell people about it.
Colleen: Oh my goodness.
It's so bad.
Yeah.
I think because some of our front end,
some of our, like other products, like our
Laravel of EHL product, not in Nova, we're
still working on the front end and our
Rails product is not ready to ship yet.
That, I almost forgot that in all of
these products we have, we have one
that is actually done and that we
can actually sell to you right now.
Michele: And I already bought it.
Colleen: And you already bought it.
That is in fact amazing.
Michele: We haven't
actually installed it yet.
I think we're still
kind of catching up from
Colleen: Right.
Michele: Being away for a week, but
I'm super excited to give it a try.
I think we even talked about
maybe doing like a video, um,
like hybrid episode where like you
and Erin, walk me through it, I
guess maybe like, I think we have
it on our like, test environment.
So like we could do something like that.
Colleen: Yes,
Michele: would be really fun.
Colleen: I think that'd be fun.
And it'd be great for us.
We can maybe use that
as marketing material.
Michele: Yeah.
Colleen: I think that'd be awesome.
I'd love to onboard you guys.
Yay.
Michele: But also when we were
talking about as like, you know,
you've been saying, okay, well,
we've got, you know, the Laravel side
and then we've got this rail side.
And like, you guys are like building
like all of the features, but I'm
like, you could just sell this as
a thing for Laravel Nova to start.
You don't have to start with like, It
has to be usable by the entire world.
It could just for the foreseeable
future, be something that is just a,
you know, an add on feature to Nova
and like there's certainly enough
people in the Laravel world and enough
people running sites with Nova like
Colleen: Yeah.
Michele: that, that could
be a good little business.
If not just something
like to get you going.
Colleen: Yeah.
I mean, I can't believe it didn't
occur to me until you said something.
Absolutely.
We should be talking about and
selling the Nova integration.
And I think what had happened with
the Nova integration, um, Aaron
could speak to this more, but I think
it was like, he just made it real
quick because someone wanted it.
Cause it's just the front end
that we had to get, get working.
We already had all the backend stuff,
so yeah, we haven't pushed that at all.
We're not talking about that enough.
We're not on our site.
There's nothing like specific about that.
We still have on our, our main
site is still like sign up to
hear about when Refine launches.
So I feel like that's a
super high priority is still
that people know about that.
And to start selling Nova.
Michele: Yeah.
Yeah.
Colleen: Yeah.
Do that.
Right.
Michele: do that
Colleen: I do that now.
Michele: Okay.
Um,
Colleen: Oh,
Michele: I feel like that's
some movie reference and I
don't even know what it is.
It's probably some movie like 20 years
ago starting Will Ferrell or whatever.
Okay.
So yes, do that now.
Um, sell it to people, tell them about it.
Colleen: Yeah, we should be doing that.
Like, this is just so obvious.
I
Michele: like this, like this cannot be
like, you know, a sort of stereotypical,
like developer thinks about marketing
conversation, that's like, yes, we
should mark it that, and then there's
like, crickets, like,
you gotta like, do it.
Colleen: Let's talk
about, oh no, I'm ready.
I'm all in Michelle.
I am like, ready.
Aaron uses this term
all the time, eat glass.
I'm ready to eat the glass.
It means, it means just
grind out the hard stuff.
Like just do it.
Michele: I have never heard
Colleen: He
Michele: this.
Some like Austin specific slang.
Colleen: I don't know,
maybe it's a Texas thing.
Um, uh,
Michele: Okay.
That sounds pretty
unpleasant, unpleasant, like
Colleen: but the point is,
instead of talking about
doing things, you need to just
Michele: Pedal to the metal, right?
Colleen: So my take on this, the first
thing to do would be either, would to
be, to make a Nova specific landing page.
I don't know if we have one because
with three of us working on this, like
there's a lot of, I don't have a lot
of visibility and this is my own fault.
And I'm literally going
to fix this tomorrow.
I don't actually know all of the
moving pieces, cause we have so
many moving pieces in this business,
like, cause we have contractors
and then we have three front ends.
And then I have my client, which
is technically a Hammer stone
client, not a Colleen client.
And so tomorrow I'm like, I
am going to get organized and
that's where I'm gonna start.
And, um, yeah, figure out,
like, make an actionable plan.
Stuff we can actually do not just
talk about to let people know
about Nova and start selling it.
Michele: Do you guys have like a
shared Trello or git like canvan,
like some sort of centralized system
for seeing what all the tasks are
and what everybody else is working.
Colleen: Yeah, that's what we need.
We have a Trello board, but we
don't it's it's not really being
used in an effective manner.
So, um, that is literally tomorrow.
I'm going to take a couple hours
because I'm doing a long day.
So I've tried, I'm trying to do like
one long day a week, which really helps
give me more time for side projects.
Not that this is a side project, but
I'm going to take that time and spend a
couple hours and really get us organized.
That is my plan.
And we have a Trello board.
You know, I might spin up Notion, I
don't want to overly complicate it, but
we have a lot of moving pieces and I
need to make sure everyone knows what's
going on with all of those moving pieces.
Michele: So it's actually
something we're dealing with too.
Yeah, it's like just
what are all the pieces.
What are the priorities?
You know, what is the visibility
and, you know, at various points, I
think we've, we've had Trello boards.
I think at one point we had a
private Trello, and then a public
Trello that didn't last very long.
Um, but we've also used Base Camp.
We've used Notion.
And I think where we actually settled
on a couple of weeks ago, but have not
acted only acted on a little bit, but not
fully is using the git hub projects, beta,
because we tend to just kind of throw
everything product related, into git hub
issues and they made it so that you can
have one project across all organizations.
I don't know if it was always like that.
And I didn't know that or
like, it's a new thing.
Well, it says projects beta.
So like, it used to be like, they'd like
git hub, git hub, uh, Kan Ban boards.
Right.
Um, and what we like about that
is like, it's just directly
integrated with all of the issues.
Um, but yeah, this is not a
problem that like goes away.
Um, But it is worth spending
the time of like, okay, what
are we actually working on?
Or the things we're working
on the most important things.
And especially where, I mean, like
we have this coordination problem,
and we literally work not five feet
from each other and live in the same
house and like, most days, you know,
we're the only other adult, like, you
know, the other one sees very often.
So, we still have this coordination
problem, and you guys are,
you know, halfway across the
country from one another.
So it seems like an important thing to
like, kind of get sorted out, but also
not, you don't want to spend too much
time fussing over this because it's going
to evolve as you and the company do.
So like, you still want
to be flexible with it.
Like, You know, don't go off and buy a
license for some super enterprise, easy,
um, project management software right now.
Right.
But yeah, you at least need to spend
time, keeping things organized,
whether you're early days or
whatever days we are at this point.
Colleen: Yeah, I totally agree.
I think that, I agree.
We don't want to, I don't want to
sink a lot of time into it, but it's
important to have visibility to all
of the projects we have going on.
So we know what the highest
leverage activities are.
Michele: Yeah.
Yeah, for sure.
Okay.
So you're going to make
a Nova landing page.
What else are you gonna do?
Colleen: Um, Well, okay.
First of all, I'm going
to get us organized.
Then goal two is Nova landing.
And
Michele: on the landing page.
Colleen: I don't know, go buy this.
It's awesome.
Michele: Is it like, are we doing.
Colleen: I haven't
Michele: Is there going to be
like a sample of it somehow?
Like, Is there going to be a
video of you walking through it?
Is there going to be like a GIF
of somebody clicking through it?
Colleen: I Like, gifts.
I
Michele: is there going to be like
code samples of some or something?
Like, is there like,
Colleen: I don't
Michele: like what have you learned
from simple file upload that
people like on a landing page that
makes them want to buy something?
Colleen: Ooh.
that's such a good question.
Um, my experience has been,
people like videos, people
like gifs, they like visuals.
They like code samples.
They like, I mean, we're selling to
developers, so we're going to want
a developer focused landing page.
So our focus here is on results
and developer happiness.
So testimonials from people who
have purchased it, there are two
people, now, if we include you, who
haven't, who have purchased the Nova.
So the way I envisioned this is maybe a
gif, maybe a video showing you what it
does, a code sample of how to integrate
it, testimonials from people who have used
it and then schedule a call or buy now
Michele: Yeah, why do they,
why do they need a phone call?
Do you need a phone?
Colleen: Do I, I don't, well, I think.
I don't know if they don't need a phone
call, maybe the option to schedule a call.
Michele: Well, I feel like when I see
schedule a call on a landing page, I'm
like, oh, this is some enterprise thing.
Colleen: You're right.
Okay.
So just buy now.
Michele: Yeah.
I mean, or it could be, you
know, like email us or whatever,
if you have questions, but
Colleen: Right?
I mean, our license is a thousand dollars,
so I don't think people are just going to
cough up a thousand dollars without one.
The reason I was thinking schedule a
Michele: Well, they, they do
for do Geocodio all the time.
They go cough of a lot more than
that without ever talking to
Colleen: Without talking to you.
Okay.
So go ahead and buy it.
and
then
Michele: SaaS for the win.
Colleen: for the win.
So yeah, I think that landing
page schedule, no, we're
not with no call to action.
Buy it
Michele: Yes, so, okay.
So this video and like, I feel like you've
had success with videos in the past.
Like I remember you saying
that, like, there's some videos
that you had on YouTube of like
talks and stuff you've done.
I thought, I don't know if that was
like, learned to code stuff or whatnot,
but I got the sense that you have some
amount of following on YouTube or at
least that people like watching you talk
about code things on YouTube is that
Colleen: Yeah, I think that's accurate.
Michele: Let's use that.
Colleen: Okay.
So I, I mean, it's interesting because
different people like different
things, you are always very adamant
about how you don't like videos.
You want texts.
I know.
And it's because I understand
it's because you can read faster
than you can watch a video.
So I think
Michele: but like, I'm not
necessarily your customer here.
Well, I
Colleen: well, you kind of are.
You're literally our
Michele: But yeah, no, but like
don't, you know, I'm, I think I'm
in the minority of like, not liking.
Colleen: Well, I think you do both.
So I think, I think there's a video.
What I like what my thought is,
you have a link to the docs.
You have a short snippet of
how you integrate it quickly.
You have maybe a short video or a
GIF, and then you have the option
for them to watch a full, like,
longer how to install it video.
Okay.
Michele: Yeah, I think, yeah, the
short video is like, here's all
the awesome stuff that this can do.
Don't you wish you could do it.
It's so easy.
You just have to drop in those
code and then you're good.
Colleen: Right.
Michele: And then there's the
longer video if they need it.
Colleen: Yeah.
Um, yeah.
Okay.
Absolutely.
That sounds great.
That's a lot of work, but I got it.
I got it.
Michele: So the other thing we talked
about that both of us are going to be
doing, you are going to be leading a
workshop related to Refine and Sequel.
And what is it?
Active record.
Colleen: Active record and ARL.
Oh, you listen to me when I
Michele: I did listen,
um, at Ruby conf, which
is S sorry,
why is it not gonna, it's not called Ruby
Colleen: Ruby conf is in the fall
rails conference in the spring.
Michele: Oh, there are two.
Okay.
I didn't just like, make that.
Okay.
Okay.
All right.
Okay.
Okay.
Sorry, not my world.
When is rails?
Colleen: Oh, M G May 15th,
I think May 16th really
Michele: Okay.
So then the other thing going on is I
am also leading the first all day deploy
empathy masterclass workshop, um, at
the go-to conference, which is a B2B
enterprise uh, SaaS conference, uh, Orca
software in general, um, in Aarhus Denmark
in June, and doing a couple of other talks
and another workshop in the Fall too.
But anyway, so I have never led
a longer workshop, I've only
done one to two hour workshops.
So both of us need to figure
out how to lead a great workshop
in the next few months as well.
Um, how long has your work.
Colleen: hours.
Michele: Okay, so that's yeah,
this is not, this is more than
like a meetup talk, right?
Or like meet up kind of workshop
where it's like half an hour
or 30 minutes or 60 minutes.
Um, We kind of led our first introduction
to workshops while I was in California.
Led a tie dying workshop with six children
under the age 10 and under, which was an
experience, um, and mostly successful.
Colleen: mostly successful.
Michele: Um, But I feel like both of
us are kind of feeling like we need to
double down on putting together a great
workshop and making that a good experience
for us and for the participants.
Um, so I bought a couple of books
about workshops, which is whenever
I don't know how to do something.
I, as we sit, as we discussed, I
do not watch videos, I read books.
Um, so I have those two books
sitting on my desk here.
So it's kind of like my homework
assignment, once I get over my
jet lag and everything to start
reading those and share that with
you on what makes a workshop great.
And what makes them terrible and
like how we should think about that.
And I'm also doing a bunch of talks
too, like shorter talks over the
next couple of months, leading up to
that two or three of which are mini
versions of what this workshop will be.
So we've kind of also got that.
I feel like we've got these
like big things coming up in
the next couple of months.
Colleen: Yeah.
I'm, I'm sweat in the workshop.
And the reason I'm sweating the workshop
is because I promised, in my pitch
that the audience would leave with
a query builder that actually works.
So I like to do this when I give
talks, like I over, like I get really
ambitious and then it forces me
to hustle to fill in the details.
And so this requires, I mean, this
is, there's a fair amount of technical
work required on my side to get our
open source front end component working
with basically that the plan for me is
we have a front I'm sorry, front end,
open source component that we haven't
hooked up to the rails back end yet,
so this requires me to hook this up
to a skeleton of the rails backend.
Select a portion of our query
builder that we can build into ours.
So technically from a technical
perspective, like there's just a crap
ton of work I have to do on top of the
desire you just stated, which is make
sure no one is bored and falls asleep.
Um, Software workshops can be really dry.
And so how do you, oh, so, so I'm
kind of sweating it because it's
two months and it's a lot of work.
So that just is.
Michele: Yeah.
So is this work that you
have to do for the workshop?
Like, stuff you can repurpose
elsewhere or like that feeds into
the broader product, or is that work
that only goes into this workshop?
Colleen: So I have a couple of
thoughts on this and I own the content.
So I could put this together and use this.
I mean, I could use it as a free
course Hammerstones or stones site
that's lead gen for the product.
Like it's like, oh, you can build
one 16th of this, one 32nd of this,
a tiny portion of this in two hours.
And I'm going to show you how to do it.
You can spend, you know, a month, two
months, five months, six months building
out the rest and hope you get it right.
Or you can just buy our
product, but I could do it.
I mean, I can package this workshop.
So typically workshops aren't recorded.
Aaron and I are talking about,
paying hammer stone paying to
have this re workshop recorded.
So we, that can then repurpose
that content, like I said, as lead
gen or as a free course about how
query builders work or something.
Yes.
But the whole purpose is to be able to
repurpose this content, whether we start
giving it at other places or whether
we just, I mean, obviously we'll just
put it on our website in some way.
Michele: Yeah.
I almost wonder whether it might be
better to not record this specific
instance since an in-person workshop,
people might like raise their hand and
ask questions and like, like it could,
like, I think it applies it's less,
repurposable the, the exact workshop
itself then like a talk is right.
Cause there's no real interactive
element of a talk, but once you have the
content, then you can use that wherever.
Right.
So like, you know, the, the mini
workshops I'm giving in the next
couple of weeks, like I'm doing
the practice interview workshop,
I think in three different places.
This is a workshop I've given
several times before, and I
feel like the content is down.
I know how to run the activity.
I have a really good
sense for how that runs.
And so now I can just give
that over and over again.
And so I think once you have the content
together and then you kind of learn how,
like what snags people might have to in
person, then you could just record that
as a, a version that is intended for
YouTube or intended for the landing page.
It just might be a little bit cleaner
and then you'll have more control
over how the content appears as well.
Right?
Because like, what if there's like a
technical issue or what if like the camera
doesn't pan to like the right place?
And like, you're doing a code
example, but it's on your face.
And like, you don't have
any control over that.
But I think if you can structure
the workshop in a way that
makes it repurposable, then,
then that's really valuable.
So that it's not just all this effort
going into this one specific work.
Colleen: Well, and I was talking to my
friend who gives workshops at rails conf
and he said he got like 20 to 30 people.
So it's got for the amount of
work that's going to go into it
on my side, I've got to make that
content repurposable like absolute.
Michele: Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely.
So then there's like the content
side of it, and then there's the,
I'm thinking a lot about, is like
the UX of attending a workshop.
Especially for me, like the, the one I'm
doing an all hosts is from nine to four.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, and I was reading something earlier
today saying that like, you know,
even like a 60 minute talk, you should
imagine that it's in four 15 minute
episodes, because otherwise you're
going to lose people's attention span.
And so like basically plan to have some
sort of shift or break or, uh, whatever
that is like every 15 minutes or so.
So like, I feel like I'm going to
have to really like, make a script
for this, or like, like an agenda.
But that reminded me today that I really
need to read those books and figure out,
how do you structure this, but bearing
in mind that you have all of this work
to do, to like create your content.
I at least already have all of my content.
It's just kind of a
matter of repackaging it.
Um, I will take on the heavy lifting of
reading all the books about the UX of a
workshop and just share that with you.
Colleen: Yay.
Thank
Michele: So then you can,
uh, yeah, you can do that.
I almost wish I could like demo
the workshop, like the whole thing,
but that, that seems like difficult,
it's not like practicing, uh, you
know, half hour or 45 minute talk.
I can't, you know, go talk
Colleen: Yeah, for eight hours.
Michele: eight hours.
Colleen: Matias, I need
eight hours of your time.
We're going to sit down and I'm going
to give you this whole workshop.
Michele: Lunch will be included.
Uh, actually I have to figure that out.
I guess I'm not responsible for like
the sandwiches and whatever, but I
like, is there a lunch break in there?
I need to, um, it's
just all these details.
Colleen: Yeah, that's a whole,
I mean, a whole day is intense.
Michele: Yeah, yeah, I am.
I'm pretty excited actually.
So I have like kind of an
intensive week too, because I'm
going to be that conference,
which is in, the middle of June.
I think it's like June
13th or 14th or something.
And so then I'll drive there and then
I'm going to drive down to Hamburg,
Germany after that and give a talk
at Mind the Product Hamburg, which
I'm super excited for, I don't know
if I've ever ranted to you about
the hair, the Henry Ford analogy.
Do you know this?
Colleen: No, it's
Michele: That people say that um,
what was it that if Henry Ford had
asked people what they wanted, they
would have said a faster horse.
Have you ever heard someone say that?
Colleen: I feel like you ranted
about it on Twitter once.
Michele: it.
Oh my God.
It's just so like, like anyone who
has ever tried to do any amount of
customer research has gotten this
sort of retort from someone back.
It's just, it is like the, uh,
fastest way to make a product or
a UX research person's skin crawl.
Um, And so I'm going to spend a
whole talk, just tearing it to
shreds and being like, what if, what
if he actually had done research?
What would that have looked like?
And like, where can you go with this?
And apparently people also say that, like,
Steve Jobs never did research either.
Colleen: That is a big Steve Jobs thing.
I read his biography.
That's a big thing.
Michele: Yeah.
I, you know, maybe it worked for
jobs, but I don't think most of
us have the amount of like hubris.
Right.
Um, yeah.
I mean, oh yeah.
There's so much myth around him too.
Colleen: it's like he just
wheeled this into existence.
You're like
Michele: Right.
But it's also, I feel like when people
repeat things like that, it's like it
kind of like saying that you're just
as, you know, sort of special as like
Steve Jobs, like I think he's kind of
a, you know, a once in a S yeah, yes,
very much an outlier and i, I recognize
like I'm not as brilliant as Steve Jobs.
So I have to do research like,
and mate, maybe other people are
as brilliant as he is and are
undiscovered, but I think a little bit
of humility is required for most of us.
Um, so I'm going to have an absolute
ball tearing that apart, but that's
going to be like a whole week of talks.
Cause I'm actually, I'm doing
the workshop at GoTo and then I'm
doing a talk the following day.
Then I have a one day break and then I do
the talk in Hamburg, so it will be busy.
But I think that also means
that like, you know, I'm not one
to do unplanned talks, right.
But like, I really need to get all
of this ironed out well in advance.
Like I don't want to be, you
know, furiously making slides
like the day beforehand.
Right.
Because I can't, I can't
go into that week tired.
Like I need to have all of this.
Down pat.
So I need to start planning that out now.
And I mean, I feel like May is
going to be here before we know it.
Colleen: Oh, Yeah.
I can't believe it's April.
Yeah.
I can't believe it's April.
Like what I'm actually, like I
said, I'm, I'm kind of sweating
my timeline on this workshop.
So I also need to hit the
ground hard running with this.
Michele: I mean, I wonder what
you're going to do with like
simple file upload in this time.
Colleen: Oh man.
Okay.
This is so funny.
You bring this up because I launched
a free plan as we discussed.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And can I tell you what happened
Michele: what happened?
Colleen: in two weeks?
I had like 75 signups.
Michele: Really?
Colleen: I usually get
like 15, maybe 15 a month.
Yeah, so it's
Michele: Okay.
So you were afraid that it would
cause this like massive increase
in customer support requests.
Colleen: No one has emailed me.
Michele: Really
Colleen: One person emailed
me to ask me how to upgrade
to a free or to a paid plan.
Michele: Really?
That is the only email
you got from 75 people.
Did they actually upgrade?
Colleen: I, like, they just emailed
me today or like 30 minutes ago,
so I didn't email them back yet.
But, um, yeah.
So speaking of that, I, um, I got, let go.
I just gotta make, make
it through the workshop.
I think it's just funny, like how the
timing of all these things has collided,
Michele: When it rains, it pours.
Colleen: I mean, it's, it's amazing.
I'm not upset, but it's, it's also like,
wow, I, um, I just have a lot going on
and it's really exciting, but my simple
file upload does all of these things.
I've added all these features that
are not even on my landing page.
And I was feeling kind
of down on the product.
Cause you know, you're on Twitter
and you see other people's like MRR
growth and you're like, mm, mine
is pales in comparison to this guy.
And then I was talking um, so I'm
going to have Zach Goldie on the
podcast to talk about positioning.
And I was talking to him.
I know I'm super pumped
about that by the way.
And I was talking to him about my
product and he was, so he was looking,
we're looking just at Heroku right now.
And he was talking about all the
competitors and he's like, oh, well,
these people do something similar.
And I'm like, actually, no, they don't.
They're just giving you a AWS S3 bucket.
I do all these other things.
So as I was telling him how
awesome my product is, I
realize my product is awesome.
So that was a good feeling.
And also.
Michele: Heck.
Yes, it is.
Colleen: Like, I'm not
even communicating that.
So I don't know what to
do with this information.
I'm just sharing it
Like there's just a lot
Michele: Well, it sounds like you
should have like a competitor,
a competitor comparison landing.
Colleen: Yeah.
So he, he and I are going to talk
about all that stuff, like how to.
How to do well.
I mean, I should start with putting
the stuff that I do on my own
land, like my initial page, right?
I don't even say on my side, if you got
a simple file, upload.com, you wouldn't
even know I do image resizing or image
tagging, or you can limit, like you don't,
I don't have any of that stuff on there.
The pages from over a year ago
when I launched this product
without any of these features and
it literally just uploaded files.
Now it does all these other things.
Michele: I feel like there's
a theme here of like,
tell
people about the thing you made.
But I think that was also a title of
an episode, like a year or two ago.
So I feel like, I feel like
we have a, a running theme.
I guess I'm just curious how
you're going to like balance that.
I know that there's been times when,
you know, like when you move to
California, for example, you basically
didn't touch simple upload for like two
simple file upload for like two months.
Um, and I wonder if you're going
to go back in that state or.
Colleen: Well, I don't know because
this workshop, if I look at all
of these things, this workshop is
super high priority because there's
a ton of work I have to get done.
And the Laravel of ELs, the Nova stuff we
were just talking about, to me if I had
to list these in order of priority right
now, first week of April would be the
workshop because that's six weeks away
and I don't have anything done for it.
I have a ton of work to do the Nova stuff.
Wait, the workshop, get organized.
That hardly counts because
that takes like two hours.
The Nova landing page.
The simple file upload.
Michele: I would put the
Laravel Nova stuff first.
I think that's even more important
than getting organized, right.
Is like start being able to sell
Colleen: Yeah.
Yeah.
You're right.
We need to, we need to sell some stuff.
I mean, you'd still put it
below the workshop though.
Michele: No, no, I think that's
your top priority, right?
Colleen: Okay.
That's interesting.
I mean, I could whip out a
landing page and I mean, not that
will be excellent, but
Michele: Right.
It doesn't have to be
perfect.
It
just needs to be
like, we just talked
about doing two videos.
Just launch it with one that just
tells, shows people what it does.
Right.
Like, you don't need the longer one.
Like, Just start with
the minimum you need.
And once we get it installed,
we'll give you a testimonial.
And you know, then you can write, this
is awesome, michelle Hanson, do your
Geocodio, or maybe you just quote Matias.
So it's not like, you know,
it's a little bit distant.
Um, um, right, but like, just
start with that and then.
And then I think if you also get that
going, like you get that out there and
people know about it, then after the
workshop, then you can be like, okay,
like, what are some, like other Laravel
places where we can start promoting this
and like, maybe get you on some podcasts
or like, all that kind of, you know, kind
of like a press blitz, um, around it too.
And you're also not
doing the workshop alone.
So like that's not all on you.
Colleen: Well, I mean, I'm
taking Erin and he doesn't know
rails, so it's mostly all on me.
Michele: But he also is part
of building the product.
So,
And he is like the, he's like
the ringmaster for Sequel like
people really like hearing him
talk about sequel and queries.
And I, I mean like of all of like the
unique talents to have, it is a very,
very relevant one, um, for what you're
doing, but like you're not alone in that.
Colleen: That's true.
No, he can, absolutely, and he will
be, I have to figure out how to do
that, but absolutely can work with
me to figure out the content and how
we want to structure it and how much
we want to expose and all of that.
A hundred percent.
Wow.
Okay.
Cool.
Michele: Maybe getting organized, like
you'd need like mini organizing, not like
Colleen: Oh, yeah, let's
Michele: full, like mini
organizing first
Colleen: Mini first.
I'll do that this week, like tomorrow
Michele: landing page for
Nova, Refine plus Nova.
Um, and then work.
Colleen: Okay.
This sounds like a great plan.
Michele: I just like
planning out the workshop.
So at least, you know, what
the work is to be done.
Like I find that just planning something
out helps with knowing what the work
is and that reduces some of the, like
the stress going into something like,
I always need at least like a mental
outline for something which I actually
don't even have for my own workshop.
So I think for me, like over the next
week, once I get over my jet lag and,
you know, finish taking a machete
through my various, very clogged inboxes.
I need to like read one of those
books by the time we talk again and
share something of value to you.
I can help with your workshop and maybe
have my own like, My own, I don't know.
I think I need like a
sketch or like an agenda.
And I guess I also need to make
sure that all of my talks are
together because my first talk of
this little road show is the 19th.
It's an online talk for a UI breakfast.
So I have something on the
19th and I'm doing a practice
workshop, the 25th for CPH UX.
And then I'm doing a another
practice interview workshop.
No, no, it's not practice here.
See, I'm getting this all confused.
I'm doing okay.
Oh, I am doing a practice interview
workshop for the calm fund
portfolio companies in early may.
And then I'm also doing a troubleshooting
interviews workshop in like early mid may.
So I also need to make sure that like all
of my ducks are in a row and my outlines
and everything for all of those, because
I, I need to be able to keep myself.
Colleen: Yup.
Michele: then somehow
get all of my other ones.
Colleen: And still do our
Michele: Done.
Right, exactly.
Like, I know someone reached out to
me like that they had been, like,
someone had recommended me to do like
a UX, research consulting for them.
And I was like, sorry, like, you know,
I just don't have the bandwidth to take
this on like a to to take consulting on.
And then they were like, well,
what about a full-time job?
And I was, no, like I already
run a company, like, I'm sorry.
Like, this book thing was supposed
to be like this fun little side
project for a period of time and
then it would go away, I guess.
Um, Yeah, man got to have the
full-time job and the side
projects and all the things.
Colleen: all the things.
Michele: Oh, the things.
Okay.
Good chats.
Colleen: Good
chat.
Michele: guess we should get back to.
Colleen: All right.
Goal oriented, execute.
Michele: See yah.
Just want to say, thanks again
to Bento for sponsoring today's
episode, head to bento now.com to
book a demo and see what developer-
friendly email marketing looks like.