Indie Bites

Justin Duke is the founder of Buttondown, a simple email tool he launched in 2017. Justin was last on the podcast 2 years ago when he’d hit $15k MRR and just left his role at Stripe to focus on Buttondown. I was struck by Justin’s well thought through approach to building. He makes calculated risks and shares a lot of his learnings on his blog, Applied Cartography (which is an essential read for any indie hackers).

This episode I catch up with Justin to hear how he’s grown the team to 8 people and his approach to building a company he loves. This is a cut down version of an hour long catch up I had with Justin available on the Indie Bites membership which is available at indiebites.com/membership, where we discuss his personal blog, how he structures his time as a new parent and we go deeper into hiring high agency unicorns.

Timestamps
  • 00:00 - Intro
  • 01:58 - Buttondown growth
  • 03:40 - How to build a company you don't hate
  • 07:16 - Marketing and positioning Buttondown
  • 11:17 - Buttondown's unique home page approach
  • 13:45 - Building a business you enjoy
  • 15:32 - Recommendations
My links
Sponsor - EmailOctopus 🐙

EmailOctopus is an independently owned email marketing platform, built to support other small growing businesses. With a focus on affordability and ease of use, EmailOctopus contains all of the features you need to reach and grow your audience. You can start today, with their industry leading free plan where you can contact up to 2,500 subscribers without paying a penny.

Creators and Guests

Host
James McKinven
Host of the Indie Bites podcast & founder of PodPanda.
Guest
Justin Duke
Founder of Buttondown. Prev Stripe & Amazon.

What is Indie Bites?

Short, bite-sized conversations with indie hackers that have started small, profitable and bootstrapped businesses. You'll learn how they come up with ideas, what they do to validate, find those first customers and make a sustainable income. Episodes every Tuesday.