@nikkielizdemere Hey Nichole! I tend to gravitate toward longer-form, deep-dive pieces. I especially like Stratechery, Not Boring, Divinations, and The Information. I think a lot about Charlie Munger and Warren Buffet's comments on knowledge and how it compounds like interest, so I try to be deliberate about learning something new every day. For some fun (non-tech) general news analysis, I like Galaxy Brain and Pirate Wires.

@maxwellcdavis Hey Maxwell 👋 You're totally right! We are currently staffing up our native mobile team so you should see a lot more from us soon! In the meantime, if you know any great mobile engineers or designers, please send them our way!

@lior_galante_cohen Hey Lior! Lots of exciting stuff to come, I outlined the major stuff we're focusing on in this comment.

@mishra_mayank Inspired more than overwhelmed, I just try to keep up with everyones' endless energy and enthusiasm to keep tackling interesting problems.

@jgrenzemann Hey Johannes, thanks for the kind words! As you say, Product Hunt is incredibly valuable to startups and makers, so job #1 is: "don't mess anything up" 😹 Beyond that, we have a lot of work ahead! I summarized our main focus areas in this comment.

@deephdave Hey Dave! We're actually thinking a lot about this right now. We don't have the exact implementation details ironed out yet, but it's likely we'll start with a more siloed experiment to start and figure out if / how to integrate into the broader system afterwards.

@rony_rom What sort of analytics do you have in mind? We are current beta testing some additional analytics as an optional add-on, but curious if we're thinking about the same things.

@ahiggz Demographics on people who upvoted/commented on your product, especially because the main use case on PH is to validate your idea. Also, best time to engage with others on the platform can be a nice touch.

@bharatpasam Looking at our track record, I think we're pretty great at it! But we're always trying to find ways to get new makers on the platform, so that launches stay fresh and interesting.

@abel_product Hey Abel! Historically the team has run super lean and PH usage skewed pretty heavily in favor of desktop web, so that's what was focused on. But these days, things are trending more mobile, and we're growing like crazy (and staffing up our native mobile team). Our plan is to build a new, mobile-first experience for PH as soon as that team is in place. Stay tuned!

@helenx324 Hey Helen, thanks for the question! Growth always boils down to acquisition and retention. I personally think there are a fair number of hacky / quick paths to acquisition to choose from, but you can't cheat retention, and that's the hardest thing to crack. It doesn't matter how many new users you get to the party if you can't keep them there. At the end of the day, everything comes down to: what value are you adding that your users can't live without? If you solve for that, you can push new users in from all sorts of places (referrals, ads, content marketing) and growth will work itself out from there. Easier said than done!

@ahiggz Thanks for your insightful answer! I agree, it's a challenge, but a necessity, to tackle retention and acquisition at the same time. Definitely worth the effort though!

@butafly Hey Zhanet, thanks for the question! Our main focus areas right now are: 1. Staff up our native mobile team so we can build a brand new, shiny, mobile-first experience for PH. 2. Make contributing to PH more delightful. Not just products, but discussions and comments too. 3. Modernize the look & feel of the site (you may have noticed some of these changes already). 4. Support more intent-driven product search & research, in addition to the serendipitous discovery you get from the homepage. 5. More editorial content that helps contextualize the launches you see everyday. Not only "what launched today" but also "help me understand this better" 6. More ways to engage with Product Hunt IRL via events put on by our team, and our growing team of PH ambassadors worldwide. 7. Find opportunities to partner with our new sister company and venture arm, Hyper. We've almost doubled head-count this year with lots more growth to come, so we're firing on all cylinders. Expect to see a lot from us in the coming months!

@sam_carow Hey Sam, thanks for the questions! Hard to choose but here goes: Most rewarding: hearing the ways makers from around the world use Product Hunt to get inspired, launch their products, and learn with (and from) the community. It's a really meaningful thing for a lot of people and it's humbling to be the shepherd for that. Most challenging: the community is extremely encouraging and agreeable (which is a strength!) but as a product person, it can also make it difficult to get honest feedback on Product Hunt itself to inform the future direction. This is a big change for me, coming from Reddit, where users are all too willing to tell you all the ways you're getting it wrong 🤣.

@sam_carow @ahiggz that's so true Ashley. Reddit community is so critic and direct, sometimes even hard. On another side most people on PH are tapping you on a shoulder, and agrees on what other influencers saying without even thinking. A lot of time it can be encouraging, but that's not what you need all the time. You need real feedback which can be a critic, which would make you do better and make even better decisions.

@ahiggz How is the audience on Reddit different in composition compared to here?

@sam_carow @ahiggz @stefan_smiljkovic @ahiggz this post is really insightful and at the same time it opens up to share a recent experience when I launch on the product hunt last week... The feedback from an actual customer was really true and they really like to support it. But strange enough there were votes and feedback directed to gain mutual attention. On the other hand, I also got so many offers even one marketer said with $3k, the #1 position is guaranteed. Even he agreed to issue invoices only when we are on #1....it was almost tempting to agree. But I think it's a big reputational issue for Product Hunt to check if your algorithm is really unique and does it works it is expected to work. I see the day I launched upvotes for competitors getting by 40 to 50 in a time of 5 minutes. That is unrealistic even though PH mention several factors you take into account...still I found there are Facebook Groups where you can post for upvote... which makes the whole experience and excitement a little down. When as a maker I come to a platform, I trust the PH capabilities and how I can get genuine exposure and not a paid exposure. Hopefully, @ahiggz is looking into this.