Should you do #buildinpublic?

Elena Tsemirava
22 replies
What advantages and disadvantages do you see?

Replies

Paul Mit
YES! Sharing your experience is valuable for other makers ←→ works the other way round too
Elena Tsemirava
@mituhin cannot say it better!
Jake Harrison
Definitely, and seems X encourage this. If you share like some statistics about your MRR, users, X will give you high impressions.
Roman Gordy
We live in an era where everything is content. Make it public if your internal building processes are honest and can be wrapped in an attractive visual.
Florian Vates
Mindr - Mindful Reminders
Mindr - Mindful Reminders
Im a huge fan. There are so many advantages of it. You get motivation, early feedback and early customers, all free of charge. Best decision I’ve made this year :) Why wouldn’t you? I was always too afraid of someone stealing my idea, but chances are, your idea isn’t unique anyways 😅
Elena Tsemirava
@fvates I hear you Florinan!
Niko Germish
I'm not a fan of the #BuildInPublic approach. I prefer the traditional MVP style where there's an element of surprise for the end-users. However, I might be wrong. Can anyone share projects that had a successful launch after building in public?
Elena Tsemirava
@nikogermish I know a few from both sides.
Lorena Vanez
You get instant feedback, build a loyal community, and it holds you accountable. Plus, it's a great way to showcase your journey
Elena Tsemirava
@vanezlorena I think I should give it a try!
Daniel Zaitzow
I love it in theory but I would be fearful of going live with an underdeveloped app and giving people a bad user experience. Pushing them towards alternatives in the market - might be hard to have them revisit the platform. Customer Churn before they're in the door. Whereas if you start with a flushed out product you might not run into that issue. I think its a middle ground - go live with a great solid core offering and build in public for all the roadmap things that will make it next level.
Elena Tsemirava
@dzaitzow honestly speaking I have a kind of barrier to start my #buildinginpublic journey.
Daniel Zaitzow
@elenat its a tough one. I think there are pros and cons of both strategies but at the end of the day I love the idea of taking the best of both and figuring out something that works best for your platform / prospective community.
Shajedul Karim
sharing your work journey in public, or #buildinpublic, is like sharing bits of your story as you go. good things: 1. making friends: you can build a community who cares about your work. 2. staying on track: when people see what you're doing, it pushes you to keep going. 3. learning from others: you get quick feedback which helps you fix things fast. 4. trust: people tend to trust you more when they see how you work. 5. fun story: it's fun to look back at how far you've come. not-so-good things: 1. distractions: you might focus on likes and shares more than your work. 2. less privacy: not everything is for sharing, finding what to share is tricky. 3. wrong ideas: people might get the wrong idea if they don’t see the full picture. 4. extra stress: you might feel rushed to show progress. 5. being copied: though it’s rare, someone might copy your ideas. every coin has two sides. sharing your work journey is fun and helpful, but it’s good to know it's not all easy.
Pam K.
That hashtag could mean different things to different people. To me, "building in public" is about sharing the product development journey. Not so much sharing exactly how you are doing it. I have no qualms about this. On the contrary, I think it is helpful to gain feedback and gauge setiment, especially in the early days, e.g. when our product was ready for closed beta testing.
Elena Tsemirava
@silisolutionist thanks for sharing! Which channels do you use for #buildinpublic?
Pam K.
@elenat I only have time for X, targeted communities on Telegram and Product Hunt at the moment.
Pam K.
@elenat Our launch page is finally live.