When my brothers and I built our last business, we made no content at all. I spent my days writing software. Then we sold it for over a hundred million, and I know what it feels like to walk away from something you've spent years on.
This time I've been building Clipflow for three years, and it's hard to get momentum with a software product. A lot of people think they can build their own now with AI. Each customer pays a small amount, and a pure software business takes a long time to become self-sustaining.
I was talking to my cofounder about selling one day, and I said I didn't want to sell, because I didn't want to start from zero again. His answer was good. If what we believe is true, and a personal brand and a presence on social media help, then you don't start from zero. We've spent this whole time building our brand and getting good at earning attention. My brothers have done the same with their business.
I hadn't looked at it that way. If you build a brand, you build an audience that trusts you, as long as you do good work, talk about it and never lie to them. When you move on to the next thing, you already have channels you can use to tell people about it.
Pieter Levels is the example that comes to mind. He has a strong profile on X, so when he launches a new product he can get thousands of views and users almost overnight. That's what a marketing engine does for a founder. It works for this business and for whatever you build after it.
It's hard to make time for while you're busy building the product, and I won't pretend otherwise. But if nobody knows about your product, nobody can buy it, and that holds for the next one too.
Put a recurring slot in your week for building your audience. Whatever you launch after this business will be able to use it.
