Not a shovel business manifesto
As a moderator, I wanted to scribble a short manifest for the Not a shovel business group. This won't be a structured article, somewhat random thoughts about why I established this group in the first place.
Unfortunately, the majority of the indie hacking/bootstrapping projects have a flaw. We are building for other people like us. And that creates some pyramid scheme where the top 1% is soaking all the money from wannabe successful indie hackers that have just entered the scene.
Every week, dozens (if not hundreds) of new projects targeting other indie hackers are surfacing. And often, these products are the ones that get the most upvotes, buzz and interest because yet-to-be-successful indie hackers are hoping that that's "The Thing" that will give them the business they dream of.
Top 1% keep producing "information products", "newsletters", and" [put any word here] kits & tools" for newbies. The rest of the folk head-dives into those products hoping that now it's their turn to be successful. But this creates a vicious circle.
The money-makers keep making money off of people who want to be them. The worst, we started to copy those people. Nowadays, everyone's dream is to build the next 6 figure newsletter about vague content about indie hacking. It-just-doesn't-feel-right.
What's your solution then?
Nothing. I want to be part of a space where we build for others. Agency owners, farmers, board game geeks, music lovers... simply, anyone but indie hackers. Just by doing that, we destroy all self-promo opportunities.
We can finally share our struggles and wins without thinking about gaining a potential customer. And most importantly, we can finally stop spending our money on other people's fluff instead of a quality dinner to boost our morale.
If anyone relates to this feel free to join the group Not a shovel business where self-promotion is prohibited.
10/10 group name and you hit the nail on the head. I've been seeing an increasing number of IHs adopting this wantrepenuer mindset and spamming other IHs here and writing scripts to collect folks' emails.
It's super frustrating to keep getting cold emails for yet another freemium SEO tool lol
I personally do not have anything against newsletters.
I actually am planning on starting one, i'm entrepreneurial minded.
And I have to admit that the groups without much self promotion are the best ones. I enjoy those the most.
It's much better to talk about a subject that is thrilling than just seeing another ad.
I look forward to seeing everyones post in the group.
I also have nothing against newsletters or courses or whatever kits. The problem is that majority is aiming for that. If everyone is in the "talking" business who will be in the "doing" business? :)
I just joined your group, this is something I see and it's like a nagging feeling at the back of your head. I keep coming across some "expert" who blabs about how they make 2 mill a year doing X and they will show you how as well. The first step in reality would be to start a YouTube channel talking smack back in 2010 and make sure you talk faster than the next guy. The only thing I am interested in really is either developing my own thing or seeing someone make their own thing that is totally original. The very last thing I saw that met this description oddly enough is Wordle - a clever game, very addictive, a simple build, and I personally think it was sold too early but it was up to the inventor of it. I think its okay to follow trends when you sprout an idea, like maybe some web3.0 thing, but do it with a clean sheet of paper and dream something into existence.
Out of topic, what are the capabilities of a group moderator?
Last time I saw, it was all about pinning posts to the top and featuring a few posts to the side of the group page. Is it possible to prohibit anything?
The thing with this place, it's full of "indiehackers" so if someone building for us. This is the best place to be around. From 101 guides to advanced and complex solutions.
This post sounds like going to a science forum to talk about art. I joined this group to read and learn about alternative things people are doing. The way they market their stuff, the struggles they are facing, their mindset etc... This wasn't the expected content.
Hey, thanks for the comment.
Tbh, group moderators are not much different from the users. As a moderator, I can't enforce anything. But I can flag the contents and try to reach someone from the IH mods to remove the content that doesn't fit here.
This particular post is just a manifest to set the expectations and limits. I want to be part of a space where I am not the target audience. But I still want to be with people who are running their businesses. I know it's some sort of a grey area.
I personally will share my business updates mainly here without any promotional content. (My current business that I am trying to make work caters to digital agencies and corporate businesses)
In fact, I have created a marketing flywheel document while working on this project. Will try to share it here but first need to scrape my business details from it :D
I see, good luck with your business as well as the group.
I think this is a mistaken assumption. I could see how it's true for some but most people aren't targeting IHers in my view.
And not to further poo on this idea ... but there are still plenty of opportunities for people to self-promote even if they aren't directly addressing their target audience. Relevancy doesn't stop self-promotion. I=
Indie hackers, like all humans, are complicated. Our lives don't neatly stop as an indie hacker vs. board game player vs. corporate drone vs. a farmer. You could be all four.
Love the sound of this group though! Thanks for sharing Emre :)
Hey, thanks for sharing your opinions.
Tbh this is exactly what's happening. Almost all the fresh success stories here and in PH comes from products that cater directly to other builders.
There are multiple reasons for that. In fact, I am currently working on an article about why we default to building something that targets people like us.
Humans are complicated. But if you build something for let's say boardgame lovers, you don't seek approval or feedback here in IH. You come here to share the inner dynamics of your work or ask for help about some niche business problems you encounter from people who are in similar businesses. Can you find new customers here? Absolutely! Should this be something you should focus on? No!
As I said in the article, I am not inventing anything new. Simply trying to create space (mainly for selfish reasons) where I can come, write, and read about how people struggle with their business without any virtue&success signalling.
Even if it'll be completely a dead group for others. Fine for me. At least I have a space to write for myself now :D
Love that!
Cheers in your quest
Really interesting thoughts. I'm curious. Would a platform/api business fall under your conception of a shovel business? In a way the target is other builders so you could consider it as selling shovels...or tractors. But it still feels like a legitimate business to me.
Any examples on that? I don't recall any api business that is directly targeting indie hackers.
I think a good tool example is Less Annoying CRM. It's a good tool for indie hackers with it's pricing and lean methodology.
But the tool markets itself as a lean CRM for small businesses. It's not "CRM for indie hackers" And based on what I see, majority of their customer base are not indie hackers as well. Hence, it's not a shovel business.
But there are dozens if not hundreds paid Notion, Airtable CRM templates for indie hackers, bootstrappers etc. Complete shovel business.
Ah! I think I get the nuance now! :)
I initially thought you meant anything centered around helping builders deliver their product faster, which an API would. It's really those information products targeting indie hackers specifically that are the issues. In that sense yeah I totally see where you're coming from.
Love the idea!
This is something I have a hard time with on Twitter as well. I want to find inspiration in people producing SaaS for people outside of tech.
I'm also a little tired of reading success stories of tech guys with tech products for tech people.
Love the story from Hauling Buddies for example (https://twitter.com/haulingbuddies). Outside the tech market.
He even uses Ruby on Rails, he's outside of any framework hype/trend :p
I want to see more stories like this! Who don't target me indirectly but who honestly tell their story.
You are still making shovels when aiming for those industries: https://amandoabreu.com/wrote/when-do-we-stop-selling-shovels/
Interesting take. If I am making some tool for let's say stay-home parents and solve their pain that's not a shovel business. But if I start yet another parenting blog/newsletter as a new parent, yes that is a shovel business in their own community.
B2C is less shovel-y because people buy more emotionally perhaps? But B2B is essentially just shovels right now.
I get it. Really, I do,
but, consider how antagonistic this post and group is. I did this once upon a time too, and i think a lot of others do it too because it's comfortable to sell to members of this community, not because they want to profit off of others trying to be like them.
I think a little empathy would go a long way here tbh.
I completely understand what you say, but I don't see anything antagonistic here. We are in the indie hacking business, and we all want to earn our lives from our creations. But the action shouldn't be another airtable collection targeting our peers and defaulting to a comfortable path atrophies our muscles.
Many engineers, savvy marketers or creative people are trying to build that minimum effort paid information thingy instead of something they excel at.
Tbh I prefer the indie dev (game) mentality here. The majority of people don't think of making money from each other because they want to make games. Do they still create tools and gadgets? Yes. But many of them are shared for free. They are helping each other build their games with no to little financial expectation. And that creates more robust relationships.
The irony of posting this in on of the most famous sites dedicated to other wannabe entrepreneurs, to create another group formed by... wannabe entrepreneurs. It is turtles all the way down.
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That's an excellent read. And exactly what I was trying to explain 🙂
I will dive into HN comments as well. Sadly we are going in the same direction at full speed with the paper you shared.
Talking about something always brings more money and fame than actually doing it. So talking about how to grow a business and status signalling has more financial rewards than actually trying to grow a business.
It all started as a "marketing tactic" but now turned into a whole genre of the business itself under the solopreneurship ecosystem.
No one is posting photos of themselves [...]
I've seen people sharing their new house plans, lifestyle on a tropical island even an Aston Martin. It's really naive to think we'd be immune.
A group of people labeling themselves as something, with similar goals and path creates the demand and someone will supply for it. This forum serving the same purpose for free.
I don't like those how-to guides but I'm not against it, if there are wantrepreneurs who believes paying nine bucks on an e-book about twitter growth will make them an influencer, let them do it. :)
Just maybe they are working as a placebo. "I paid for it so I gotta succeed" could be the way of their commitment 🤷♂️ or that amount could turn into a retweet from the author with a huge following.
edit; Stripe dashboards are our lambos. :)
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Well said, as always. I can confirm since I tick all those three points.
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I believe that the IH community want to reap the fruits from the seeds that they planted.
If you build something you want to bring value into the world. At least for me that's the case.
You naturally have the urge to show the world your product to see if it can help them.
I don't see anything wrong with that.
And of course everything has it's place ,and I don't enjoy watching ads as much as the next guy, it's just the way the world is.
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Not at all. Feel free to post anywhere you like. I am just tired of either being exploited or trying to exploit other indie hackers.
As a moderator, I will be maintaining this space as a self-promotion free group where people are solving other's problems.
I recently started to work on a new project targets another segment and realized the amount of info and help you can find here is very limited. So the group idea born out of my personal frustration.
Aaaaand...you just admitted trying to "exploit other indie hackers"
Can it be that YOU are one of the small % that's here just for the self-promo?
not trying to be rude, but...just reading your comment that's what I felt.
That really requires some twisted thinking or lack of understanding of a "figurative speech" to come to that conclusion :D
But if you really think that I am the real reason, there is a very simple solution to that. Just ignore me and my thoughts. The IH will offer YOU a way better experience without my opinions on it. 💪
I published this group for a similar reason- to keep some members out of my and other like-minded people's focus zone.
Hey Emre!
You are probably right.
Wasn't in my best mood this morning and I think I "unleashed the dogs" after reading your comment. My honest apologies for that 🙏🏻
Not something I tend to do, so I guess the best way to proceed is to apologize and move on!
Good luck with the group and keep going!
Hey,
No problem. It's ok to be sceptical about anything. :) It's not my group btw. I just happen to introduce it to the IH scene. The group will live with the contributions of like-minded people.