Sparel

Well this is exciting. A couple of weeks ago, Sparel was on Show HN and instantly gained 80 new signups. Since then things have slowly made its way to 100 new users!

Now the question is what to do next, and my thought right now is to reach out and see what kind of problems people are trying to solve.

Good timing too because I just pushed out a welcome e-mail with a getting started video that took way to long to make!

Getting from 5 to 21 users has been excruciating but it's a work in progress. Originally Sparel was designed for engineers, scientists, writers... but...

Unfortunately, the first set of potential users liked the idea of Sparel but not everyone takes every problem to this extreme, and when they do, the tools they have seem to be okay. It's hard to sell a new concept to replace or augment how people solve problems. Often the problems are already solved and need only to be executed.

However, people who are in the position of making decisions are already operating at this level, they are building maps, they are already operating with critical thinking as a key piece. So now I'm starting to look at PMPs, CTOs, CEOs, managers, tech leads. This "feels" like a natural fit but I need to talk to them - this is my main focus right now, and I've temporarily halted any more development until I have PMF. I think it's the right thing to do!

I know it's not a lot but considering I haven't really promoted Sparel - we have five sign-ups!

As I'm still in the discovery phase, and not growth phase, I hope to learn a lot about these initial people who have real-world problems that need solving 💪 but in the interim I may have to come up with an intro video now!

I've launched a somewhat stabalized version of Sparel.

It has the core components that I wanted to launch with including a map to see your problem solving holistically, an insights view to give you clues into other ways of solving the problem or things that you might be missing - overtime my goal is that insights will be incredibly smart.

I also implemented a foundation for data protection - project data is now encrypted and I ripped out all internal third party tracking from the web app itself (the tool that everyone uses). I wanted to get this right as one of the first mandates of Sparel from an ethical standpoint.

And finally, Sparel isn't just restricted to just a few root types (hypothesis/questions). You can also add fears, uncertainties, and constraints. You can also validate your solutions with experiments, models, and resources.

After much reflection, the initial prototype that i built or Sparel did not match the vision, so I reworked the entire interface. It now taps into fear.

There were two goals to this pivot. Firstly, people who used the web app wanted something light that could fit within their existing workflows. I spent too much time adding additional fields thinking that it would replace people's entire research platform! Not going to happen.

The second goal was that the prototype that I had built was not inline with my vision. I want people to explore their fears, constraints, and uncertainties, because often there is an underlying theme or connection that can bring out incredible solutions!