When I'm heading somewhere new, the first thing I read isn't guidebooks. I read the personal accounts of people who've been there. It doesn't matter – whether it's a trip to a city or a long hike. I want to know how someone already walked the route. What they liked, what they didn't, how long various stretches took them, where they spent the night. Whether they consider the hike a good one – or maybe they regret having taken that particular route.
These stories have everything: numbers and details, places and descriptions of the overnight stops, personal observations of the landscape and even of the people met along the way. They have emotions and impressions. In the end (if the stories are good) it all comes together into a whole picture, and from it I draw the first and most important conclusion: whether it's worth going there at all. The second, no less important, takeaway – how I can travel that route so it turns out well.
When we need to see a doctor – we turn to personal impressions too. Especially when they're authored, signed – not hidden behind avatars and handles.
And when I need to reach some audience, and find a product its first customers or subscribers, I follow the same path. I read stories about it. Unfortunately – there aren't many truthful, detailed accounts of this, and the ones there are lie scattered all over the internet. It's easy to find a guide, a manual, even a book: usually, though, they're trying to sell you something. Little of it is personal.
And when I was thinking about what idea to take for the new project, I took my own problem. I decided to build a platform where real people share real stories about distribution, promotion, finding customers. I thought – let them be stories of successes and failures, with numbers, details, and emotion. Not the highlight reel, but ordinary progress. Not tens of thousands of subscribers or customers in 2 months, but the truth. Let it be us – independent authors, makers, coaches, founders of small projects without a serious ad budget. Recognize yourself?
Once there are enough cases, I'll build in search and sorting across the database: by numbers and details. For now it'll be in newsletter form, maybe – with a tag filter on its page.
As a founder and a newsletter writer, I really need a platform like this. And I think you do too.
Getting ready for a route, we're always looking for the one person who's already walked it. And when we walk the route ourselves, many of us share everything that happened along the way.
Right now (probably, unfortunately) distribution beats the product. What matters most isn't the idea or product you have, but how well you managed to get them across to your audience.
That's why reading stories about promotion will help you get your bearings in a fast-changing world. And that's why your stories are sure to be read (and your projects looked at – I'll be linking to them).
If you're curious, here's the newsletter's About – a bit more detail there. Here is the first case – my personal story: How Substack and Its Tools Inspired Me – and Let Me Down post.
If you've found your first audience or customers for your own thing – a newsletter, a shop, whatever it is – without a serious ad budget, I'd like to document how you did it: what worked, what didn't, the real numbers. It goes out under your name, with links to your project – real promotion for your thing, and nothing gets published without your sign-off. Want to share how you found yours – email me about it, and I'll send you the questionnaire link.
Subscribe for more like this – full stories and digest roundups land in your inbox about once a week, each one showing how someone found their customers while spending next to nothing on ads.
– Alex, tinyfound