I feel the issue with a lot of this advice like "don't care about what other people think about you", "be yourself" is, it tries to free people from one extreme (caring too much about what other people think for example) by talking about the opposite extreme.
It is helpful to have awareness about how your behaivor and actions may affect others, depending on the situation and your relationship with them, and how they may perceive or react to it. I find the key is to have and develop values you consistently act and live by so even if someone reacts negatively or different from what you expected, you don't feel this means you did something wrong or need to change something about yourself.
I agree. I think many of the extremes, like "be yourself [despite all others]" comes from a lack of self confidence. Hearing what others feel about you, empathising and deciding what _you_ feel about it takes a lot of self confidence.
Something else if you're a freelance developer:
In order to command a higher rate and not just be hired as a code monkey to implement a predefined task, it helps to position yourself as a consultant who can help the client discover the best solutions to achieve their goals.
Example: instead of just agreeing to develop a client's website per their initial specs, in your discovery call, find out what their goals for the website are.
Let's say they want to use it to capture pre-orders for an upcoming product. Based on this, you can propose a few ROI-positive solutions like integrating payments with their email marketing platform to engage customers and bring back cart abandoners, hosting a viral share giveaway, etc.
I feel while a learning methodology may make it go faster, what matters more is having the intrinsic motivation to actually get started and keep going (especially when you hit roadblocks).
What works for me is having a project or goal I'm excited about. That motivates me to learn the skills and knowledge to achieve it. Back in my teens, I really wanted to customize a Neopets guild (remember those? ;) ) so I started learning HTML to be able to. After, it was "I really want my own site" so I learned PHP to customize Wordpress and so on.
When I was in school and some of the information I had to learn wasn't directly applicable, I made a game out of testing study techniques. Such as taking annotated screenshots out of Youtube videos (10x better than textbook diagrams and walls of text). This game (which was really about changing my own perception from "ugh, rote memorization" to "let's test study techniques") helped me through the denser materials.
(Sorry to nitpick, but) I think you mean "learning method"? A method is a method; a methodology is the reasons, rationale, explanation for why you've used that particular method. I see this error everywhere, although it's much longer and incorrect. I guess it sounds/looks impressive, kinda scientific.
I didn't quite understand your question, but yes it's really an error. No, that's not what methodology means. Although if everyone uses it to mean the same as method, as seems increasingly the case, then that will be what it means and be printed in dictionaries. Personally, I like short words and think they should be preferred, besides the two concepts being entirely different.
> Although if everyone uses it to mean the same as method, as seems increasingly the case, then that will be what it means and be printed in dictionaries.
As far as I've ever heard or seen this word used, "methodology" is used to mean "a set of methods". Maybe you're a bit confused by the fact that a method can be usually destructured into sub-methods - or conversely, a "methodology" is just a single method in the set of methods one meta-level up.
You buy the products locals ordered (locals pay for item + delivery fee upfront into escrow) so there's no risk of a third party hiding drugs or illegal materials.
One risk is if the item is perfectly legal and ordinary in the US but is illegal to import into the foreign country. The courier could wind up paying heavy fines or much worse.
Kinder eggs are an example of an item that is perfectly fine in, say, Canada, but carries a heavy fine for import into the US.
Evading duty is still a legal issue. Some countries have laws that permit you to carry some articles without duty, for personal use. This is a clear subversion of such rules.
Question: do you send new users an onboarding drip email sequence?
This makes a huge difference in driving them to actively use it and upgrade later.
Sequence:
1. Welcome email.
2 Educate them about the value of one major feature with screenshot(s) (what makes it better/easier than similar products).
3. Educate them about the value of another major feature with screenshot(s).
4. (Specific to your product since tons of existing users request features): Send an email listing the top 3 most frequently requested features and ask them to vote for (click on) one. This email increases user investment in your product and subtly reminds them about it.
5. Ask them to upgrade (buy a licence in your case).
Tools you can use to send this sequence: ActiveCampaign, ConvertKit, MailerLite
Don't worry about possibly annoying some users with the onboarding sequence. The increase in number of users you'll convert will greatly outweigh the number you may potentially annoy (and they can 1-click unsubscribe anyway).
Thank you for the good suggestion. I know it's a common practice for SaaS businesses. I'm not doing it (yet) because mine is a desktop app, which doesn't require you to leave your email address to get access to. In other words, I can't send out a drip sequence because I don't have my users' email addresses. In my niche, asking the user to supply his email address just so he can download is very uncommon. I'm afraid that it will annoy users. I am trying with a tutorial [1] first. If that doesn't work, asking for email and sending out a drip sequence as per your sequence is still an option.
Always liked this stealthy prospect finding method. Here's another few (best for B2B):
1. If some change happens at one of your competitor's product (got acquired, changed a beloved feature, etc.), go through threads on public forums discussing it. You'll find a lot of current users (ie customers to poach) of that product. A recent example: Atlassian acquiring Trello.
1b. Also, look through the comment sections of news sites that reported this change. You'll also find tons of current users there.
2. Go on user submitted product review sites. Lots of them out there for different types of products: Chrome extension review page, Capterra, G2 Crowd, etc. Approach the users who left reviews expressing dissatisfaction with the competitor product. Or users who use a complimentary product.
3. If a competitor product hosts customer sites on their servers (Shopify, etc.), you can reverse lookup their IP to find all of them.
Then it's a matter of introducing your product with a semi-personalized cold email, reassuring the prospect you have the competitor product's most vital features and you also do XYZ better than them. Here's a template: http://www.artofemails.com/cold-emails#competitor
> Approach the users who left reviews expressing dissatisfaction with the competitor product
Though obviously be careful to filter those. There are some customers who are never happy with just one moon-ona-stick, who you would rather leave for your competitors to waste time on!
Have you considered highly targeted value based cold emailing?
The HN community may be weary of sending / receiving unsolicited email but if you provide massive value upfront and only contact prospects who would get 2x+ ROI from your product/services, you will not be seen as spam and will convert a good % of the prospects.
I've run a lot of these type of campaigns and the key is to:
A) Only target prospects who have a real need for your product/service and have the budget for it
In your case, I would go on different grant websites and add their grant recipients to your prospect list. This way, you only target organizations who actively use grants.
B) Do a bit of work for them to provide upfront value in your cold email
In your case, research a list of grants they're eligible for (you can share the same list to nonprofits in the same space) and provide unique insights about these grant givers are looking for based on your experience. Your value upfront + value ideas will open the conversation and naturally lead to prospects asking about about how you can help them.
I'm an executive at a nonprofit and I delete all unsolicited email unopened. I just don't have time for it. I don't know how typical I am (small organization and it's part time for everyone involved)
How I see negative emotion is, it's similar to what physical pain teaches us.
You touch a burning stove. It hurts. You learn this action -> undesirable outcome and avoid doing it. (Sometimes it can take a few times though!)
Just that with negative emotions, sometimes it's less obvious the cause or it's an interplay between a few. And sometimes, there's a time delay between an action and the negative emotion. That's why self-awareness and introspection helps a lot in learning from your experiences.
I think the "you can choose to be happy all the time" movement maligns negative emotions too much - it can be an important warning "hey something is wrong" system in life. Also, I believe the use of the word 'happiness' often leads to misunderstandings.
You cannot be happy, the emotion, all the time. Hour to hour, day to day, we all go through different emotions.
You can however be more consistently happy, as a perspective on life and approach to life.
That I believe is what people really mean when they talk about 'being more happy'.
But a lot of people misunderstand that, thinking if you aren't feeling weeeee most of the day, you aren't really 'happy'.
The issue with depression is I think this emotional signaling can be entirely miscalibrated, and sometimes, you do you have to figure out a way to override those signals.
This can happen anytime, and could since the times human life became more complicated than hunting and gathering and living in caves.
Negavive emotions (and physical pain) may be a warning, but I strongly wish I'd have more control over them. It reminds me of a typical scene from a naval or sci-fi movie, when something happens and there's an alarm siren blaring. The captain comes to bridge and asks some crewman to shut off the alarm sound. Because such a warning is useful until it's heard and understood, and then it's only seriously distracting. Much like negative emotions and physical pain.
As someone who is starting a new relationship where we are literally 10,000km away, this is my new normal. I feel intense jealous, anger, sadness when we are away, and we are close I am filled with pure bliss. Pure emotion.
keep that communication channel wide open. be vulnerable. be realistic. spend time finding ways to get closer, if you want it to last. but those facetimes and letters and long distance virtual hugs are a really valuable tool for learning about your partner, and yourself, and each other in the absence of abundant time to spend together. good luck, it's hard. but if you feel the real shit, get super dirty and roll around in it as hard as you can. be vulnerable, supportive. write for yourself. and for your partner. and be vulnerable twice as hard as you think is safe... just don't be unpleasant. happy days.
I think the beauty of side projects is it's a low pressure way for people to put their idea out in the world and see what happens. Only difference between a hobby and side project is most side projects start off with a slightly more defined potential to monetize it.
And if the project pans out, great! If not, hopefully the side project was you doing something you love anyway so you still had fun and gained a lot of experience.
The fact it's now easier (cheaper startup costs for many types of work) to start side projects is a boon for the rest of us. It means every once in a while, someone who would never had considered starting a biz right away but would create something for fun may end up bringing a truly valuable product or service to the world.
I started my biz (http://www.artofemails.com) as a side project. I think seeing it as a side project in the very beginning freed me from feeling I had to do market validation and the whole launch a biz laundry list to just put it (in my case sales email templates) out there. Once it was up and I got really positive feedback, that's when I committed to growing it as a fully fledged business.
Growing up in one, you get to know all of your neighbors really well since you see each other every day. My mom who grew up in a one, still knows all of her childhood friends and they have regular reunions.
Wish they were more communal spaces like this today where you're bound to regularly run into and interact with your neighbors.
Certainly that is part of it, but I think a bigger part of it is that finding a group of people you'd like to live with a space that enables communal living is really hard. Therefore developers build for the plug-and-play self contained dwelling.
Stated another way, the prevalence of independent living is more a consequence of high "coincidence of wants" costs and not of preferences.
Typically the choice is to either have your own space entirely, or share everything but the bedrooms. There's approximately nothing available like what's described above, with a shared courtyard and separate adjoining houses. How can we meaningfully be said to have a choice when they don't exist?
I noticed lots of spaces like this in a trip to northern Italy, as well. Buildings push right up to the sidewalk, and surround private courtyards with a single entrance.
Not sure how communal these spaces are, but I presume not all of these blocks of buildings were owned by single families.
It is helpful to have awareness about how your behaivor and actions may affect others, depending on the situation and your relationship with them, and how they may perceive or react to it. I find the key is to have and develop values you consistently act and live by so even if someone reacts negatively or different from what you expected, you don't feel this means you did something wrong or need to change something about yourself.