For me it's usually rebuilding a solution to a problem that I understand well that I've already solved with a familiar language.
Take for example Git. If you understand its internals well enough to build it yourself, then rebuild git in the new language. In the future, when you want to pick up yet another language, rebuild it again.
One of the reasons that I think it's extremely useful for a programmer to have at least one complex system that is well understood and implemented under their belt.
Yup, I DCA regularly, but thinking about whether this is a good opportunity to throw extra into an index fund like VTSAX or maybe solid individual stocks.
Extra would be coming from an account that I keep cash in for unforeseen opportunities.
> * Filtering cards based on tags. Once you have a couple of dozen cards on a list it becomes increasingly difficult to get an overview of what you're doing, what you should do, etc. I use tags like DO THIS, DISCUSS THIS, INCOMING and would really like to filter lists so they only displayed, say, DO THIS cards. Right now I find myself fiddling around with the lists far too much, trying to figure out what I should do next. Not good if you're a procrastinator.
You can do this now in the "Search and Filter Cards" menu. Just click on the label and it'll only show you cards with that label. You can also rename labels to Incoming, etc...
This is a question I've been struggling with for a while now.
Would you host your company's super important bread and butter code on GitHub instead of your own server?
I get a funny feeling every time I think about this mostly because I've put tons of time (3 years) into our code base and I think of it as one of the most important aspects of our company.
Then again, GitHub hosts their code on GitHub which makes me feel a bit at ease in doing so.
Drawing energy from people and specially your customers is a much underestimated ingredient for success.
After a couple of years of being a machine, you need an oil change and you need to replace the wear and tear components.
I found taking one week a day and cold-visiting our customers brings back the much needed spark that makes you feel like taking over the fucking world!
Video sounds really cool, but our niche doesn't seem to care for it much. It's mostly the high end dealers that like them. Maybe one day when we target them.
A very valid point and it has come up in my head many times, not just in regards to entrepreneurship, but other issues with a similar pattern.
Before giving out the advice, I had to ask myself whether things started getting better because of charging customers, or did charging customers coincide with an unknown event that caused some success?
Everything points to the former, in my case. But I do believe this particular advice applies to many other startups, not just mine.
Edit: I'd like to add, that after charging and studying usage more closely we removed some unused 'cool' feature that we thought were awesome. Charging customers also prunes your app. If you pay attention.
Nope, no secrecy. I really don't believe in it for most situations.
It's mostly my tendency (weakness) to focus on developing new features than to update the marketing site. I'll be updating this with pricing very soon since I finally hired a great developer to help out in some of my coding responsibilities and to help shape ZZA's policies and future.
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Here's our current pricing:
10 cars or less $55.
70 cars or less $125.
200 cars or less $225.
No contract. No limit on features. No setup fee.
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Here's what we did/considered to reach these prices
0. We wanted to serve the startup dealerships. We know how hard it is to start one up (we did it, after all), so we wanted to provide a cheaper entry point.
1. We looked at what competitors were charging and what features they were providing.
2. We talked to more than 10 dealers to get their input.
3. We definitely don't want to convey that we are competing on prices. We're not! We're competing on understanding of domain, features and quality.
4. I read some blogs regarding this subject. Like Joel's and some others.
5. Had tons of discussions with people who's judgment I trust.
6. Estimated at what volume of vehicles would a given price make the most sense.
After doing these things, I simply wrote down 10 @ 55, 70 @ 125, 200 @ 225. It felt right.
As you can see, it's very non-scientific and many would disagree with this way of doing it. But it's what we did.
Maybe when it's time to rethink our prices, we'll have more time for surveys and research.
The sites that don't have an API, we simply provide an iframe and provide the user the tools to easily cut & paste into the iframe (Worst part in the app). 90% do have APIs though, which we use extensively.
Right now, my niche is only dealers with 200 cars or less. It's what I know. Later, when I feel like we've dominated this niche, we'll expand into other areas for sure.
In the last few months, my focus has been 90% on the software.
What I did with the dealership is Im more or less, followed the advice in E-Myth (http://www.amazon.com/E-Myth-Revisited-Small-Businesses-Abou...) and created position contracts for all our employees (7 of them now.) This has cut my involvement in the dealership tremendously. Now, I only put out fires, make sure management is going smoothly and handle some of the accounting.
At the head of the dealership is my brother, whom I trust. He makes sure that all manuals are updated and are followed. I make sure his position contract is followed.
This way of doing things will be much harder if you don't have a partner that you can trust to handle his part. Specially when things start growing.