How do I get started?

The most unexpected thing about sharing my story and journey in public is people reaching out to me and asking this question "How do I get started?".

But first, in case you don't know what I'm doing, let me tell you.

I'm building a SaaS in public, posting progress every day. At the bottom of this post, you'll find a progress update with the EXACT actions I took to get here. You can also binge-read all the past updates here

I wasn't ready for people asking "How do I get started". I don't know what I'm doing. Nobody knows what they are doing.

I know all the mistakes I made and I'm trying to use them to be better this time. I don't have it all figured out, this is a big reason why I'm sharing stuff in public!

I spent almost 2 years consuming an insane amount of information. Books, podcasts, videos. If a piece of content was about building a business or succeeding as an entrepreneur I consumed it.

It didn't help.

There are so many ways to start a business. There is content published daily about this topic. Is impossible to keep up with it and you can never get enough information that way.

So what do I tell people when they ask me how to get started? "Give up mate, is too hard"? Absolutely not!

I tell them what I would tell my past self if I could go back in time.

So here's my advice:

Learn as fast as possible.

Learning comes from 3 sources:

- learn from published material (books, videos, podcasts, etc)

- learn from others. There are tons of people like me sharing their mistakes and stories. Find them and consume everything they have to say

- learn from experience. Do something yourself. Make mistakes, try new things.

Here's the important part: Do all 3 of them at the same time.

If you spend too much time in any of the 3 above you'll end up nowhere:

- if you spend too much time reading or listening, you won't get first-hand experience

- if you spend too much time looking at what other people did you won't have the base knowledge about why they did it.

- if you just do something yourself you won't have any knowledge and make the same mistakes others have made.

Spending too much time in any section is a mistake.

Here's a concrete action plan.

Part 1: Pick 3 books about starting a business.

I’d recommend Million Dollar Weekend by Noah Kagan and the 2 books by Alex Hormozi. They have been the most impactful to me. Read all of them (use audiobooks for extra speed). Those books don't have all the answers, they have enough pointers for you to focus on what matters.

Part 2: Learn stuff from people like me.

Find people who are willing to share their journey. Subscribe to their newsletter (mine too please) and consume everything they have to offer. Think of them as somebody telling you the fire is hot without you having to touch a fire in the first place. You'll learn about silly mistakes you can easily avoid and jumpstart your journey.

Also talk with friends, family, your boss, whoever you can find that can give you advice.

Part 3: Do something yourself

Have a simple aim: earn 100£/$/€ on your own.

Don't focus on the big money, start super small. Do anything you can to get there and find a way to make that a monthly income. Don't start with external capital (e.g. borrowing £50 to try making £100)

Do a bit of each part every single day. Don't read 3 books THEN find people that share lessons and THEN do something yourself.

Read a bit of a book, and on the same day ask people about their journey.

The same day start thinking: how can I earn £100?

This is what I'd tell my younger self.

What do you think? Is it good advice? Do you have anything else or a different take? Let me know in the comments!

Progress update

- I'm currently validating a hypothesis. "People are willing to pay for a product that makes it easy to create high-converting landing pages."

- I have recruited 8 people to do a user interview, and I've interviewed 6 people so far.

- I'm starting an MVP, yesterday I published https://landingpagewizard.co/ simple page with a link to my Calendly.

- I'm shipping part of the MVP daily. Today I am figuring out how people can create their landing pages, hosted by me.

Celebrations

More legends have joined the group!

- I have 15 subscribers to the newsletter https://welldoitlive.beehiiv.com/

- My LinkedIn newsletter has 108 subscribers at the time of writing

I cannot thank you all enough for your help and support, you're legends!