What's New: Stop setting deadlines

(from the latest issue of the Indie Hackers newsletter)

Stop setting deadlines. Unless...

• You can accurately estimate time costs. This is difficult to do, so instead of setting deadlines, focus on setting a timeline to review and refine.
• Would your business still go on if something happened to you? Future-proof by focusing on SEO, separating finances, and automating payouts.
• 1.5K unique visitors and 100+ interested users. Saïd Ait Mbarek built his launch platform in public in 3 weeks, with a major focus on community.

Want your product seen by nearly 85,000 founders and businesses? Sponsor an issue of the Indie Hackers newsletter. Choose between 3 affordable tiers that can fit almost any budget.

Stop Setting Deadlines ⏳

by T

In today's fast-paced world, deadlines have become an integral part of our lives. We often find ourselves setting deadlines for every task we take on. However, more often than not, we realize that these deadlines are impossible to meet, resulting in constant changes and adjustments. It's a frustrating cycle that often leaves us feeling overwhelmed and stressed.

I have not set deadlines for years. Here's my method for handling expected project completion dates!

Setting deadlines requires accuracy in time costs

There are only two scenarios in which you can estimate the time cost of a task accurately:

1. If you or your team has completed a similar task before, and there are little to no changes for the next task.

2. If you can predict the exact time it will take. However, things are subject to constant change. Even seemingly similar tasks have their own unique challenges and variables, making accurate time estimation difficult.

So, if relying on deadlines proves to be ineffective, what is the alternative?

From deadline to expectation

The method is straightforward: Instead of setting a firm deadline, focus on establishing an expected time point for review and refinement. For example, if you anticipate a task will take 30 days to complete, schedule a review after the first five to seven days. During this review, assess the progress made, evaluate the conditions, and refine your roadmap accordingly. Update the expected completion date based on the new information gathered, and set the next review date.

By adopting this method, you are allowing for flexibility and adaptability within your workflow. It acknowledges the inherent uncertainties and changes that come with any project or task. It allows you to continuously refine your approach, make necessary adjustments, and stay on track, without the added pressure of rigid deadlines.

Relying solely on deadlines for task management is not an effective approach, particularly for small teams and solo founders!

If you'd like to read more of my blog posts, check them out here.

Discuss this story.

Level Up Your Brand With Eye-Catching Design 🤩

This issue is sponsored by 99designs

Did you know that 78% of business owners say their visual brand positively impacts revenue growth?

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Take me to the designers!

Future-Proofing Your Product 🔮

by Dmytro Krasun

Even if I die, my product, ScreenshotOne, will keep working for years. Here's how I set things up to ensure this!

Future-proofing my product

1. I ordered, and now use, a separate credit card with a high limit for all expenses related to it.
2. I automated payouts to the same bank account that the credit card is charged from.
3. I optimized expenses and increased the profit margin to ensure that the project is profitable, and will stay profitable when growing.
4. I built a Kubernetes cluster with autoscaling, and set up Google Cloud Run as a backup. In addition to that, there is a GPU server for backup, and for customers with GPU rendering demands.
5. I wrote a lot of content to make sure that the site stays relevant on Google for years.
6. ScreenshotOne is one of the answers in ChatGPT and other LLMs for the question of the best solution in my niche.
7. I partially open sourced parts of the product. I plan to open source more, if possible.
8. I have found affiliate partners who promote the product for me.

What's next

I just crossed $5K MRR, and SEO is my only focus right now, as far as my marketing strategy.

Ideally, I want to create autonomous AI agents that quickly respond to customer issues by updating the code. But that's a long way off. Since I strive for operational excellence and efficiency, I am curious about when I will need to hire. I'm currently not overwhelmed by support issues and tasks, but that may change one day.

As far as multi-language SDK support, I built it manually, and I have an OpenAPI specification. But if I were to start again, I would just generate from scratch.

For more about my journey check out my newsletter!

Discuss this story.

In the News 📰

from the Growth Trends newsletter

🌎 A TikTok ban could upend the global app economy.

📰 Focus on these things if you're trying to grow a newsletter.

💲 Link to your product here. Our most affordable ad.

💻 How to sync offline events using the Conversions API.

🤖 Improving ChatGPT's answers with chain of thought prompting.

📱 Teenagers aren't the only ones with a screen time problem.

Check out Growth Trends for more curated news items focused on user acquisition and new product ideas.

Validating and Launching Quickly 🚀

by Saïd Ait Mbarek

I came up with the idea for my product, Microlaunch, on January 1. Microlaunch is a launch platform that focuses on gaining more input from product makers than product consumers.

Fast early validation

First, we collectively decided on a catchy name, and bought the domain. Then, I crafted a quick logo on Figma. That took me 10 minutes.

Our value props include more maker-friendly features, less unfair competition, fewer bots, a meaningful ranking system, and a new way to discover hidden gems.

I talked to folks on X about the idea, and it garnered some interest.

Shipping and marketing in public

After sharing the concept, the first product iterations created a real sense of community on social media (mostly X):

The whole shipping process took three weeks. As for marketing, I actively promoted my product on X daily, and started creating a community of core adopters around it. Transparency plays an important role in attracting people who are willing to be involved, so I decided to build the platform in public.

I also decided not to neglect SEO. Since my stack includes Next.js, I ensured my pages were properly generated and crawled by search engines.

I deployed the whole thing last month:

Results

This is where we are currently:

• Over 100 product makers and startups submitted their products.
• 41 accepted.
• 5K+ visits.
• 1.5K+ unique visitors on the platform.
• Traffic starting to build up.
• SEO foundations set up.

This is exciting, and I'm committed to making it the best place around for makers! We launched on Product Hunt on March 5. We would greatly appreciate your support!

Discuss this story.

The Tweetmaster's Pick 🐦

by Tweetmaster Flex

I post the tweets indie hackers share the most. Here's today's pick:

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Special thanks to Jay Avery for editing this issue, to Gabriella Federico for the illustrations, and to T, Darko, Dmytro Krasun, and Saïd Ait Mbarek for contributing posts. —Channing