Message to find market
Getting hardware companies started is hard. Yap your way into it.
There’s a lot of latent talent capable of building incredibly important companies in the physical world. The problem: you can’t iterate on “what the thing is” and you have to be able to sell and position to talent, capital, and market well before you get start building. No technology advancement will make this easier! Here are the consistent pattern I find across hardware founders that I admire. 1
What’s your sentence: People will only remember one sentence, at best, about your company. What is it! How clear is it? Is it something that matters to them? Should they want to share that w/ someone in passing?
Map it out: Find the 50 people who matter and give them content worth sharing. Define your desired outcome with them. Know what they must believe, who influences them, and their information sources. Inject your message at leverage points.
You: Personal outreach works better than corporate messaging. Build champions by inviting feedback and co-creation. Use your personal accounts. Write under your name.
Set core principles. Then anything goes: Operate where your beliefs overlap with company relevance and audience values. Take strong positions within these bounds. After that, don’t set rules on what you let yourself speak about or on. Everything else is room for authenticity.
Name your opposition: A credible antagonist makes your mission necessary. Your success is predetermined by how necessary the market feels your mission is. Choose something tied to current sentiment to build momentum.
Alienate people: Reject preset cultural divisions. Draw boundaries around those you serve. Plan to alienate non-customers. Execute ways for your tribe to be excited about alienating others.
Earn attention directly: Your value comes from your message, not your investors. a16z invested cannot be what people remember about your company. But it’s great if they remember one sentence about what you care about and that a16z backed it up.
Better yet, if you don’t see anyone doing messaging well in a space you’re irrationally excited about, it’s an opportunity worth looking into.
The world’s going to turn over in a decade, which means that most anything that we take for granted won’t look the same. Here are a few examples of people doing this well for physical products.
Sam is building new battery and electric powered appliances for the home.
Jim is making parts at reliable speeds and predictable prices.
Augustus is making it rain when you need water most.
Zane is giving you large amounts of metal at upfront prices.
Shreyas is making a cheap phone you want to carry on the weekends.
I’m suggesting that building a hardware company might be as dumb as taking on a market where the discourse is stale, but it’s something that you and others might care about! The better you feel about executing the message, the more likely it’s something real. Get online, go to conferences, write long form, and just show up.
If much of what I’m saying sounds familiar, it’s because you’re familiar with Lulu and Rostra. Many of these ideas have been best expressed by them, and I bet many of the people who I’m learning from have been coached by them. I’d work with them on Going Direct.
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