While Ben’s on vacation, Derrick welcomes another podcast host who can commiserate with him about email automation.
Jane Portman is a UI/UX expert and consultant who hosts the UI Breakfast Podcast and co-founded Userlist.io. She describes what it takes to create a customer messaging tool.
Today’s Topics Include:
Product Priorities: Slow, steady, and quality
Lifestyle Business: Overall goal is to replace consulting with SaaS recurring revenue
Challenges: Limited development time and resources; slow growth rate to adopt mission-critical product
To Build, or Not to Build: Avoid feature creep by focusing on what to add or improve
Playbook Post: 10 steps to successfully position a product
Launch Process: People are waiting for the right time for the right tool for their business
Customer Conversations: Pre-product interviews about problem to be solved; followed by product demos to grant access to beta version for feedback
Finding Customers: Landing page, updates, stories, sign-ups, mailing list, and more
We’re out of Beta! Simple and straight-forward product launch plan and strategy
Generic Illustrations: Product design trend that has to end
Email Experiences: Educate people on how to ethically use email to serve their business
Links and resources:
User Onboarding: The Ultimate Guide for SaaS Founders (https://userlist.com/user-onboarding/)
UI Breakfast Podcast (https://uibreakfast.com)
Userlist.io (http://userlist.io/)
UI Breakfast on Twitter (https://twitter.com/uibreakfast)
Userlist.io on Twitter (https://www.twitter.com/Userlistio)
Behind the Scenes of Our Upcoming Public Launch (https://userlist.io/launch-strategy/)
How We Used April Dunford’s 10-Step Method to Overhaul Positioning at Userlist (https://userlist.io/positioning-overhaul/)
AoP Episode 91: Feeling Superhuman with Rahul Vohra (https://artofproductpodcast.com/episode-91)
Product Hunt (https://www.producthunt.com/)
Hacker News (https://news.ycombinator.com/)
Drip (https://www.drip.com/)
MailChimp (https://mailchimp.com/)
Humans of Flat Design on Twitter (https://twitter.com/humansofflat?lang=en) 
Paul Jarvis (https://pjrvs.com/)
MicroConf (https://www.microconf.com/)
Art of Product on Twitter (https://twitter.com/artofproductpod)
Derrick Reimer (http://www.derrickreimer.com) Website
Derrick Reimer on Twitter (https://twitter.com/derrickreimer)
Ben Orenstein (http://www.benorenstein.com/) Website
Ben Orenstein on Twitter (https://twitter.com/r00k?lang=en)
Tuple (https://tuple.app/)
Tuple’s Pair Programming Guide (https://tuple.app/pair-programming-guide)
StaticKit (https://www.statickit.com/)
Level (https://level.app/)
Level Retrospective (https://www.derrickreimer.com/essays/2019/05/17/im-walking-away-from-the-product-i-spent-a-year-building.html)
Level Manifesto (https://level.app/manifesto)