I tried ShipFast...and Failed.

Summary

The video discusses the 'ship fast' movement in the dev community, where developers create minimal viable products (MVPs) to quickly validate app ideas. The narrator, a software engineer, shares their experience using Mark Lou's 'ship fast' template to build an affiliate link scraper. Despite the template's efficiency, the project's complexity led to its abandonment, highlighting the challenges of rapid MVP development without compromising on quality or user experience. The narrator reflects on the balance between speed and passion in project development.

Takeaways

• 🚀 The 'ship fast' approach in the dev community involves creating minimal viable products (MVPs) with a single feature and a simple paywall to quickly validate app ideas in the market.
• 💡 The goal is to minimize time and resources spent on an idea that may not be successful, allowing developers to pivot quickly if the MVP doesn't gain traction.
• 🤔 The speaker expresses skepticism about building a sustainable business with 'ship fast' products, especially if they lack passion for the projects and find the process unfulfilling.
• 🌐 Successful 'ship fast' entrepreneurs like Mark Lou have a significant online presence, which raises questions about the feasibility of the approach for developers without a pre-existing audience.
• 🛠️ The speaker purchased Mark Lou's 'ship fast' template to streamline the development process, despite initial hesitations about its quality due to the creator's self-proclaimed lack of development skills.
• 🔍 The speaker's project idea was to create an affiliate link web scraper, which was believed to be a useful tool for affiliate marketers based on insider knowledge.
• ⏱️ The development of the affiliate link scraper took 15-20 hours, highlighting the time-saving aspect of using a template for the 'ship fast' methodology.
• 🛑 The project was ultimately shelved due to technical limitations, such as the need for a long-running web scraping script that was incompatible with the 'ship fast' deployment strategy.
• 💡 The experience taught the speaker the importance of aligning the project's technical requirements with the 'ship fast' philosophy and the potential pitfalls of not managing user expectations properly.
• 📉 The speaker ended up with a financial loss from the template purchase and domain registration, but views it as a learning experience and an investment in future projects.
• 🔄 The speaker is still considering a middle ground between 'ship fast' and more developed projects, valuing the importance of passion and quality in software development.

Q & A

What is the 'ship fast' movement in the development community?

The 'ship fast' movement is an approach where developers aim to build and launch very small Software as a Service (SaaS) products with the simplest possible Minimum Viable Product (MVP) as quickly as possible. The goal is to validate the app idea in the market quickly, often using a simple payment wall like Stripe, with no free trials or complex subscription tiers.

What is the primary objective of the 'ship fast' philosophy?

The primary objective of the 'ship fast' philosophy is to validate app ideas in the market as quickly as possible to avoid spending significant time and resources on an idea that may not be successful. If the MVP does not attract paying customers, it is deemed not worth pursuing, minimizing the loss of time and effort.

What are the speaker's initial thoughts on the 'ship fast' approach?

The speaker is initially attracted to the 'ship fast' approach due to their inclination towards having a 'move fast and break things' mentality. However, they express skepticism about the sustainability of a business built on quickly launching minimally viable products without a strong personal connection or challenge.

Who is Mark Lou and what is his role in the 'ship fast' community?

Mark Lou is a well-known influencer in the 'ship fast' community, making tens of thousands of dollars per month from his mini SaaS products. However, a significant portion of his profit comes from selling a project template to his audience, which raises questions about the replicability of his success without a pre-existing online presence.

What skepticism does the speaker express regarding success without a pre-existing online audience?

The speaker is skeptical about whether it's possible to be successful with the 'ship fast' method without a pre-existing online audience, such as a YouTube channel or Twitter presence. They question if simply launching new projects on platforms like Product Hunt for marketing would be sufficient for success.

What did the speaker purchase and why?

The speaker purchased Mark Lou's 'ship fast' template, despite initial hesitation due to Mark's self-proclaimed lack of development skills. They decided to buy it because it uses TypeScript and Superbase, which the speaker finds useful, and they believed it could save them time, especially with the landing page and copywriting aspects.

What was the speaker's project idea using the 'ship fast' template?

The speaker's project idea was to build an affiliate link web scraper, an aggregation tool for affiliate links across the web. They believed this could be a useful tool for people working in affiliate marketing.

Why did the speaker's affiliate link web scraper project not work as a 'ship fast' product?

The affiliate link web scraper project did not work as a 'ship fast' product because the web scraping script took too long to run (an hour), and optimizing it would have violated the 'ship fast' principle. Additionally, hosting such a long-running job on a platform like Vercel, which is typically used for 'ship fast' products, was not feasible, and managing task status on the front end was necessary for a good user experience.

What was the speaker's conclusion about the 'ship fast' approach after their failed project?

After their failed project, the speaker concluded that they might prefer a more balanced approach, working on projects they are passionate about and building them to a certain extent before launching. They believe that even if a fast-ship software fails, it's unclear whether people might have liked the idea more if more care had been put into it.

What financial outcome did the speaker experience with their 'ship fast' project?

The speaker ended up with a negative financial outcome of $180 after spending $170 on the 'ship fast' template and $10 to register a domain for their failed project.

What is the speaker's current status and future plan regarding the 'ship fast' approach?

The speaker is currently working on a more established startup, which is taking up most of their free development time. They plan to keep their audience updated on their progress and will consider trying another 'ship fast' project in the future.