Hey everyone, welcome back to Software Social. This week's episode is brought to you by Refine, Colleen's product. You should go to hammer stone.dev, if you use Laravel Nova and buy it from Colleen. It will help you build advanced features in minutes with the drop in feature builder for Laravel Nova. I'm just reading from the homepage. It is finally allowing you to add the advanced filtering that has lingered on your roadmap.
So goes your hammer stone.dev, and buy it, I think it's a thousand dollars a year. It is the best thousand dollars you will spend today on filtering for Laravel Nova. Go do it. Um, by the way, if you, um, actually want to sponsor Software Social, you can go to software social.dev, and click on the sponsors tab. Uh, shout out to transistor.fm for making it super simple to add a sponsors page to our website.
Okay, so with those rather unusual sponsor note announcements that Colleen did not know about, uh, Refine. How's it
So I S I see that you have, um, that was really funny. So we're both live and I was trying really hard not to laugh, but I did not see that coming. So I see that you've seen our new homepage. What do you think?
I do. I see it. I like it.
Yeah.
so, I mean, so we like bought it. We haven't installed it yet. We will get to it. I promise. But, so it basically looks like, sort of like meta base filtering almost like if you used meta base.
I used metabase for, um, simple file upload.
it kind of reminds me of meta base, but easier to use, because I feel like every time I open metabase, I get like a little bit overwhelmed with like, oh, which database, my querying from like, oh God, make sure it's not the one that like gets overwhelmed easily. Like I don't want to accidentally run some query, that's going to be crazy. And like, so this actually, this is like, looks pretty, you know, pretty great.
yeah, I'm a meta base user, cause that's what I have right now for simple file upload. Hm. The diff, I mean, there's a lot of differences, but I'd say one of the big things about Refine is with meta base, when you go in, like, you know how you can ask a simple question or a complicated question to write custom sequel, all of that in the Refine products is extrapolated away.
So you would just log in and then you would immediately see all of your filters and be able to query your data more intelligently. And the developer who sets up Refine, can allow or not allow you to query based on certain things. So like for example, I cannot wait till I'm done with the rails version of Refine so I can put it on simple file upload because metabase drives me a little bit nuts.
Cause sometimes when I'm trying to get to, for me, like a really specific piece of data, for example, with simple file upload, I do this query where it's users that have signed up after February 4th because that's the day I started charging for, you know, and I want to separate them on by plan and I want to make sure the app is still provisioned and what else? And there's like other stuff I do in this query and it required me to write custom SQL.
And so with refine that's you wouldn't have to write custom SQL for that. You can just go in and define your filters in that way, so you can query based on all kinds of cool stuff.
Can You save a filter?
You can.
Oh, cool. Yeah, I don't see. Yeah, I don't see that in the screenshot.
you don't see that in the screenshot?
Yeah.
Well, this is our first. Okay. So let's talk about this site. I mean, this is our first pass at this.
Yeah, this is, like a, this is a big improvement over what I feel like the previous website was like, it was like a black background. It did not have this cool stripes style. Uh, like, what, what do we call this? Where, where there's like the diagonal shading? Um,
Oh, I see.
Yeah, no, like, it's, it's definitely much more polished looking.
Yeah, I, this, I mean, and this is, this has been a week, right? This is what we did in a week. So this is definitely a first pass of this site, but um, it's way better than it was last time we talked.
Yeah.
So here is what we think the next step is, so we built this site and if you click read the docs, it will drop you to the docs. And if you look in the docs and the left-hand side, there's the Nova, nova link, so you can see how to install it with Nova. So our next move, is w we have not sent an email yet to tell people, so we have 200 plus people. I could actually get the number, but it's something like that on a mailing list and we have not emailed them yet.
So the goal this week is to actually email people, telling them they can buy it.
So, and that list is like everybody who's ever been interested in hammer stone. Why is it called hammer stone? If the product is actually called Refine.
I don't know. That was before I joined the company.
Okay. Okay. So,
that came from.
um, So but like those people were, were in general, interested in Hammerstone and stuff, or were they interested in the Refine for Laravel Nova package.
So I don't actually know. Let me see if I can tell Aaron set this up. So this might be partially like people saw his talk and were just excited about Aaron and they signed up.
Well, that would be good because that was that those Laracon
Laracon. Right? So
right? Yeah. So that would be, that would be promising.
Yeah, so we have MailChimp set up and we, um, yeah, so I don't have great demographics on the people on this mailing list, but I do think we have them, like Laravel people, non-Laravel. And so this would go out, we don't know who's Nova and who's not Nova. I don't think, but this, this is, I think the next step is to tell the people on our mailing list, they can buy it and we haven't done that yet. We are going to do that like tomorrow.
Yeah, I guess not everybody using Laravel is going to be using nova, I mean, like if you use, Laravel kind of make sense to use Nova as your admin and like, it's great, but Yeah, I guess that'll be sorry, mitzi has just walked in. So we had been hoping to do like a live install and then for a variety of reasons that That is not happening tonight. Um, Hi. Yeah,
It's so late there you're such a trooper. Michelle, you got child to put to bed. You've had a long day.
over. COVID. Yeah.
You're getting over. COVID
So Refine, we will get it installed eventually. Um, no, but I actually like really want to use this,
Yeah, I think you're really gonna like it. I really want to use it. Like literally every rails project I've used, I'm like super excited. I mean, so our game plan, here's what we were kind of thinking as a game plan over the next week. So we'd get an email out. Okay. Oh man. And I want to talk to you about pricing. So are we ready to talk about the email we're going to send tomorrow or do we have other stuff to cover here?
I have other questions, but let's talk about the.
So, like I said, we haven't sent out an email yet. We think we are ready to do that. But one of the things Erin and I were talking about was pricing. And I had the thought that maybe we do what we're charging now is a thousand dollars a year for an annual license. I feel like that's kind of inexpensive for the quality of the. And so maybe what we do is we do like intro pricing, like for the first two months or something, we keep it to incentivize people to buy.
But also because I think a thousand dollars is cheap. So it'd be like, Hey, if you buy, buy, you know, June 1st, like we'll keep you out a thousand dollars. Everyone else is going to be on the new pricing structure, whatever we decide that should be
How many people have paid you so far. okay. So I will agree with you that your pricing should probably change, probably be higher. I think at this point it would be somewhat premature to announce pricing changes, right? You need to have some time to learn about who's using it and why they're using it and what is the value they're getting out of it.
And, you know, like thinking back to our episode with Ben, from Tupelo, for example, like, you know, they gave it, like, I think he said like at least six months with their initial pricing model and kind of knowing that wasn't going to be the longterm thing. And so, I do like the idea of being like, Hey, like it's a thousand dollars now it's going to go up in the future, but you don't really know when that is or like how it's going to change.
But like, I think, you know, it's a thousand dollars a year now, and if you know, you buy it now you'll always pay that. Right. Um, which I guess actually that is something that quite a few pricing, people would, would quibble with me on is whether you keep people always That same price or you adjust their pricing plans. Um, big topic of conversation. I know there's a lot of very respected people who have very different opinions on that and probably disagree with mine.
I would say like, just sell a bunch of this at a thousand dollars. See how much you can sell. See who's going to buy it right. Get them to be like rabid fans of yours that are telling everybody about it. To the point where you're like, we can't keep selling this thing at a thousand dollars a month because it's flying off the shelves and we've got so much demand and so many customers, and we can't possibly serve all of this at a thousand or $1,000 a year.
Right. Like, I don't know, get to like 30 or like 50 customers. And then, maybe, maybe think about it again, but like at this point, just focus on.
Okay. That sounds great. So let's talk about selling. So we're going to send an email out. That's the first step. I think what we're going to do, so you and I talked about is we shouldn't force people to talk to us as an onboarding step. So what we're in.
please. God do not force people. I have had two calls this week that were like, call us for demo or sign up, like, please. Please let people sign up without having to talk to you. Like
we
yes.
So what we're thinking of doing based on your, cause you basically said that last week too, you were like, no, no, no, no. Don't make me have a call. So I think what we're going to do is send an email out tomorrow to our Laravel people tell them it's available for sale and they can optionally book an onboarding call with Aaron and myself, if they need help getting it installed. And I think we're going to learn so much with that like first wave.
Yeah, I would, I would do that. Like, again, and this is something also that, you know, respected people are going to disagree with me on, right? I know some people who, you know, who forced the onboarding call or a force, an off-boarding call. Right.
Yeah, that's the worst. Those people are
Yeah. Yeah. We're not going to name any names for a very well-known company that started doing that after being beloved for a long time. But like, you know, if people want to do that, like they will do it, but like, isn't it better if they, if it's so easy to get started with, they can just install it and start using it. And then they tweet about how great it was and how easy it was to get started. Right?
You know, there's choices here and how you structure the business and how you structure the user experience. Right? The user experience is not just. Screenshot, I'm looking at of somebody having it installed in Nova. The user user experience is also how do I buy this? What is my experience like to buy it? How do I feel about. that? How do I feel about how quickly I go from deciding I want it to actually getting to use it, right? Like those things are user experience too.
And so I feel like that is, uh, a pretty important user experience decision. And I mean, it's, it's just the two, we got you guys, you don't have an army of sales people, right? Like you need people to like, love this and talk about.
Yeah, absolutely. Okay. And you know, our documents are incredibly extensive. So for the developer who just wants to get rolling, like he, or she should be able to do that you know, on their own accord, as they desire.
I feel like that's something you have learned from simple file upload. Like remember, you were like talking to people and at about what was holding them back before they decided to use it. And one of those key things. Oh, well, like, you know, where's the documentation, like, I just want to see how it works or the, the code pen, right? Like seeing it in action before you decide to install it.
And so I feel like I can really see that in this landing page that you have seen the importance of, like, if you're selling directly to developers to make it really easy for them to see what they are getting and how complicated is going to be for them to.
Yeah, it'll be interesting to I'm I'm super excited to send this email tomorrow because there'll be interesting, to me, if people are going to ask for, Hey, can I try it for so much, you know, XYZ time and things like that, because it is kind of a lot to ask someone to spend that kind of money without really fully comprehending the developer experience. So I'm just really curious to see what kind of responses we get.
Yeah. I mean, but like, thinking back to the episode with Ben, from Tupelo, I might be remembering this entirely incorrectly, but like there was one phase of there is where like, You had to pay like $500 for a one month trial of it. And like people put it on their personal credit cards cause they really wanted to try it so much. Right. So like, I think it's okay if in the beginning you have a lot of, people were like, Hey, I would love to try this, but it's just really out of my price range.
And be like, I can totally understand that I'm going to save your name on a list. I'll reach out when we have, you know, pricing that might be a bit more accessible for everybody. But, Yeah. I have this, just, you know, only deal with the people who want it so much that they're willing to pay you a thousand dollars a year for whom like, like you told me this thing was a thousand dollars a year and I was like, great, that sounds cheap. how do I pay you? Right.
You want the customers like me right now?
Right,
And there's time and space to have something that brings everybody else on board. Right. There's also the open source version. So. I feel like if people can't pay for it, they can just use the open-source version and like, you know,
Good
with their time instead. Right? Like that's, that's an option, right? Like this is that's the ultimate accessible.
What was I going to say? Yeah. So how do I, we're going to send an email, how else do I find customers, like you.
Oh, how do you find customers like me? That is a really interesting question. I feel like, I mean, I guess Aaron is, more in touch and like the Laravel of a world, right? Like this, like that is definitely his people. Um, I know he's, you know, definitely like built a reputation for himself in that world.
I mean, have you guys talked about doing any like advertising in terms of like, you know, or even just PR like, have you tried to see if you could get it mentioned on Laravel news or Like, has it officially launched? You're sending this email tomorrow,
tomorrow. I feel like we'll officially launch when we tell people we have not told people about it yet. So tomorrow that's why I'm asking. So I won't talk to you, you know, we won't record again for a week and in that week we want to start taking steps to launch in quotes. Right. We're not, you know, to, really start the business side of this, right? Like the focus now needs to be on selling this thing. So.
I mean earned media is always a good, good try. So I feel like it's worth, at least reaching out to Laravel news and S
Oh, Laravel hill news.
Yeah, Earned media. right. As opposed to like paid media. Right. So like earned media is, you know, journalist writes about you or, you know, a blog or something like that as most like paid media ads, right?
Right. I don't think we're, we're not gonna run ads in the first
Yeah. Yeah. But see, I mean, Laravel news or, you know, I imagine Aaron is going to be tweeting about it and you know, Maybe he can get some clutch retweets on that. Right. Cause I mean, he's so good at Twitter and he just like shows like, Hey, here's this really cool thing that I built. And then people like, whoa, that is like really amazing. He's just really good at that. I think he describes it as like nerd tweets, right. That are just, you know just like really cool stuff.
Not very articulative of me. so Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah. I don't, and maybe that'll like fine, but also like, I, mean, I'm sure there's people listening who use Nova at work, like your hand if you use Nova. If you're currently walking your dog, raising your hand, high five from me. Um, right.
There's probably people listening who used Nova, like either in their own businesses or at work and also for whom it is not a big lift to pay a thousand dollars a year for something that's going to make it much easier for them to like slice and dice their, their users. Right. literally, this is not a Halloween episode.
Not literally.
literally.
Um, yes, absolutely. That sounds, that sounds great. So I feel like in this next week, like, this is exciting. Like we're whatever you want to call it soft launching tomorrow. So
so
like in this next week,
is actually
tomorrow, April
four. So this, this airs on Tuesday, right? So this so this will have been last Friday.
That's right
we need to start talking about the future as if it's in the past.
think that's
This is getting all back to the future here.
oh my goodness.
At what point do you and Aaron get out of a DeLorean? That is your launch video.
Yes.
Oh, man. We're all thrilled. Okay. So I mean, I just, I seriously, this is a huge improvement, even from like what, like two weeks ago when I slacked you and I was like, Um, oh, no. It's cause you just told me, just totally, as an aside that you had this Nova thing when we were in California and I was like, what? You have a Nova thing that people can buy and you didn't even tell me. I was, I was mad, honestly, that you had something that I could buy that was relevant to me.
You know, I love that you have simple file upload. It's not super relevant to what we do, so I haven't bought it, but like, this is super relevant. And I was like, you didn't even tell me that I could give you money. Like, um,
It's so true. Yeah.
So, and then I think from that point, I like slacked you. And I was like, so how do we buy this? And like, basically got like a direct, you know, one of those, like, Stripe magic checkout links. Um, And, but like, there was like nothing on the Hammerstone website, so, and that was like Two weeks ago, maybe. So like, you guys are really on fire right now. like
we're moving.
that you guys are moving. Yeah.
are, we are moving. We are ready. Like the time is now. We are the next, honestly like this week, we'll be big Michelle, because if we have, okay, let me look up our account. How do I MailChimp? We have 277 people on our mailing list segment ref wait, let me look at the refined Laravel segment. That's probably. Oh, yeah, 399 contacts, 277 if I'm looking at this, right. I'm kind of new to MailChimp um, that are Laravel specific.
So, so I mean, if we got like, I mean, I just feel like in this next month, no week in this next week, like, it'll be really interesting to see what kind of response we get. And honestly, like it's easy for people to sign up for a mailing list, a whole different thing to buy a product. So. Yeah. I feel like a lot's going to happen
Have you set a sort of like stepped goals for the, like, just like for your own expectations of.
yeah, we want to sell five licenses a month.
Okay. So if you send out this email and then a week from now, you have sold five, then that would, that would be a big success
oh, that'd be cute. I feel like that would be a huge success. Like.
Cool.
That would be huge. Yes,
Okay, cool. Yeah, I think. You're you're moving. I feel like you've been kind of frustrated for a couple months because like, things kind of weren't happening as fast as you hoped for. And you felt like you had done like your, your part basically, like the rail side was done and you were, you weren't like twiddling your thumbs, but you almost were like getting a little bit antsy, right? It's like, well, what do. I do. now? And now it's like, what you do now is you grow into the next.
Phase of being a founder and, you know, go like, go beyond your own, you know, scope of expertise, right? And use you to just said like, you're new to MailChimp, but you're figuring it out. You're querying. It it's almost wish you could use your own tool for that. Right. Um, right. Like you're learning new stuff, like who wrote the.
We didn't we're going to write it tomorrow.
You haven't written the email yet.
That's correct. But yes. To your point. Yes, absolutely. I think that's Growing into the next stage of, of being a founder, which is all this, all this stuff, right? Like all of, all of it. So
I wonder, what, what do you feel like you have learned since you launched simple file upload like that you're bringing to this? I, you know, I mentioned the thing about the importance of the docs.
I mean, honestly, it's so many things, everything I have done for simple file upload, has prepared me for hammer stone. And I think, you know, fundamentally, I mean, it's just so many things, but I fundamentally, I feel like when you're first trying to launch a business as a developer, the reason so many people fail is because we fundamentally do not understand this concept of selling and marketing. Like we just do not get and. Over time, the more you do it, like this stuff is really hard.
I think I love this article by Alex Hillman about why so many people fail and it's because he takes developers who are at the top of their field and that he asked these people to learn an entirely new skillset and internally you kind of freak out and you're like, oh my gosh, how do I beat? I think it's called how to begin again or something like that. Like how do you become a beginner again? And all of these things like that are so hard. Like I'm a developer.
I can make anything, but ask me to give me like a computer and say, build a landing page like two years ago. That was just like, Hmm, what do I put on a landing page? Like I literally do not know. Right. Stuff like that. So you'd have this, or at least I would have this like fear, for example, of a blank page, no designer. That's like the scariest thing ever. And so I think those kinds of hurdles, which theoretically, like technically speaking, building a landing page is really easy. Right?
I know how to build what, like, like the technical, the code is like the easiest thing ever, but like, thinking about what do you actually put on it? What do you say? Do you use images? What kind of images do you use videos? All of that is really hard.
I think I need to dig up this article because I definitely feel that way about my Danish language classes. I relate very hard to this. Like I remember like being when I started the classes last I guess the end of last summer and like, I couldn't even, I think I had write some like basic email inviting someone to a party and I was like, oh my God, I speak several other languages and I'm literally an author in my own language. And I can't like say this really.
Like, I can't even interact with like a grocery store cashier or like write an email, and it. was like his tone. It was like, uh, it was like this like kind of personal, crisis of like you're very advanced in one area. And then going to something where you're just, kind of completely standing in the wilderness or less, and feeling like you have no map and no idea how to get out. Right?
It's so like, personally disorienting and for you, like, I think, you know, this is one of the reasons why it's so helpful to have a side project, even if it doesn't lead to anything, if you want to be a felt like it doesn't have to be your forever business, right. Or even like a business becomes a full-time thing, because you got to go through not only that sort of personal crisis side of this, right? With something that, that effectively, like, didn't matter as much, right?
Like it still matters. It's still running. You still have customers, but like you're, you're really all in on Refine. And I feel like you wouldn't have same level of composure and kind of clarity about it had you not gone through not only that like psychological experience, but also like, I remember when you made simple file upload, like you were done with the actual product months before somebody could buy it.
Cause then you were like, oh shoot, I got to build all this stuff users, yeah, I guess like building a way for someone to make a user account and like reset their password is totally different from how they actually use the, the thing, like the tool. And so, like, I think you had, uh, a certain amount of perspective this time and of course, you know, still, growth to be had as, as we all do.
Right. Um, but, but I think it was, I think it was valuable for you to like go through that beginning again, thing before this.
oh, incredibly. I think the biggest difference between when I launched simple file upload and launching Refine or hammer stone, the products called refine the businesses hammer stone is I feel like I know what to do now and that I don't have all the answers, but I have, I have ideas like before, when you start for the first time you try to launch a business, you literally have no idea what to do. Like, like you're just like, what the heck? And now I have, I feel like I know what to do.
I feel like I have all these ideas. I feel like, you know, I don't feel so lost. Of course I, you know, love to talk to people who have more experience that can give me other ideas, but mostly it feels intimidating because it's like, okay, we're going to try this thing. If this doesn't work, we're going to try this other thing. Like I have a whole laundry list of, of ideas.
You know, you need to do marketing now and you kind of, eat like, you know what some of the things you can do, right? Like, you know, you know, you need to send an email tomorrow, which is actually last Friday, hashtag back to the future. Right. you know, you need to send that email and like, you know, we're talking about like different types of media and like, for it, you know, trying to get people to cover it. And like, is easier, I think, to, to like riff on those ideas.
And you at least have a place to start with versus for simple file upload. It was where do I go? Like, Hmm, what, what is here? It was almost like you were in like Janet's void from the good place. I feel like I've mentioned Janet's void from the good place before. But, and you were just kind of just like standing there, like in what felt like nothing and everything at the same time, which is very scary.
uh, yeah, so I think that it's been great. I mean, it has unlocked so many opportunities for me and also just having so much more confidence. Just knowing different things you can do. Like you said, just, just having the knowledge of, okay, what does this look like? What does marketing look like? I don't know, but we can figure it out.
You know, you can figure it out at this point versus before you didn't necessarily know that you could figure it out.
Totally.
Well, I guess I should let you get back to work and, uh, write that email. Oh, we know no it's launching Thursday, right? No tomorrow, is not Friday.
Correct. You do have your days of the week wrong. I just didn't correct you because I know it's really late there. That's
my brain is not working. Like I can. Yeah. Um, okay. I'll let you get back to work for your launch. Everybody go to hammer stone.dev, if you use Laravel Nova, buy it. .If you don't use Laravel Nova. Nova. Please tweet about it. Um, help Colleen out here. And also if you want to sponsor this podcast, go to your software social, software social.dev/sponsor. And I should, I should honestly go to bed because I'm recovering from COVID. My brain is not working.
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