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My guess would be that the people you are trying to reach are not reading reddit nor Hacker News. In my experience, typical business folks are too busy runnin

My guess would be that the people you are trying to reach are not reading reddit nor Hacker News. In my experience, typical business folks are too busy running their business to look beyond their everyday problems. I have lost count the number of times I have come across people using a spreadsheet program as a form of database, e.g. for keeping track of customers and email as a hierarchical filing systems, etc. Perhaps you should read: "eMyth". The basic message is that most people are working "in" their business and not "on" their business. Which in turn means that only a tiny percentage of business owners would be even thinking about looking for some form of improvement. Lest I sound too negative. My advice is to get up from the computer and go and talk to small business people, e.g. networking events, chambers of commerce, etc.

whamlastxmas 7y ago
I agree this is likely a large contributing factor. I've done the whole networking thing a lot before and it's tremendously time consuming with very little to show for it. But I guess that's probably largely my fault in addition to probably going to the wrong sorts of networking opportunities
- CyberFonic 7y ago
  I agree networking events generally consume a great deal of time. Perhaps you could try to be a more strategic. That is, at least get an idea of what your idea client / collaborator would be like. For example, if you are interested in health and fitness, then make contact with SMEs who have gyms, sports stores, provide boot camps, etc. Still on that same track, google to find some forums and directories and find out who might be interested in your area. Ok, sport and fitness might not be your ideal, but the same principles apply to any general area. I firmly believe that you need to build up an interest in a specific domain/industry in order to find opportunities. The recommendation to scratch your own itch leads us to build stuff for other hackers/programmers and thus end up in a small and over-crowded market.

whamlastxmas 7y ago

I agree this is likely a large contributing factor. I've done the whole networking thing a lot before and it's tremendously time consuming with very little to show for it. But I guess that's probably largely my fault in addition to probably going to the wrong sorts of networking opportunities

CyberFonic 7y ago
I agree networking events generally consume a great deal of time. Perhaps you could try to be a more strategic. That is, at least get an idea of what your idea client / collaborator would be like. For example, if you are interested in health and fitness, then make contact with SMEs who have gyms, sports stores, provide boot camps, etc. Still on that same track, google to find some forums and directories and find out who might be interested in your area. Ok, sport and fitness might not be your ideal, but the same principles apply to any general area. I firmly believe that you need to build up an interest in a specific domain/industry in order to find opportunities. The recommendation to scratch your own itch leads us to build stuff for other hackers/programmers and thus end up in a small and over-crowded market.