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I'm validating whether developers actually want this or if it's just me: Problem: I know personal branding helps career growth, but I have 500+ LinkedIn connec

I'm validating whether developers actually want this or if it's just me: Problem: I know personal branding helps career growth, but I have 500+ LinkedIn connections and zero posts. Writing "content" feels performative and time-consuming. Proposed solution: Daily push notifications with quick prompts ("What are you working on?"). Answer in one line. AI transforms weekly check-ins into platform-specific posts (LinkedIn, X, Mastodon, YouTube). You review/edit before posting. Target: Developers who know they should build a brand but hate "content creation" Pricing hypothesis: $29/mo for unlimited AI-generated posts Before I build this: - Would you actually use daily check-ins for brand building? - Is $29/mo reasonable for this? - What would make you NOT use this? Landing page: https://devcue.io/ https://devcue.io/ Validation survey: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdwOiLmEKVxmoSuqu0eQed6AFEKwAyNxvbzCNT0rIg9qNRF6g/viewform https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdwOiLmEKVxmoSuqu0e... Planning to kill the project if <20 people say they'd pay. Build if 50+ would pay. Brutally honest feedback needed.*

stephenlf 1y ago
I really like the idea of a daily check in, but I don’t want to sound like AI. I think the issue that many would face is that they just don’t have interesting things to say every day. But maybe a tool like this would prove me wrong and improve my self esteem at the same time.
- dlukdsza 1y ago
  This is exactly the concern I need to solve. Current plan: AI drafts use YOUR actual words/patterns from chech-ins, and previous posts, not generic templates. You review/edit before posting. Think of it as "auto-formatting" not "AI writing". Would that address the authenticity concern, or does any AI involvement kill it for you?
alganet 1y ago
Brutally honest feedback: if everyone has a brand, then it's not special anymore. What's the next move after that?
- dlukdsza 1y ago
  Fair point. I probably framed it wrong. I'm not trying to help everyone become a LI influencer, I'm solving for devs (like me) who know sharing work and ideas helps careers, but hate the performative "content creation" game. The check-ins aren't about building a "brand" in the influencer sense. It's more like "I solved X today", or "I used Y library". Meaning quick note -> formatted as a post as if you want to share. Does that change your take, or is the whole premise flawed?
  - alganet 1y ago
    I think it could be gamed, and quickly derail into influencer territory. What makes progress reports useful and career-helping are valuable notes, not game-like achievements. Those are hard to craft, and often not digestable to a larger audience. I'll think the next steps for you. If things continue the way they are, it's likely someone will try to skip the influencer stuff and create automated systems that evaluate whether someone is really making progress on something novel or not. That sort of thing could change the way we look at developer presence. In that world, you want to cultivate a smaller audience that can understand your notes, build upon them, and resonate value within that smaller audience. I'm saying a smaller audience because the larger it is, the higher the chances of it derailing.
    - dlukdsza 1y ago
      This is exactly the concern I'm trying to solve for—not against. You're right that optimizing for reach creates influencer theater. What if the product optimized for credibility within a smaller, technical audience instead? Instead of "broadcast to everyone," what if it was: - Daily check-ins capture real work - Weekly digest shared to niche communities (Dev.to, HN, technical Slack/Discord) - Audience: 100 devs who understand your domain > 10,000 LinkedIn randos Re: automated evaluation of real progress—that's fascinating. How would you validate "novel work" vs "performance theater"? Is it context (where shared), substance (depth of notes), or something else? Your smaller-audience point resonates. Would you use a tool that helped you share technical progress with ONLY people who'd understand it, while filtering out the influencer noise?
sillyfluke 1y ago
As a developer, I ignore LinkedIn posts. It's completely meaningless to me. Any developer brand that gets my attention are the good personal blog posts on non-LI domains the likes of which are often posted on this site. The more technical the better. I don't agree with the defeatist position that a personal brand is meaningless if everyone's doing it. The point is not to write generic bs or obscure configuration/installation pasta. Developers have different skill areas and different recruiters are looking for different key words. Emulate the likes of simonw for example (the quality level of the posts, not necessarily the soecific domain or content). If you have to put something in Linkedin I would just put excerpts and links from your dev blog.

stephenlf 1y ago

I really like the idea of a daily check in, but I don’t want to sound like AI. I think the issue that many would face is that they just don’t have interesting things to say every day. But maybe a tool like this would prove me wrong and improve my self esteem at the same time.

dlukdsza 1y ago
This is exactly the concern I need to solve. Current plan: AI drafts use YOUR actual words/patterns from chech-ins, and previous posts, not generic templates. You review/edit before posting. Think of it as "auto-formatting" not "AI writing". Would that address the authenticity concern, or does any AI involvement kill it for you?

alganet 1y ago

Brutally honest feedback: if everyone has a brand, then it's not special anymore. What's the next move after that?

dlukdsza 1y ago
Fair point. I probably framed it wrong. I'm not trying to help everyone become a LI influencer, I'm solving for devs (like me) who know sharing work and ideas helps careers, but hate the performative "content creation" game. The check-ins aren't about building a "brand" in the influencer sense. It's more like "I solved X today", or "I used Y library". Meaning quick note -> formatted as a post as if you want to share. Does that change your take, or is the whole premise flawed?
- alganet 1y ago
  I think it could be gamed, and quickly derail into influencer territory. What makes progress reports useful and career-helping are valuable notes, not game-like achievements. Those are hard to craft, and often not digestable to a larger audience. I'll think the next steps for you. If things continue the way they are, it's likely someone will try to skip the influencer stuff and create automated systems that evaluate whether someone is really making progress on something novel or not. That sort of thing could change the way we look at developer presence. In that world, you want to cultivate a smaller audience that can understand your notes, build upon them, and resonate value within that smaller audience. I'm saying a smaller audience because the larger it is, the higher the chances of it derailing.
  - dlukdsza 1y ago
    This is exactly the concern I'm trying to solve for—not against. You're right that optimizing for reach creates influencer theater. What if the product optimized for credibility within a smaller, technical audience instead? Instead of "broadcast to everyone," what if it was: - Daily check-ins capture real work - Weekly digest shared to niche communities (Dev.to, HN, technical Slack/Discord) - Audience: 100 devs who understand your domain > 10,000 LinkedIn randos Re: automated evaluation of real progress—that's fascinating. How would you validate "novel work" vs "performance theater"? Is it context (where shared), substance (depth of notes), or something else? Your smaller-audience point resonates. Would you use a tool that helped you share technical progress with ONLY people who'd understand it, while filtering out the influencer noise?

sillyfluke 1y ago

As a developer, I ignore LinkedIn posts. It's completely meaningless to me. Any developer brand that gets my attention are the good personal blog posts on non-LI domains the likes of which are often posted on this site. The more technical the better. I don't agree with the defeatist position that a personal brand is meaningless if everyone's doing it. The point is not to write generic bs or obscure configuration/installation pasta. Developers have different skill areas and different recruiters are looking for different key words. Emulate the likes of simonw for example (the quality level of the posts, not necessarily the soecific domain or content). If you have to put something in Linkedin I would just put excerpts and links from your dev blog.