Steering into the iceberg

What goes viral on LinkedIn =/= What works

I should quit LinkedIn.

Every time I log in, I see another piece of viral advice for founders that’s wrong and counterproductive.

Part of me feels like I should pick fights when I see something that’s clearly wrong. The other part of me thinks, “well, if there’s so much bad advice out there, maybe I can build a living off of good advice.”

At very least, I’ll call out the worst piece of advice I’ve seen in a while in this newsletter so you’re immunized against it.

I saw this post last week:

It had over 1,000 likes and 50 shares at the time I took this screenshot. It continued on for a few more paragraphs (and some fancy graphics) and didn’t get better.

I have two main problems with this post.

First, know what’s most important when you’re pre-revenue? Generating revenue.

There are far too many pretty products with no revenue out there. They die. Your product doesn’t have to be pretty. In fact, you want your product to be so valuable to your customer that design doesn’t matter. If you’re pre-revenue, go sell.

Second, know what doesn’t matter when you’re pre-PMF? Metrics.

There’s a nonsensical line of thinking that says you have to run surveys and prove some metrics to know you have product-market fit. Focusing on metrics prevents you from finding product-market fit. Instead, get a specific kind of customer to say “hell yes” and then figure out how to sell to all other customers like them. This is a qualitative exercise, not a numerical one.

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In other words, I disagree with everything about this post. Should I argue with stuff like this online? Or just keep fuming?