Product People

1 hour 28 minutes
EP101 – Scott Young: teach yourself how to program, finally!
I've been trying to learn how to program since 1985. This past year, at 38 years old, I finally figured out how.
Questions we discuss in this episode:
- Is there only "one" way to learn how to code?
- Why is getting started SO HARD?
- How did Justin finally figure out a way to learn programming?
Show notes
- Get the book: Ultralearning
- Scott's blog
- PDF: The science of cycology
The latest from Justin:
- Want to start a podcast?
- My podcasting startup: Transistor.fm
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Listen to my startup podcast: Build your SaaS
★ Looking for a community of bootstrappers?
- Join MegaMaker Clu
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
7 August 2019, 1:00 am
1 hour 3 minutes
EP100 – James Clear: improving your life in 2019 with Atomic Habits
James Clear describes how you can improve your life, using small incremental steps that add up to big wins.
Questions we discuss in this episode:
- How does "what you repeatedly do" affect your identity?
- How does someone’s context affect their ability to set and maintain good habits? Are good habits only for people of privilege?
- How can you maintain habits for people with depression, anxiety or attention deficit?
- How to form habits when your schedule is not in your control? (if you have kids, etc...)
- If you do fall out of a habit, what should you do? Revive it, or let it go?
- What systems and tools can you use to help automate, facilitate or help ingrain healthy habits?
Show notes
- Get the book: Atomic Habits
- Get the habits journal
- Steven Pressfield: "Stevie Wonder’s territory is the piano. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s is the gym. When Bill Gates pulls into the parking lot at Microsoft, he’s on his territory"
- Seth Godin: "Who is it for, and what is it for?"
- Seth Godin: “People like us do things like this.”
- James Clear's AMA on Reddit
- Read James' blog: JamesClear.com
- James Clear: "Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become."
- Nir Eyal shuts off his internet every night
- James Clear: "When you're struggling with a new habit, your effort's not wasted, it's just being stored."
The latest from Justin:
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Podcast in 2019!
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Listen to my startup podcast: Build your SaaS
- Want to start a podcast?
★ Looking for a community of bootstrappers?
- Join MegaMaker Club
- Looking for your app's first 100 customers?
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
24 January 2019, 1:30 pm
1 hour 8 minutes
EP99 – Ben Orenstein's new startup is focused on pair programming
Ben is the co-founder of Tuple.app and is running a new course called Habits for Hackers.
★ Looking for a community of bootstrappers?
- Join MegaMaker Club
Show notes
The latest from Justin:
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Podcast in 2019!
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
2 January 2019, 2:30 pm
1 hour 11 minutes
EP98 – The hard truth about bootstrapping startups (Part 2 with Jason Cohen)
Jason Cohen asks Justin Jackson hard questions about his startup, Transistor.fm, and what it's going to take to go full-time.
This is the second half of our chat. Part 1 was really just setting the stage. Part 2 digs into the real-life challenges of bootstrapping a business.
★ Looking for a community of bootstrappers?
- Join MegaMaker Club
Show notes
The latest from Justin:
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
17 December 2018, 12:40 pm
32 minutes 47 seconds
EP97 – Can you bootstrap a company on the side? (Part 1 with Jason Cohen)
When you're building a startup you have these questions:
- Should I work on my startup on the side, and grow it slowly?
- Should I take investment and go full-time sooner?
These are the questions that have been circulating in my head over the past few months.
Which is why when Jason Cohen, founder of WPengine and someone I respect, replied to my tweet, I took note:
"It’s difficult to find successful companies where founders didn’t work 80+ hours and took longer than four years to get to $1M ARR. If you're two years in and you still need a day job then by definition it doesn’t have good fundamentals. I usually think of "$10k/month/founder" as a rough measure of whether you're ready for full-time. Saying that should take three years is wrong. It's hard to find that companies that live and took that long."

Today we'll be digging into that! (Check back next week for Part 2)
★ Looking for community of bootstrappers?
- Join MegaMaker Club
Show notes
The latest from Justin:
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
14 December 2018, 12:10 pm
58 minutes 4 seconds
EP96 – My secret phone call with Hamish
Hamish Macpherson is an engineer at Buffer, and was one of the first people to join MegaMaker.
★ Looking for community of bootstrappers?
- Join MegaMaker Club
Show notes
The latest from Justin:
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Snapchat: @mijustin
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
23 November 2018, 2:00 pm
1 hour 7 minutes
EP95 – "Programming's gateway drug" with Samantha Geitz
This is a great chat with Samantha Geitz, a Senior Developer at Tighten, and the founder of BetaFish.
Topics in this episode:
- Should "business/marketing" people learn programming?
- What's the difference between messing around and being a serious programmer?
- Do regular programmers Google for answers?
- Why English Majors can make great programmers.
- If you want to learn hard things, do you need to be in a classroom?
- Why should take a mental health day when you need it.
Announcement:
- Want to speak at a tech conference? I'm doing class called "public speaking for geeks." More info here.
Show notes
- Samantha Geitz on Twitter
- Tighten.co
- Battle.Tighten.co
- Samantha's new startup: BetaFish
- CoinPress.cc
- Samantha's blog post: "How I overcame my fear of public speaking"
Stuff from Justin...
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Looking for community? Join MegaMaker Club
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Snapchat: @mijustin
Thanks to...
- Podcast hosting: Transistor.fm
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
5 November 2018, 12:00 pm
57 minutes 17 seconds
EP94 – Does the old SaaS playbook still work in 2018?
So many great topics in this episode:
- Should developers learn design?
- Derrick's "viral signup" trick
- How important is a personal brand?
- How to promote your project (while you're still building it)
- Do software companies need to become more service oriented?
Announcement:
- I'm having a birthday sale! Go to megamaker.co/birthday and get up to 38% off Marketing for Developers, my books, and Product Validation Checklist!
Show notes
- This is the recording from the Art of Product Podcast. Full episode will be there!
- Ben Orenstein on Twitter
- Derrick Reimer on Twitter
- Derrick's new app: level.app
Stuff from Justin...
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Startup announcement
- How do you validate your idea? megamaker.co/validate
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Snapchat: @mijustin
Thanks to...
- Podcast hosting: Transistor.fm
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
11 June 2018, 9:15 am
57 minutes 42 seconds
EP93 – SaaS pricing with Patrick Campbell
I'm building a new SaaS in 2018 with my buddy Jon Buda called Transistor.fm. Now, we're trying to figure out our pricing. We're trying not to pretend we know everything there is to know about running a SaaS.
So, we wanted to reach out to some experts and get outside opinions about how to create our pricing tiers. So I asked Patrick Campbell, from Price Intelligently, to help give us some direction. He blew my mind. This conversation is incredible, you're going to get so much out of it.
Two announcements:
- Want to validate your product idea? Productvalidationchecklist.com is launching soon.
- Now is your last chance to get Marketing for Developers. Use the the code "summer2018" and get $50 off. In July, I'm taking it off my store so I can relaunch it in October. (If you buy now, you get future updates).
Show notes
- Jon and I discussed pricing on Build Your SaaS
- Patrick Campbell on Twitter: @patticus
- Patrick's free pricing software for SaaS: profitwell.com
- Price Intelligently's book
Stuff from Justin...
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Startup announcement
- How do you validate your idea? megamaker.co/validate
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Snapchat: @mijustin
Thanks to...
- Podcast hosting: Transistor.fm
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
1 June 2018, 3:00 pm
49 minutes 49 seconds
EP92 – 2018 MicroConf guide with Mike Taber
Mike Taber (Bluetick) and Rob Walling (Drip) started MicroConf in 2011 as a conference for self-funded startups. It's gone from just over 100 attendees to nearly 500. It's become the place for bootstrappers to hang out.
Get $100 off MicroConf Starter Edition

Go to megamaker.co/microconf or text "microconf" to (424) 247-5762.

Show notes
- Read the 2018 MicroConf Guide
- Register for MicroConf
- Get $100 off Starter Edition
- TED - how to make a great presentation
- DeckSet - make amazing slides
- Draftsend - Hiten Shah's new slidesharing app
- Mike Taber on Twitter
- Bluetick - Mike's software company
- The Startups for the Rest of Us podcast
Stuff from Justin...
- My new startup: Transistor.fm
- Startup announcement
- How do you validate your idea? megamaker.co/validate
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Snapchat: @mijustin
Thanks to...
- Podcast hosting: Transistor.fm
- Theme music: Striker-metal.com
★ Thinking about how to validate your product? megamaker.co/validate ★

🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
15 March 2018, 2:00 pm
58 minutes 29 seconds
EP91 – Josh Nielsen from Zencastr: software for podcasters
Josh started out trying to build a "GitHub for music." When that idea didn't pan out, he still wanted to do something with Web Audio and WebRTC. So he started building Zencastr, which gives podcasters the ability to record "double-ender" interviews in the browser.

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Show notes
"I asked a podcaster I knew how much he'd pay, and he said '$20 / month' so that's what I used for a price."
- Leave a review on iTunes!
- Zencastr
- Read Josh's MegaProfitable case study
- IndieHackers interview
- Follow Josh on Twitter: @joshontheweb
Want to contact Justin?
- Join Justin's newsletter justinjackson.ca/newsletter
- Send Justin a message on Twitter: @mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Instagram: instagram.com/mijustin
- Send Justin a message on Snapchat: @mijustin
Thanks to...
- Podcast hosting: Simplecast.fm
- Theme music: Striker-metal.com
🎙️ Podcast hosting is provided by Transistor.fm.
📺 Learn how to start your own podcast!
6 January 2018, 11:44 pm
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