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Welcome to Volume 118!
We’re just two weeks into the year 2023—the holidays are over, the kids are going back to school, and the mid-winter vacations are being booked.
Coincidentally, it’s also right around this time people start lapsing on their New Year’s resolutions. Life gets busy and the old habits take back over.
(If you’re wondering, yes, I’m very much one of these people.)
That said, the allure of “this could be the year” is still in the air and there’s no better time to start (or restart) than now.
That’s why this week’s newsletter is all about ways to improve your performance over the coming year.
Whether you want to become a more impactful creator, improve the profitability of your company by bringing in more ARR, or understand what’s driving the success of TikTok, we’ve got all the info you need and more.
Here’s what we’ve got on the docket:
- Make 2023 the Year You Create Like the Greats
- Why More Tech Brands Need to Focus on Market Annealing
- What’s TikTok Got in Store for Us Now?
Make 2023 the Year You Create Like the Greats
Foundation’s latest foray into the study of culture-shaping content was actually inspired, years earlier, by this quote from Steve Jobs:
“Everything around you that you call life was made up by people who are no smarter than you.”
When Ross first heard this quote, he had a major realization: “creators” aren’t just the artists of the world — the writers, the painters, and the musicians. Really, they’re just people who dare to be great and use their craft to produce things with world-changing potential.
It might be something as profound and complex as the creation of a new AI technology; or as simple as writing a Tweet that inspires just one of your followers. Either way, we all have the potential to create things that shape the culture around us.
And, since you’re reading this, I’m willing to bet you’re someone who wants to:
Ross’s new podcast, Create Like the Greats, is dedicated to dissecting the aspect of being a creator that trips up most people on their journey to becoming a creator—the creative process.
Through the HubSpot Podcast Network, Ross pulls back the curtain on successful creators—across the tech industry and beyond. From the marketing strategies of major brands to his own personal tactics and self-talk, it’s a deep dive that you won’t want to miss.
Here’s a look at the episodes so far:
- How MasterClass Created a $2.8B EdTech Empire
- Thinking About Death Can Free Up Your Creative Process
- Deconstructing Adobe’s Massive $500B SEO Moat
- 7 Productivity Tools to Help You Leverage Your Creative Time
- Creating Sustainable New Year’s Resolutions and Other Habits
- Will AI Actually Take My Job?
Foundation Insider is live! Subscribe now for exclusive access to the next generation of our legendary case studies, tutorials, guides and research.🔍
Why More Tech Brands Need to Focus on Market Annealing
Whenever I’m looking for inspiring content from the world of startups and venture capital — or simply want a reminder that there are “levels to this game” — I check on what the good folks down at a16z are saying.
Andreesen-Horowitz never disappoints and this week is no different.
a16z General Partners Martin Casado and Peter Levine discuss an alternative mindset and strategy to the commonly used PMF approach; An alternative strategy with the potential to fast-track the transition from product to a low 8-figure ARR in early markets.
The approach is called market annealing.
In materials science, annealing refers to processes that alter the properties of a substance to make it more pliable. Typically metals.
Casado and Levine make the argument that many startups — particularly those dealing with unestablished, new, or changing markets — expend lots of resources forcing both their core offering and their unpliable market into something resembling product-market fit.
They refer to this expenditure of effort and resources as company-market annealing—market annealing for short.
Like the physical process it’s named after, market annealing is difficult and has few shortcuts. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be refined with steps and protocols.
In this deep-dive, Casado and Levine analyze how founders, sales reps, and marketers should navigate the go-to-market process to reach that $30M ARR milestone quickly and efficiently. Here’s a quick look at what they discuss:
- Find your GTM approach from the market itself
- Kickoff your growth to $4M ARR by leaning on founder sales
- Establish annealing quotas and scale sales strategically
- Focus on hiring product marketing generalists first
- Core messaging does not come from marketing
What’s TikTok Got in Store for Us Now?
I’ll be the first to admit that I am not the expert authority on TikTok.
Yes, I know it’s an important—even crucial—platform for brand growth and audience connection, but some things are best left to those who are plugged into the channel day-in and day-out. (Reddit, now that’s a different story).
Luckily, I’m just playing the role of facilitator today.
The ideas you’re about to read come straight from the horse’s mouth or, in this case, the kind folks at TikTok’s Creative Center in the form of their What’s Next for 2023 Trend Report.
Here’s what the team at TikTok’s Creative Center sees as the most important trends for social media marketers to be aware of going into 2023:
1. Actionable Content is King
TikTok is revamping the old saying “Content is King” with a simple, but powerful qualifier—actionable.
Even non-users like myself know that one of TikTok’s biggest draws is the prevalence of hacks and how-tos that users share with one another. There’s a reason that the platform is creeping up on Google as the top search engine for Gen Z and even Millennials: the algorithm works really well and the content is highly sharable.
Plus, the UGC video content makes it inherently actionable—with creators showing, not telling, their audience how to dance, cook, build, and more.
2. TikTok is the Joyful Social Network
From Facebook and Instagram to Snapchat and TikTok, it seems like every major news story about social media is doom and gloom. Even when said news story is delivered through social media.
There’s certainly a point to be made about online security, mental health, and productivity, but user polls often tell a different story.
Especially in the case of TikTok.
According to a study performed by Marketcast, 50% of TikTokers actually report a boost in mood and happiness after using the social platform. This is likely because the majority of videos focus on providing joy to others—whether it’s through humor, candor, inspiration, or disclosure.
3. Hyper-Niche Communities Share Ideals and Interests
TikTok’s massive audience may seem like a monolith from the outside, but the Creative Center team argues that it’s actually a mosaic of “hyper-niche” interests. And these interest-based groups are solidified into communities by ideals.
From #TiredMoms who want share time-saving hacks to #CozyGamers are looking for a more relaxed online experience, people have specific goals for their ideal online experience and the algorithm makes it easy to identify like-minded users.
No wonder TikTok is taking over social at a break-neck pace.
Check out TikTok’s What’s Next for 2023 report and get your social media strategy rolling now!
NEWS OF THE WEEK:
- Wallaroo cements their position as the official AI-ML partner of the Detroit Lions
- Khosla Ventures attempts to secure $3B in new funding
- Microsoft bets on AI tool ChatGPT with potential $10B investment
- Rippling’s attempts to become the “Salesforce of Employee Data” with Finance Cloud tool
- Looming CTO lawsuit coincides with Carta’s 10% lay off
BRAIN FOOD OF THE WEEK:
When I was scrolling through Forbes earlier this week, I came across an article title that made me pause:
I paused, not because I’m a particularly unlucky person, but because it’s a concept I’ve heard countless times but never put in such concise wording. This helped me understand a fundamental and obvious, though underappreciated, truth about luck.
It all centers around a specific action: positioning.
From the “go to the net” sayings in sports to the “right place, right time” and “if you want to win the lottery, buy a ticket” idioms, most sayings involving luck revolve around placing yourself in the place where success is most likely to occur.
Sometimes you do it knowingly, like when you buy a lottery ticket or crash the front of the net. Other times, like meeting a romantic partner at a coffee shop, it seems like a pure coincidence but is actually the result of positioning yourself in a social setting.
I know. It’s just a working theory.
Still, I’m going to focus a lot more on where I’m positioning myself this year — both online and in the real world.
OTHER NEWS OF THE WEEK:
- Bespoke insurance provider for SMBs, Superscript, raises $54M
- Tech slowdown looms as Salesforce cuts workforce by 10%
- $1B Web3 venture fund created by Venom Foundation and Iceberg Capital
- OpenAI monetizes with an experimental paid version of their ChatGPT
TWITTER THREAD OF THE WEEK:
Your SaaS Metrics Are Lying to You by Corey Haines
INTERESTING FINDS ACROSS THE INTERNET:
- Microsoft releases VALL-E AI tool that can reproduce your voice from just 3 seconds of audio
- In yet another groundbreaker, AI will be used as a legal assistant in court
- Gizmodo reviews the coolest and strangest gadgets from CES 2023
- Apple to take screen production in-house starting in 2024
IN CASE YOU MISSED SOME OF OUR GREATEST HITS:
- Content Distribution Strategy: What Is It & Why Do You Need One?
- 6 Ways Slack Ignored Traditional Marketing To Kickstart A $27B Valuation
- The Ultimate Guide to B2B Marketing on Linkedin
- How Miro Turned the Whiteboard into a $17.5 Billion Valuation
🎧 WHAT WE’RE WIRED INTO THIS WEEK 🎧:
This week’s round-up is brought to you by Ethan Crump — Jessica will be back next week for our regularly scheduled programming!
