Yeeesssss! I couldn’t agree more. Do the things that truly move the needle for you. Everything else is just noise.
If the goal is to sell, focus on evaluating feedback through that lens. Ask yourself whether the feedback helps you increase the likelihood of a sale. If it does, pay attention to it. If it doesn’t, it may just be a distraction.
"If you fall victim to every piece of misaligned feedback, there’s a real possibility of moving in the wrong direction."
This might just be be the most sound advice a solopreneur may hear this year.
I was recently pressure testing an idea using Reddit and learned an invaluable lesson about feedback.
On Reddit, being wrong in a comment costs nothing. There's no accountability for forming a bad opinion. A pithy "isn't this just X with extra steps?" gets more upvotes than a thoughtful analysis, which reinforces the behavior across the platform.
I had more than 5K views and comments across multiple subreddits and I tried my best to genuinely engage each user only to discover that the vast majority never even clicked through to view the app or experience the free trial, yet they still shared a snarky comment disguised as feedback. ;-(
This essay helped me think about the times when I’ve reacted critically to a creator changing their brand and I have a theory. I was following a YouTuber whose style was “talking head casual” and I could always spot his new videos on my feed because they were a simple screenshot of him in his cluttered office.
As he grew bigger, he outsourced his packaging to a professional designer and this titles and thumbnails suddenly started looking like every other large and polished YouTube channel. The change rubbed me the wrong way because I realized my brain had developed a heuristic about his channel - I had a visual cue to recognize his videos and the titles were actually descriptive of what the video was about.
Now my brain was being forced to develop a new pattern recognition heuristic for his content and to think about what his videos were about since the titles became mysterious and curiosity-inducing.
In other words, his changes had destroyed a brain shortcut I had developed and felt disruptive. It was like when you have a spot in the house where you put your car keys and one day your spouse moves them to a new spot.
We humans are creatures of habit so the inevitable criticism to your website changes probably has nothing to do with you or your website and everything to do with the “who moved my stuff” reaction.
This reminded me to “Never accept criticism from someone I wouldn’t go to for advice.” (Someone I go to for advice would first know what I was trying to achieve. )
Yeeesssss! I couldn’t agree more. Do the things that truly move the needle for you. Everything else is just noise.
If the goal is to sell, focus on evaluating feedback through that lens. Ask yourself whether the feedback helps you increase the likelihood of a sale. If it does, pay attention to it. If it doesn’t, it may just be a distraction.
Yep. It’s good to get the feedback, but it’s better to know what to do with it.
Yep! And it takes effort to tell the difference.
This is a strong distinction.
Criticism shows up fast because it is easy.
Real results take longer because they require consistency, patience, and a system that keeps working after the first reaction fades.
That’s right.
"If you fall victim to every piece of misaligned feedback, there’s a real possibility of moving in the wrong direction."
This might just be be the most sound advice a solopreneur may hear this year.
I was recently pressure testing an idea using Reddit and learned an invaluable lesson about feedback.
On Reddit, being wrong in a comment costs nothing. There's no accountability for forming a bad opinion. A pithy "isn't this just X with extra steps?" gets more upvotes than a thoughtful analysis, which reinforces the behavior across the platform.
I had more than 5K views and comments across multiple subreddits and I tried my best to genuinely engage each user only to discover that the vast majority never even clicked through to view the app or experience the free trial, yet they still shared a snarky comment disguised as feedback. ;-(
Opinion matters but we should be clear with our outcomes.
"Criticism shows up fast. Real results show up slowly."
Seven words that every creator needs tattooed somewhere visible.
Sounds like a grounded take on modern work life
This essay helped me think about the times when I’ve reacted critically to a creator changing their brand and I have a theory. I was following a YouTuber whose style was “talking head casual” and I could always spot his new videos on my feed because they were a simple screenshot of him in his cluttered office.
As he grew bigger, he outsourced his packaging to a professional designer and this titles and thumbnails suddenly started looking like every other large and polished YouTube channel. The change rubbed me the wrong way because I realized my brain had developed a heuristic about his channel - I had a visual cue to recognize his videos and the titles were actually descriptive of what the video was about.
Now my brain was being forced to develop a new pattern recognition heuristic for his content and to think about what his videos were about since the titles became mysterious and curiosity-inducing.
In other words, his changes had destroyed a brain shortcut I had developed and felt disruptive. It was like when you have a spot in the house where you put your car keys and one day your spouse moves them to a new spot.
We humans are creatures of habit so the inevitable criticism to your website changes probably has nothing to do with you or your website and everything to do with the “who moved my stuff” reaction.
This reminded me to “Never accept criticism from someone I wouldn’t go to for advice.” (Someone I go to for advice would first know what I was trying to achieve. )