Day 831 - What if you had to start from zero all over again? - https://golifelog.com/posts/what-if-you-had-to-start-from-zero-all-over-again-1681183399692
Seeing how some indie hackers' MRR went from profitable to [ZERO](https://twitter.com/maximehugodupre/status/1645096979649769476) were heart-breaking to watch. These were the folks who built Twitter tools on top of the Twitter API, especially Twitter analytics tools. Almost overnight, their developer accounts were suspended, or they closed it themselves due to the ridiculous price hike.
Platform risk is so effing real.
Seeing this play out got me thinking: *What if this same thing happened to me?*
Even though I don't build Twitter tools, there's a thousand scenarios an existential rug pull can happen:
- Your cloud hosting platform deletes your servers for no reason (happened to someone recently on Heroku).
- The critical infrastructure that your business depends on could suddenly raise prices to the point that it makes your business untenable (Bubble, Twitter API are recent examples).
- You somehow got an unknown wave of chargebacks, and banks and credit card networks decide to blacklist you, and you can no longer use Stripe or any payment platform.
- Your domain name provider accidentally expires your domain (yes GoDaddy seems to do that) or decide to ban it and you lose all the page rank and SEO juice you built up.
- You get into an accident or contract some illness/health condition, and become unable to work for in medium term (risk of being solopreneur).
- The platforms you build on (Apple App Store, Android Play Store), could ban you for reasons that are unclear. Same with your distribution channels (ad accounts getting banned for no reason are commonplace, and an existential crisis if you heavily depend on it, e.g. ecommerce).
- A VC-funded competitor enters the market and poaches all your customers away.
- Macro economic issues like recession or some major crisis (e.g. pandemic) changes customer behaviour drastically (e.g. F&B all struggled to survive in the age of lockdowns).
Just a quick thought experiment: What if this happened and I have to start from zero all over again? What can I do to reduce chances of rug pulls happening, and if it does, what can I can to lessen the impact?
- **Diversify.** Sure, concentration builds wealth, but diversification builds resilience. Focus on 1, but no harm building up 1 or 2 more side projects. You can re-start a new business yes if the current one fails, but the incubation period might be long. Easier to not lost momentum by shifting to something already running.
- **Backups.** Keep multiple backups for your data, have ready alternatives for your critical infrastructure (set up secondary databases on Render on top of being on Heroku, be on more than one payment platform, like Stripe and Lemon Squeezy).
- **Test new ideas constantly.** Going all in on 1 business makes a hidden assumption – that the situation your business is in is stable and unlikely to change. Then when things go from stable to chaos, you're caught blindsided and not sure where to even re-start from. Constantly tinkering with new ideas, keeping the entrepreneurial spirit alive, might help counter that blindside. You have ready ideas and motivation to hustle all over again, plus all the practice from starting from zero for new ideas.
- **Keep tabs on the pulse of your industry.** Prepare. Reading the experiences of those Twitter tools who survived the axe (like Hypefury), they started preparing way ahead, before things went sideways. They spoke to Twitter directly, got on whitelist for the new Enterprise plan, and paid immediately way before the deadline. I read that and I was impressed by their foresight. Only the paranoid survives.
- **Don't overthink it**, create undue anxiety. Being preapred is all good, but there's a million possible scenarios. Spending too much time and effort in remote possibilities is a huge time and emotional suck. It's a good reminder to myself that we need to prioritize because there's so much you can do to be prepared. Almost too much. Overthinking it is pointless too. This entrepreneurship game is something you can't be 100% prepared for.
*What else did I miss? What would you do if you had to start from zero again?*
Platform risk is so effing real.
Seeing this play out got me thinking: *What if this same thing happened to me?*
Even though I don't build Twitter tools, there's a thousand scenarios an existential rug pull can happen:
- Your cloud hosting platform deletes your servers for no reason (happened to someone recently on Heroku).
- The critical infrastructure that your business depends on could suddenly raise prices to the point that it makes your business untenable (Bubble, Twitter API are recent examples).
- You somehow got an unknown wave of chargebacks, and banks and credit card networks decide to blacklist you, and you can no longer use Stripe or any payment platform.
- Your domain name provider accidentally expires your domain (yes GoDaddy seems to do that) or decide to ban it and you lose all the page rank and SEO juice you built up.
- You get into an accident or contract some illness/health condition, and become unable to work for in medium term (risk of being solopreneur).
- The platforms you build on (Apple App Store, Android Play Store), could ban you for reasons that are unclear. Same with your distribution channels (ad accounts getting banned for no reason are commonplace, and an existential crisis if you heavily depend on it, e.g. ecommerce).
- A VC-funded competitor enters the market and poaches all your customers away.
- Macro economic issues like recession or some major crisis (e.g. pandemic) changes customer behaviour drastically (e.g. F&B all struggled to survive in the age of lockdowns).
Just a quick thought experiment: What if this happened and I have to start from zero all over again? What can I do to reduce chances of rug pulls happening, and if it does, what can I can to lessen the impact?
- **Diversify.** Sure, concentration builds wealth, but diversification builds resilience. Focus on 1, but no harm building up 1 or 2 more side projects. You can re-start a new business yes if the current one fails, but the incubation period might be long. Easier to not lost momentum by shifting to something already running.
- **Backups.** Keep multiple backups for your data, have ready alternatives for your critical infrastructure (set up secondary databases on Render on top of being on Heroku, be on more than one payment platform, like Stripe and Lemon Squeezy).
- **Test new ideas constantly.** Going all in on 1 business makes a hidden assumption – that the situation your business is in is stable and unlikely to change. Then when things go from stable to chaos, you're caught blindsided and not sure where to even re-start from. Constantly tinkering with new ideas, keeping the entrepreneurial spirit alive, might help counter that blindside. You have ready ideas and motivation to hustle all over again, plus all the practice from starting from zero for new ideas.
- **Keep tabs on the pulse of your industry.** Prepare. Reading the experiences of those Twitter tools who survived the axe (like Hypefury), they started preparing way ahead, before things went sideways. They spoke to Twitter directly, got on whitelist for the new Enterprise plan, and paid immediately way before the deadline. I read that and I was impressed by their foresight. Only the paranoid survives.
- **Don't overthink it**, create undue anxiety. Being preapred is all good, but there's a million possible scenarios. Spending too much time and effort in remote possibilities is a huge time and emotional suck. It's a good reminder to myself that we need to prioritize because there's so much you can do to be prepared. Almost too much. Overthinking it is pointless too. This entrepreneurship game is something you can't be 100% prepared for.
*What else did I miss? What would you do if you had to start from zero again?*