Build In Public

Building in public is a powerful marketing approach that turns your product development process into a series of engaging content opportunities. Instead of keeping your work under wraps until launch day, this tactic encourages you to share your journey openly, from ideation to implementation. It's about bringing your audience along for the ride, sharing insights, challenges, and victories as they happen.

This strategy flips the traditional launch model on its head. Rather than putting all your eggs in one basket with a single, high-stakes product announcement, building in public allows you to create multiple touchpoints with your audience throughout the development process. Each update, blog post, or social media share becomes a chance to attract new customers and engage existing ones.

The beauty of building in public lies in its versatility and low-effort, high-impact nature. You're already doing the work of creating your product or feature, so sharing that process doesn't require a significant additional time investment. Yet, the potential rewards are substantial: increased visibility, stronger customer relationships, and valuable feedback that can improve your final product.

Moreover, this approach fosters transparency and authenticity, two qualities that modern consumers highly value. By pulling back the curtain on your process, you're not just marketing a product – you're building trust and credibility with your audience. This can lead to a more loyal customer base and a stronger, more engaged community around your brand.

Why this works

Building in public works because it taps into several powerful psychological and marketing principles:

1. Transparency builds trust. By sharing your process, challenges, and decision-making, you're demonstrating honesty and authenticity. This openness can significantly boost credibility with potential customers.

2. Frequent touchpoints increase engagement. Regular updates create multiple opportunities for your audience to interact with your brand, keeping you top-of-mind and fostering a sense of connection.

3. FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) drives interest. As people follow your journey, they become invested in the outcome, creating anticipation for your product launch.

4. Social proof accumulates over time. Each milestone you share acts as evidence of your progress and expertise, gradually building social proof.

5. Feedback loops improve the product. Sharing early and often allows you to gather valuable input from potential users, helping you refine your product before launch.

6. Content creation becomes effortless. Your development process naturally generates content ideas, reducing the effort needed for marketing.

7. SEO benefits compound. Consistently publishing relevant content improves your search engine rankings over time.

8. Community building happens organically. Regular sharing fosters a sense of community among followers who are interested in your journey.

9. Storytelling creates emotional connections. Sharing your ups and downs makes for compelling narratives that resonate with your audience.

10. Launch day amplification. When you finally launch, you'll have an engaged audience ready to spread the word, amplifying your reach.

Examples of effective "build in public" strategies:

• SaaS company. A project management tool shared weekly development updates on Twitter, turning followers into beta testers and eventually paying customers.

• Marketplace app. An online learning platform documented their tech stack decisions on their blog, attracting both potential instructors and students.

• Digital product creator. An ebook author shared daily word counts and writing tips, building an audience eager to purchase the finished product.

• Ecommerce store. A sustainable fashion brand documented their fabric sourcing journey on Instagram, educating customers and justifying premium pricing.

By consistently sharing your progress, you're not just marketing a product – you're inviting your audience to be part of your story, creating a powerful connection that can translate into long-term customer loyalty and business success.

How you can steal this

Here's how you can implement a "build in public" strategy for your internet business:

1. Choose your channels. Decide where you'll share updates. This could be Twitter, LinkedIn, a blog, or a newsletter. Pick platforms where your target audience is active.

2. Set a sharing schedule. Commit to regular updates. This could be daily tweets, weekly blog posts, or monthly email newsletters. Consistency is key.

3. Document your process. Keep a running log of your work, decisions, and challenges. This becomes your content bank for future sharing.

4. Share milestones and metrics. Celebrate your wins, no matter how small. Hit 100 users? Share it. Reached $1000 MRR? Let people know.

5. Be honest about challenges. Don't shy away from sharing setbacks. Your audience will appreciate the authenticity and may offer valuable advice.

6. Involve your audience. Ask for feedback on features, design choices, or pricing models. This creates engagement and helps validate your decisions.

7. Repurpose your content. Turn a Twitter thread into a blog post, or vice versa. Extract key points from a long-form article for social media snippets.

8. Use visuals. Share screenshots of your work-in-progress, graphs of your growth, or behind-the-scenes photos of your team.

9. Tell stories. Frame your updates as narratives. What problem were you trying to solve? What did you learn? How did you overcome obstacles?

10. Leverage different content types. Mix it up with text posts, images, videos, and even live streams for major milestones or Q&A sessions.

11. Create a hashtag. Use a consistent hashtag for your build-in-public journey. This makes it easy for followers to track your progress.

12. Engage with your community. Respond to comments, answer questions, and participate in relevant discussions. Building relationships is crucial.

13. Share your tech stack. Discuss the tools and technologies you're using. This can attract other developers and potential collaborators.

14. Offer sneak peeks. Give your audience exclusive previews of new features or products. This creates anticipation and makes them feel special.

15. Document your learnings. Share insights from books, courses, or mentors that are helping you on your journey. This adds value for your followers.

16. Be vulnerable. Don't be afraid to admit when you're stuck or unsure. Your honesty can spark helpful discussions and show your human side.

17. Create anticipation. Tease upcoming features or announcements to build excitement among your followers.

18. Share your roadmap. Let your audience know what's coming next. This gives them something to look forward to and shows you have a plan.

19. Highlight team members. If you have a team, introduce them and showcase their contributions. This humanizes your brand.

20. Celebrate your customers. Share success stories or case studies of how your product is helping real users. This provides social proof and shows appreciation.

Remember, the goal is to turn your product development process into a series of engaging content opportunities. Each update is a chance to attract new customers, engage existing ones, and build a community around your brand. By consistently sharing your journey, you're not just marketing a product – you're inviting your audience to be part of your story.

Examples of build in public

Here are some detailed examples of effective "build in public" strategies for different types of internet businesses:

• SaaS company. A project management tool startup shared weekly development updates on Twitter, including screenshots of new features, bug fix announcements, and behind-the-scenes glimpses of team meetings. They used a consistent hashtag #BuildingPMTool to make their journey easy to follow. This approach turned their followers into an engaged community of beta testers who provided valuable feedback and eventually became paying customers upon launch.

• Marketplace app. An online learning platform documented their tech stack decisions in a series of detailed blog posts. They explained why they chose certain technologies over others, discussed scalability challenges, and shared performance metrics. These posts attracted both potential instructors curious about the platform's capabilities and students interested in the cutting-edge tech behind their courses. The transparency also helped build trust with users concerned about data security and site reliability.

• Digital product creator. An ebook author shared daily word counts, writing tips, and snippets of content on Instagram Stories. They created a highlight reel dedicated to their book's progress, allowing new followers to catch up on the journey. The author also hosted weekly Q&A sessions about their writing process and research methods. This consistent sharing built anticipation for the book launch and created a ready audience of buyers who felt invested in the project's success.

• Ecommerce store. A sustainable fashion brand documented their fabric sourcing journey through a series of YouTube videos. They showed visits to organic cotton farms, interviews with fabric innovators, and the testing process for new eco-friendly materials. This content educated customers about the true cost and value of sustainable fashion, justifying the brand's premium pricing. It also attracted environmentally conscious consumers who appreciated the brand's commitment to transparency.

• B2B software startup. A data analytics company shared their product roadmap publicly on Trello, allowing customers and potential users to vote on feature priorities. They provided monthly video updates on YouTube, discussing progress on top-voted features and explaining any changes to the roadmap. This approach not only kept their audience engaged but also ensured they were building features their customers actually wanted.

• Subscription box service. A monthly tech gadget box documented their product curation process on TikTok. They shared unboxing videos of potential items, polled their audience on preferences, and even livestreamed meetings with suppliers. This behind-the-scenes content built excitement for each month's box and showcased the value subscribers were getting, helping to reduce churn and attract new customers.

• Open-source project. A developer building a new JavaScript framework used GitHub's project boards to publicly track issues and feature development. They wrote detailed explanations for major design decisions in the repository's wiki and actively participated in discussions on the project's Discord channel. This openness attracted contributors, accelerated development, and built a strong community around the framework before its first stable release.

• Fintech app. A personal finance management app shared weekly updates on LinkedIn about their journey to obtain necessary financial regulations and security certifications. They explained complex financial concepts in simple terms and discussed the challenges of building a secure, compliant app. This education-focused approach positioned them as trustworthy experts in the field and alleviated potential users' concerns about data safety.

By consistently sharing their progress, challenges, and decision-making processes, these businesses didn't just market their products – they invited their audiences to be part of their stories, creating powerful connections that translated into long-term customer loyalty and business success.