Every Inc.

Forget category creation. Here's a bold truth: The most successful startups often start by disrupting existing markets rather than creating new ones. In his new piece for Every, James Evans shares why: • Guaranteed demand: Tap into established buyer needs • Easier marketing: No need to educate the market • Existing budgets: Customers already allocate funds for your solution • AI advantage: Leverage AI to outpace incumbents quickly You can win by being less different. Here’s how: https://bit.ly/3Yl3GQ9

Traditional advice says to "make something people want." But how do you actually do that? Consider: • People don't have a list of needs ready to share • Needs arise in context, not as fixed facts • The right prompts create needs in customers • Product development is about learning to generate the right sequences Become the kind of person who notices subtle details and evokes feelings in others. That's how you create products people didn't know they wanted. https://bit.ly/48kuBA2

When is it time to pivot your startup? 🤔 Last fall, my team and I faced a critical moment: Our decision-making app wasn’t gaining traction. After nine months of development, the growth wasn’t there, and we had to be realistic about the path forward. So, we made a bold decision: We pivoted. We shifted focus to Hoop, an AI-powered task manager that simplifies how people stay on top of their work. And it’s been a night and day difference. We went from people trying and ghosting the app, to being #1 AI product of the day on Product Hunt with customers who can't imagine going back to life before Hoop. The pivot wasn’t impulsive—it was based on a clear process that guided us through uncertainty. I'm excited to share the framework that helped us pivot with confidence on Every Inc.: 1️⃣ Is it time to pivot? Ask yourself: Is your product growing? Are users excited? If not, it might be time to change course. For us, the lack of team-wide adoption was a clear signal. 2️⃣ What have you learned that you don’t want to repeat? Reflect on your experience. We asked: What worked? What didn’t? What should we prioritize next? Our takeaway: we needed users to see value much faster. 3️⃣ What are the most compelling opportunities? Don’t jump to random ideas—focus on real customer pain points. We listed 21 potential opportunities and scored them based on clear criteria. 4️⃣ Which option excites everyone and has real potential? As a team, we scored each idea independently and then discussed it together. One option stood out: leveraging AI to help people manage tasks effortlessly. We were all in. In the post, I share examples from each step and go through the detailed story. See the whole post linked below. Thanks to Kate Lee, Scott Nover and the entire team at Every Inc. for helping me tell this chapter of our startup story with clarity. Would love to hear what others think of the framework! #startup #realtalk #storytelling #startups

If you want to get big responsibility fast, you have to earn it. Here’s how, via Evan Armstrong: There are a few easy wins that have helped me in my career: - Never schedule a meeting right after a meal (sleepy). - Want to get something approved quickly without much oversight? Schedule it for Friday afternoon when focus is low. - Early-morning or late-night meetings are a great way to win favor. Pro tip: Schedule weekend emails in advance to appear like you're "grinding." Getting executives to act requires art as much as science. Read the full piece: How to win arguments and influence managers https://bit.ly/4fhqHKN

When Stella Garber recognized that her company’s decision-making software was stuck with sluggish growth, she and her team made a difficult decision: They halted its development and turned their attention to an AI-based task management app. In her latest piece for Every, Stella reflects on this decision and how she and her team figured out what’s next, and offers guidance to founders who sense they’re at a crossroads with their companies. bit.ly/3BW3tvd

Helping your manager succeed will help you succeed. via Brie Wolfson: Your manager wants you to succeed. They want you to be productive, happy, and constantly improving. The key is understanding what makes them tick. Consider these questions about your manager: 1. Why do they manage? (Develop people or deliver outcomes?) 2. What brings them pride? (Craft or machinery?) 3. How do they plug into the organization? (Upholding or challenging conditions?) 4. How do they bring work to you? (Assigning tasks or goals?) 5. How do they prefer to work with you? (Companion or hero?) 6. In what phase do they prefer to see your work? (Raw material or packaged ideas?) Dive deeper into how to help your manager help you in the full article: https://bit.ly/3ZZqcR5

🔮 BIG NEWS: Today, we’re launching Every Studio—our new product incubation arm! Imagine having a suite of AI-powered tools to supercharge your creativity and productivity. That's what we're building.   To help us get there, we’ve raised a "speed round" of $150K from Sahil Lavingia, founder of Gumroad. We believe a media company is the perfect product incubator: - With AI, we can prototype and validate ideas faster and cheaper than ever before - Our experiments inform our writing, creating a virtuous cycle of innovation  - We have built-in distribution to an audience hungry for cutting-edge tech We’ve already proven this approach works with our products Spiral, Sparkle, and Lex, which our cofounder Nathan Baschez spun out into its own company. And now, we’re welcoming our first class of 5 entrepreneurs in residence (EIRs), led by Brandon Gell. They’ll be shipping new experiments on a regular cadence. To be an early adopter and test our newest AI-powered tools before anyone else, sign up here: https://bit.ly/4f63NFV

The secret to writing essays that spread: Every article has thrust and drag. Thrust is what motivates readers to invest the energy necessary to extract its meaning. It is the reason they click. Drag is everything that makes the reader’s task harder, such as meandering intros and convoluted sentences. When your writing has more thrust than drag for a group of readers, it will spread and your audience will grow. Achieving this takes practice and experimentation. Read more about how to grow an audience online, via Nathan Baschez: https://bit.ly/4eNGPnh

This Monday, here’s what we’re reading & thinking about… - The .io domain, beloved by startups and tech companies, faces an unexpected threat. A geopolitical decision about a tiny island in the Indian Ocean could reshape the internet landscape as we know it. By Gareth Edwards. - What happens when you hire ChatGPT as your career coach? One writer's experiment reveals surprising insights about AI's potential (and limitations) in guiding our professional lives. By Katie Parrott. - Two of the smartest people we know are revolutionizing lifelong learning with AI. They share practical tips on how to use AI to soak up knowledge. By Rhea Purohit. - As AI reshapes our world, our thinking styles must evolve, too. Five new mental models for the AI age, from "sculpting to gardening" to "explanations to predictions." By Dan Shipper. Dive into all these stories from the past week: https://bit.ly/every-to