Hey, I'm Phillip Thomas, founder of
contraption company, a product studio,

crafting tools for online work.

And this podcast, I share a mix
of conversations and essays about

building a software business.

In today's episode, I chat
with my friend Erin cone.

Aaron's the co-founder of real nice, a
simple personal website builder, real

nice competes with my product postcard.

So I thought it'd be fun
to talk shop with him.

A quick note.

If you're not on the contraption company,
mailing list, sign up a contraption.com.

There you can learn more about our
products like booklet and postcard.

All right.

Let's get started.

Philip: Welcome to the contraption
company podcast Aaron Cohn you

are the best guest I have ever
had but it's also the only guest

Aaron: I'm pumped to be number one.

It's a, it's cool to be number one.

I feel like this is a canvas.

This is a ball of clay that can get
molded into any direction that we

Philip: want.

I think the number one topic that
would be fun to talk about is each

of our number one products as we
moved into this craft software world.

Which is personal website builders, so
we each build a personal website builder.

Aaron: We are competitors.

Philip: We are competitors.

We

Aaron: are fierce competitors

Philip: fierce competitors.

Well, there's some fun backstory
to this, because this isn't our

first time being competitors, right?

Nope.

.
Aaron: We met because Philip started
Moonlight, which was a two sided

marketplace for developers to get work.

And I was employee number two
at A Team, which is a two sided

marketplace for developers to get work.

And when you're starting a new two
sided marketplace, You try to rip

off users from other platforms.

So like a little piece of shit I
was, I was emailing all of Phillip's

users and Phillip labeled all of the
users, user number 500, 499, 498.

So I was just going down the list

And I accidentally emailed Phillip and
his partner and co founder Emma and

Emma was

like, you probably shouldn't be.

emailing our users, but
also we just sold Moonlight.

So it's maybe okay.

And maybe you could talk to
Philip and then we became friends.

I think we first started talking
about things that annoyed us about

making two sided marketplaces and
running venture backed companies.

And I think we bonded a little bit
over that and we've both moved very

much towards building craft software
experiences that are built with care and.

Actually giving a shit about privacy
and the user experience and not

necessarily growth at all costs.

We're like the little craft brewer going
up against Budweiser, but for software.

Philip: It almost felt similar to that
back in the marketplace days to where

it isn't quite a zero sum world where
we were fighting against each other.

we were fighting the status quo and trying
to change how people hired and behaved.

Yes.

And so I think it's always fun
to find people that are trying

to solve the same problem

as you.

Yeah.

Because when you've worked on the same
problem for years, you just have such a

depth of knowledge and understanding that
like you meet someone at a party and they

just don't understand what the hell you
work on but then you talk to someone about

the same product solving the same problem

in some ways, and there's some fun

to

it.

Aaron: Yes.

When we met and first
started talking about

two-sided marketplaces for software,
freelance software developers, there were

very few people who I could have that
conversation with, who really got it.

And I think it was nice
that you really got it.

And then, yeah, there's
also not that many people.

I could talk about the struggles
and trials and tribulations.

of building a personal website

builder with.

Philip: Yeah, so fast forward past
the Marketplace days, and each of us

have gone this indie route of trying
to make small software products.

Small in the kind of

craft,

Aaron: batch.

I think you use, the term craft,
I sometimes use the term small

batch software, but it's the

same thing.

Philip: Yeah,

and so we both set off on
these journeys and both ended

up building

personal

website

builders.

Aaron: Yeah.

I mean, everybody starts out
building, personal website builders.

Philip: Why do you think that is?

Why did you start a
personal website builder?

Aaron: first of all, after doing a
two sided marketplace, I was like,

no, we're going to build software that
people pay money to use and that's it.

Yeah.

We're building, SaaS from now on if for
every additional paying user that I get.

I want to do exactly zero additional work,

With every two sided marketplace
as the supply grows and the demand

goes, the amount of work you have
to do explodes exponentially.

You, you look at companies like
notion and Figma and Slack and

Strava that are pure software plays.

And I really believe that those businesses
are A million times more enjoyable to run

than running airbnb or running uber and i
love airbnb and uber as products But they

are a

nightmare

to run.

Philip: Marketplaces are
the ultimate hard mode

of

software

businesses.

You

have multiple audiences and you can
build the best software, but you're so

dependent on things like network effects
and growth tactics that it's hard.

So I've definitely in the same boat
where I keep in my head this idea of

classic tools, like a hammer, you know,
that lifetime warranty hammer that just

works and you pick it up and it's great.

And I really care about longevity and
software building something that you

can use for a long time and marketplaces
well hard also have this ephemerality

to it where with some exceptions, like
an Uber , there's a lot of them just

haven't survived the test of time.

They work for a bit, and
then another one comes along.

Aaron: The other reason though that
I started building a personal website

builder was because all of the initial
solutions out there really annoyed me.

And I think that's a decent
reason to start a thing.

It's obviously an established space.

There's been 500 website builders
that have come before us from

Dreamweaver to WordPress to

So many.

And obviously Squarespace and
Wix are the big guys these days.

But I've probably built over
the last 10 years I don't know,

80, 90 websites for clients.

I've used every tool out there.

I'm annoyed by all of them.

My partner, Matt, had his
personal website on about.

me and about.

me was annoying because it has
a giant flashing join about.

me on the front of it.

And Linktree , is another thing in the
space, and they all look like garbage.

Everyone has them because they're
easy, but they don't look good

and they should be on yourname.

com.

And Squarespace and Wix, I used to
run a thing called makemymommawebsite.

com,

I still

have it.

The only web dev agency in the
world exclusively for moms.

Because when you're a nice Jewish
boy from Long Island, and moms

really like you, you gotta play

to

your strengths.

So

anyway.

I used all of them and none of the moms
could figure out Squarespace and Wix.

They'd pay me a couple hundred bucks

to make them

a

very

simple

site.

And even after building 70 or
80 of them, I was annoyed by it.

I think you and I also
share a love for simplicity.

And when your company becomes too big

and you

have all these

engineers,

you

got to figure out something
for them to do, I guess, tell

them to make more features.

And when products can do all sorts of
things when they have all these features,

the simplicity

goes

away.

Philip: That's definitely
one of the reasons I

like this idea of small batch crafts.

Indie software is there's so much
pressure to make things complex

over time

where, when I went through, , Y
combinator fellowship, a long time ago,

the past company, they would tell us that
your company can only be the simpler,

easier alternative for a little bit until

it becomes

not simple and easy.

And.

There's some truth to that unless
you are just happy with not having

a billion

dollar exit Yeah, in which case things
can stay simple But , inevitably every

software company tends to follow this
path where it gets some product market fit

and then spends the rest of its days on
enterprisability authorization SSO SOC 2

compliance and all these things that are

Valuable for unlocking more money,
but can just turn the core user

experience

into a

confusing

jumble of

settings.

Aaron: I really love products
that do one thing really well.

One classic example, and they're not

a perfect

company, but Calendly.

Calendly hasn't had an update in 10 years.

They're a total sales focused organization
at this point, but Calendly Does a

pretty good job if you have a link it
lets people book time and reschedule and

cancel and it's just a very nice Utility
it does this one thing pretty well.

I like

cal.

com

better

these days, but

same

thing

There was an app that I used to use
on my phone and I don't know I got

rid of it, But I liked it for a while.

It was an app that reminded you

five times a day

that

you're

going

to

die.

Because in Bhutan, reminding

yourself of

death.

Yeah, five times

a day

promotes happiness.

It was

called

WeCroak.

And it was

so

simple and I paid ten bucks for it.

And it was great.

It did this one thing very well.

And sometimes

that's just nice.

I miss software that you just
pay for one time and it does

a thing.

Philip: Yeah, It

does

Aaron: thing

that

you

expect

it to do.

Philip: And with a personal
website, you just want it to run.

You don't wanna

have

to

go

in and

update

WordPress.

You

don't

want to have to

relearn the software to

make a spelling

Aaron: change.

WordPress is a nightmare.

It was super ahead of its time.

the stat is always 33 percent
of the web runs on WordPress.

And maybe it still
does, but it's not good.

Have you ever tried to make a WordPress

Philip: Oh, yeah.

It's,

It's the best and worst tool.

I would almost say it's the second
best tool for every job, but it'll

never be the best tool for every job.

And it's a fascinating

tool,

how

they've maintained
backwards compatibility.

Part of the sacrifices they
have to make is making it

complex

so

that

old

sides don't break.

Aaron: I'll tell you what our
inspiration for this thing really

was.

I'm obsessed with the idea of

what

I call

single

purpose

website

builders.

So Squarespace and Wix and Webflow
are general purpose website builders.

So you could build any type
of website you want on there.

You could build, if you're a restaurant,

if you're

a psychologist,

if you're

a photographer.

It could be a personal website, but it
could also be for a construction business.

But when you're for everyone,
you're kind of for no one.

And I realized there was only one.

time where friends of mine who ordinarily
I would think no way you'll be able

to make a website can make a website.

is when they're

getting

married.

they can make a

Zola site.

They can make an appy couple.

any of these wedding website
builders, because they're

single purpose website builders.

They're good at making a wedding website.

It knows

what you need.

You got to collect RSVPs.

Have location info, have some
pictures of the couple, have

some basic info about the day.

That's it.

Maybe a password protection.

Because they're single purpose, so
they give you everything you need

for a wedding website, nothing

you don't.

I would

also say that,

in certain

ways, Partyful

is

a

single purpose website builder.

It lets you make a website for your event.

Luma as well.

It's got certain things built in,

only the features that you would need

to

manage an event.

And nothing

that you

don't.

Philip: So those are all

interesting examples because with
personal website builders, it definitely

seems like people are happier to
have any website that looks good.

They'd rather, have a shortcut
to a great website rather than a

website they made themselves.

That is

super customized., maybe
stepping back here.

So

let's

just, let's recap

the basics.

We

each have

a

personal website

builder.

What is the, yeah, what is it called?

What's

Aaron: What's the,

thesis?

Philip: the

thesis., yeah,

So I started postcard, about a
year and a half ago and postcard

is a personal website builder.

It lets anyone on the internet
make a personal website

in

five minutes and the website is postcard.

page

it was originally built because

I

deleted

all my social media during the
pandemic and I still wanted a

way to stay in touch with people.

And so

I

looked at Facebook pages.

And I was

like,

Facebook pages

are basically a personal website.

They're beautiful.

They're simple.

They have a cover photo, a
photo, and you post on them.

And people know how that works.

Why don't I make a personal website
that's as easy as a Twitter bio?

Upload a photo, upload a cover
photo, and you can post on it.

And one of the things that
differentiates postcards

I

originally intended

for it to

really replace social media with

a monthly

email newsletter

.
I don't think I've done a good job of
productizing how someone should use an

email newsletter, but every postcard has
an email subscribe form and you can post

on it and it has these nice controls where
you can keep posts unlisted and it sends

an email to everyone that's subscribed.

Aaron: Yeah,

Philip: so it has

this

nice

synergy

between

website

and

email

Aaron: and by the way, I still
love getting a friend Update email.

I love getting your email at the beginning
of every month I send friend update

emails periodically maybe every two three
months And I do it the janky way where

I just have

a google sheet

and I

bcc everybody But Everyone is like,
yeah, I enjoy getting this and

I

should

be

sending out

personal updates email
every once in a while.

And I think that when you get
emails from brands, it sucks.

But if you get an email from

someone that you

know,

with

nothing that you have

to do,

it's

still a

delight.

Philip: Yeah.

And

I

think we

have

downplayed

the

value

of

long

form communication.

Aaron: think so too.

Philip: I think that Facebook posts

just have

a tendency to be like, life's awesome.

Here's me on a beach.

And I think that we are missing
out on really high quality.

Like here's a little bit
more about what's going

on

in

my life.

Yeah.

And.

I

also think that

we

have

focused

so much on competition

and dopamine, getting likes that

there's something nice

about the ritual of a

monthly

email because it's

the

same

every

month

and

you

get

a

more

constant

sample.

Aaron: Yeah.

And then when you catch up with
someone, they can ask you a better

question than how's it going

or

what's happening.

Sending

it

out

has

improved.

the

quality

of conversations that I have

when I catch

up

and

see

friends.

I don't think that you've hyped this

up enough.

I wish more of my friends

sent me

personal friend updates.

There's a

guy

in New

York

named Alex

Godin.

he's

Seth

Godin's

son.

He was

the first one that started
sending me updates, and I've got

a few others here in New York.

Casey Rosengren, who's
a community builder.

But not enough.

I want more.

I want more people to use
Postcard, so that they send

me,

or

not use

Postcard, and still

send me

personal,

monthly, or bi

monthly

email

updates.

They're great.

They don't have

to be

a big deal.

and

by the way,

I do have a

Postcard, even though we're

competitors.

if

you

go to heyitsAaron.

com, that's my Postcard.

And I

get

an email

once in a while with how many
views it gets, and it gets

more than

I

expect.

Philip: So tell

me about So

getrealnice.

com

and

Aaron: So RealNice

is

designed to be the simplest
personal website builder imaginable.

Realistically it's about

as simple

as postcard.

It

doesn't have any

email

integration

at

the moment.

where we've put a lot of focus is on
people who've never made a website before.

Similar to what you said with early
Facebook, I'm also nostalgic for the

early days of Facebook circa 2006, 2007.

I know that early Facebook made my college
experience way better because if I met

someone in a class or in my hall, I could
go look them up and I could get an idea of

What

they're about, what
they like, what they're

into,

so

that

next

Philip: we saw each

Aaron: other

we could

Philip: Sorry, intermission
as the dog is in

need of attention.

Aaron: Yeah, oh I know,
I bet my hands taste

Philip: He

finished his chicken hearts

and wants more.

Aaron: I know.

It's okay.

This is This

is

Wabusabi,

my favorite

Japanese word

that

means

It's

like the beauty in imperfections.

So a couple

dog barks in

the background.

All

good.

Philip: I have my Wabi Sabi for Artists,

Designers, Poets, and

Aaron: book.

Of course you do.

hanging

out right

here.

I think that's also part
of small batch software.

In the same way that if you get
something at a farmer's market Maybe the

packaging isn't as slick if you get a
really high quality Maybe like a yogurt

like straight

from

the cow at a

farmer's market.

It's not gonna have the fanciest

packaging

ever

It's

not gonna be

as

slick

as

chobani,

but

damn

it's

probably

gonna be

better.

And you're gonna forgive all
of the imperfections because

the core of it is good.

It's clear that someone cares about

it Yeah, real nice is the same thing I'd

say.

The other

thing that real nice

is focused on

is

everybody sucks

at writing about

themselves.

So we have a thing where you
can copy and paste your LinkedIn

into

real

nice and

we will get

you a site

in

about 10 seconds.

Yeah.

Philip: that's how I

helped some early postcard people

make websites I would

go

to

their

LinkedIn and just.

Fill it

in

and write it for them.

And that was great.

People want to have an identity separate

from

social networks.

Because those

are

all

rented,

not

owned

properties.

And a domain

is one

of the

only things you

own

on

the internet.

Aaron: Totally agree.

That's one of our things too, that
your Facebook, your Instagram is

fine, but it's still owned by Zuck.

Your LinkedIn is owned by Bill Gates
and Satya and we describe it as

having a little home on the internet.

It's a starter home.

You can't do as much on postcard
or real nice as you can on

Webflow, your former employer,

or

even

Squarespace

or Wix or

WordPress,

But

like 90 percent of people who have

a LinkedIn

don't have a site.

So

I think maybe we both also saw
that and we're like, hey, there's

still a

lot

of

people who

should

have

Just

a

very

basic internet presence
and i've seen having

a personal

site Be so helpful when it comes to
getting a job like when I worked at atm

and maybe you saw this with moonlight
Everyone who's really good who applied

to the platform had a personal website.

It's

almost a 100 percent

correlation between having a personal
website and being good at what you do,

Philip: it just

means that

Aaron: you care

a

little

bit

more

and you have

enough technical

ability to

figure out

how to

connect a domain.

Philip: I remember Expensify
looking at their job application

once back in the day and it said,
What is your personal website?

And if you don't have one, why not?

Aaron: Yeah, that's it's very funny.

Also

when

I'm hiring

Everyone

looks

like a fucking business robot on
LinkedIn and LinkedIn sucks If you do

a handful of different things if you've
got a product manager job by day,

but you do coaching at night LinkedIn
doesn't capture that super well,

or

if you've had

a

windy

career path,

you

can

actually

be

a

fucking

human being

with a personal website, whereas
LinkedIn doesn't let you do that as much.

LinkedIn

is

all the way on the side
of super professional.

And,

you're

not

really

going to

share

your

Instagram.

That's super social.

Most people have it private these days.

,
it's hard to find something in the middle.

Your Twitter profile used to be
something for tech people that,

Oh, this is like an interesting

balance between work

and

personal

and

being

human.

But

now

it's X

and

it's a

dumpster

fire.

It's

also

really

nice

to

have something that you don't have

to update

all

the time.

With

a

personal

website,

you

set it and

forget it.

but even

with

my LinkedIn,

I feel

the need to

constantly be

putting

out content, and

sometimes I

Philip: want to

do that.

I realized that with Postcard, I end up

tweaking

my

website copy

like every week

just

as

I'll,

be

walking

somewhere and

think Oh,

I

should

put that

I

like

fermentation

on

my

website

Aaron: Yeah, totally.

There's,

I think

one

thing

that's

nice

about both

postcard

and

real nice is

they

both

have

the interface of

Google docs.

Philip: Simple text editors.

Exactly.

So postcard to me,

I has more

of

a social feel.

It

has like

a Facebook

cover

photo,

less work focused.

But I think real nice does a
really good job of looking more

professional and you can have
multiple pages, which postcard can't.

And it seems like you've had

academics

be

a

little

bit

of a

group of people that like real nice.

What

would you say your personas

of

users

nowadays?

Aaron: it's

probably

a

third

job seekers.

Mm-Hmm.

a

third.

People

who.

Consultants

or they

have a side

hustle

of

some sort

and

a

third

people who

just

want to

have

a little home

on the internet

just to have one.

And maybe they're speaking at
conferences or they're trying to write

more and they just want

a

central

hub

for

all

the places

they

are

on

the

internet.

Philip: So how

did

you

build

Real

Nice?

Aaron: Oh,

so that's a

big

difference

between

real

nice and postcard.

So

real

nice

is

98 percent

built

on

bubble

bubble.

That I, uh, which

is a

no

code

tool.

And

if

you want

to build

SAS.

You

kind of need to know how to code and
I was working with a partner who is an

amazing Full stack software developer.

He was early on the team at Venmo.

He

was head

of

product at stash invest He

was

head of

product

at republic.

com.

He's

a terrific

software

developer,

but

There's this meme image of a construction
site and there's a giant hole in the

ground and there's one guy digging the
giant ditch and he's labeled developer.

And then there's 10 people standing
around the hole looking at the ditch.

And it's like product manager and
CEO and biz dev person and whatever.

And I always felt like the person
standing on the outside, I felt

like I was always nagging Matt.

To

hey, can you build

this

feature?

Can

you

build this

feature?

And

it was very

unempowering

and it wasn't

fun So I

really wanted

to Climb down in the ditch with
him And I was always jealous

of

people like you

that were technical and I tried to learn

to code a whole

bunch of times And I always fell off
the horse I was pretty good at no code

tools like squarespace and wix and bubble
is sort of like squarespace or wix on

100x steroids and that you can build

a proper

app

with

signup

and

login and Workflows and

that

sort of thing

and in

a back end

database, so I

got myself a no

code coach this guy no
code Andrew Andrew Sal

tsao on

the internet and I worked with him
every day for an hour and after three

months I felt like I could pretty much
build anything I could recreate Airbnb.

I thought it was amazing

And Bubble is not the solution
for everything, but if you're

just building something,

a CRUD

app, as they say, create data,

read,

update,

delete,

something that's basically just

a

really

nice

form,

and

pretty

much

everything

on

the

internet is

just

a

form,

I

think

that

Bubble

is

amazing.

So it's not 100 percent on
Bubble because the actual sites

themselves, like AaronCohn.

com, if we hosted it on
Bubble, it would load too slow

for SEO purposes.

So the whole editor is built

on Bubble.

We export HTML and CSS files.

to Google

Cloud,

and then

your site

is just

a static HTML CSS

Philip: CSS file

Aaron: that is

hosted

on Google

Philip: That's a pretty common pattern,
. , most website builders typically, , the

builder is, , this application
experience, but then the publishing

process,, when

you

click

publish,

it's

typically

throwing

it

into

some

kind of, static

site

hosting

tool,

like

a

CDN,

Aaron: Exactly.

Exactly.

And

that makes

it

lightning

fast.

It

makes it way better for SEO.

And

it makes it so

Yeah,

there's

just,

there's nothing

weird

about it.

,
Philip: that makes sense.

So I built Postcard with Ruby on Rails.

I coded it.

And

that's because

my background

is

more software,

which can have

the

downside

where

every

problem looks like a software problem.

And , I have ended up tweaking a
lot of things by hand on Postcard.

I would say that my background is
more on back end software engineering.

And so I'm less comfortable making
these super high polish UIs.

But things like, scaling
email deliverability and like

your

statistics

email

for

instance.

That tells

you how many

people

viewed

your

postcard.

that kind of

stuff

is easy for

me.

Aaron: Philip, I really

think

you

have

to

get

good at no code tools

and use them

for what it's what it's good at because

My partner, Matt, again, full
stack software engineer, he's

amazing, but for simple out of

the box

stuff, like making a signup flow

or

designing a page,

it

is

so

much

faster

tweaking

stuff

so

much

easier.

Anything front end.

Is

a

dream

on bubble.

It's amazing and back end stuff

you

might

run

into

a limitation,

I'm,

so

jealous

of No

code

builders who are also technical

because then they

just build their

own plugin or they

make their

own

API

to do

some very specific thing.

And I feel like you get the best of both

worlds.

The

best no

code developers

are technical.

Not

to

mention

it

took

me

three

months

to learn

bubble.

You

learn

it

in

a

week

because,

and

I think

anyone

technical

would,

because

it's

the

same basic.

structure.

You,

Philip: and

drop stuff in,

and

it just works.

And I

think that's interesting

because

As a coder, I have felt like it's
hard to achieve high levels of

polish with no code in the past.

In my head, when I think of telling
someone to make a no code prototype,

like what we did for Moonlight Was like
a Squarespace website to post a job

you went and filled out a Google form
And then we sent emails around and that

to me was the early

days of no code It worked

there was

app your jobs, but

fundamentally

still this Google form

and everyone looked at

that

and said yeah I know it's

a

Google form

and I think

what bubble

seems to be unlocking is this
deeper level of abstraction where

You

can make

a

super high polished product.

If you think of baseline Ruby on
Rails app versus the baseline bubble

app, I think the baseline bubble is
going to be much higher polish than a

naive implementation of Ruby on Rails.

I don't think someone could
just Pick up a book on code and

build

a better

app

in a few months,

even

than

just using bubble.

Because getting to

the

modern level

of

polish

is

so

far

than what

it used

to be 10 years ago.

People expect

rich

text editors

and

photo uploads and things
like that, the status quo

is different now.

We

have this group

in New

York of independent builders called
Dimes Square Ventures and over

half of the

people in there have made

their indie businesses on Bubble

from

cover letter writing
to real estate software

And

so

I

definitely

feel

like

Bubble

is

this

interesting

Technology

where you

can

reach

a

level

of

polish

that

is

Aaron: you really can

reach a high level

but I'm also very bullish and a huge

fan of your

first version

being

a

google form or maybe make it

a type

form The very first version of a
team which by the way is over 100

employees and raised 60 million
dollars A team started off with a

type form a type form for freelancers

who wanted to

join

And

a type form for potential

clients

and

they

all went

into

an

air table and

honestly we

ran it

on

an

Airtable

for

a pretty

long

time.

And there were parts of
it that were excellent.

And then, when we wanted to get rid
of the Typeform, we used VideoASK,

which is another

great

tool made by Typeform where people
could submit videos of themselves

talking, answering a question.

And that also just went into Airtable.

And I think we used

Zapier to make

the

connection.

So, if bubble

is too

much

I am such

a big

fan

because

again,

most things

on the internet

are

basically

just a form,

a

type

form.

I

also

love

tally.

so because you can

put, it's basically like type form and

Notion

had

a

baby.

If

you

love

notion,

you

can

do

really

good

logic

stuff.

It's

free

and

there's

just

no

barrier,

like

nothing,

it's totally

indie

software

and nothing

bothers me more.

And

I feel like

you're bothered by this too.

When you meet people who are just
talking about their idea for months

and months and

months.

And

they're looking

for the perfect co

founder who's technical, or they're
looking for the perfect dev shop

and they're balking every time.

You can

probably make

your version 1

on Tally.

Philip: Tally.

so

Aaron: so is

amazing.

And

it's

totally

free and

you put a

little logic

in

there.

and it's a hundred times easier

than Bubble.

So,

I'm

all

about that.

Philip: And

we

know people

who have built, AI products

on

Bubble.

Cover

letter

co pilot from

Ben.

Aaron: Yeah.

Philip: That

is

an

AI

product that

is

using a

bunch of

OpenAI

stuff and

it's

still

built on

Bubble.

Aaron: Totally.

Also, Abdul Ramirez runs BrokerLoop.

It's the

most impressive

mobile

app I've

ever

seen.

It's a social

network

for

real

estate brokers,

and it's

entirely

built on

Bubble.

It's

insane

how powerful it is.

I

really

describe Bubble

as having

percent of the

superpowers of

a software developer

with maybe

percent

of

the learning curve.

Philip: That's great.

And that's awesome because you can, as
an indie maker, infuse your personality

into the product, because

I

think

that

when you have such a scarcity

mindset around building,

it can

be hard to

build,

polish,

and add fun things . There's

so

many

of

these, people

that try to do

the Peter Lovells thing

of

like launch

12 apps

in

months, a

lesson I learned

from postcard was

that there's

definitely benefits to
trying to swing bigger

on

products because I

what craft software
shows is A little bit of

a

higher conviction.

It's like high conviction, indie software

where

you're

willing

to work on a

product for

a

long

time

and

know it

could take some time to build, but

that you're

actually going to

be

able to grow it over time.

Aaron: Another great example that I
have of these craft businesses there's

this

one called

glass.

photo.

And they

call it

a

home

for

photography.

It's

kind

of

like

a

private place to store

your photos.

And

their whole thing too is,
We're independent and proud.

We're

an

independent

company

No venture

capital or outside

funding and you

use that

as a badge

of honor to talk about why that
makes the product better They're

like because we charge for

our platform.

We

can offer it free of ads We don't

have to

do data

tracking

and

engagement

platforms.

They

tell

you

who's

behind

it.

It's

tom

and

stefan

They're

two

I

think, copenhagen

based designer

guys

And

There's so much sameness on the internet.

A lot of the indie hacker

products

feel

the

same.

Philip: Yeah.

The

Aaron: big

company

products feel the same.

Whereas

this small

batch

software,

this craft software,

I

actually feel they're

a

lot more

distinct.

Philip: I

agree.

And

Part

of that comes from

the motivations behind

the businesses.

I

think

that a

lot of indie hackers

are

motivated by,

I

want to

make a

ton of

money.

and I think that that can
dilute what they're building.

So it's like seeking business,
not, don't really care what it is.

And I think

what

you're

talking

about with craft

software

seems to be

almost

inverted,

which

is

like,

I

care

really

deeply

about a

problem.

And

I think there's a

niche of people who care deeply, like

Abdul's

company,

building a social

network

for

real estate

agents,

right?

And

There's

this

small

group

of

people

who,

they're

not

going to

be

served by VCs, but

if

you

find

someone who cares

really

deeply

and understands

the

market,

there's

going to

be

some

good

Aaron: opportunities

Totally.

I

also think

that

there's

some,

Intrinsic motivation behind the people who
build these products, like the guys from

goodenough.

goodenough.

us, I think.

Philip: yeah.

Aaron: they're

a

little product

studio,

I

think

mostly

in

Brooklyn,

but

they're just

like

old

friends.

and I

don't know them particularly
well, but based on everything that

they write

and their products that they use,

I

kind

of

think

that

they

view themselves

as

artists above

everything else.

They

just

love

building products

the way that

they

want to build

it.

And

I think

that

they

do

have

high

conviction,

even though they

do

launch a

lot

of things.

I

think

they kind of

have

high

conviction

on the products.

One

of their guys

Barry,

made

a

blogging

platform

called

Pika.

page.

And

I really

like it.

P I K A dot page.

And it's just good.

He just

was

annoyed

about

the way that

other

blogging

platforms worked.

But

I think he's

an artist.

There's

Philip: artistic

Aaron: element.

They're not

A B testing things

to death.

They just

have

a belief

in the

way

that

the

world should

be.

Philip: but because

of that, they're moving fast.

I met up with James from

good

enough

in

London

for lunch

one day.

I really like what they're doing

too.

It's

like

the small batch,

building stuff.

I do think they're gonna

probably

switch towards caring a little bit more
about the business side, but I think that

they're in an exploratory phase right now.

And what inevitably happens with these.

Indie micro businesses is that they end
up having one product that is where all

the revenue comes from and I think that

my guess

for someone like a good enough

is

if

you're

trying

to

build

this Indie

studio

Aaron: that

Philip: being

able

to

roll

out a

bunch of

products

Aaron: you

some

Philip: ability

to

tell

when a product

is

actually getting

traction.

It's

Aaron: It's definitely
nice to have a product

that

is a

cash

cow.

Before

they

sold,

I

know,

I

would call

Wildbit.

Wildbit has

been

doing

this

a while.

And

Wildbit

had,

it's

not a

sexy

product,

but

they had Postmark

I use

Philip: use Postmark for postcard.

Aaron: I use Postmark

too.

Postmark kicks

the shit

out of

Sendgrid.

Postmark is, transactional email

sending with a

little

bit

of

marketing email sending.

But it is a cash cow because
everyone needs to send it.

But

then

they have all these other

auxiliary

products

around it.

Peoplefirstjobs.

com.

That's great.

They've

built

some

other

things.

And I

think

that

they're kind of artists.

Philip: they're artists,
but then they sold

out,

right?

So

Aaron: Well, well, can you,

I

don't think

you

can really say they sold out Because they,
they kept it going for 20 years I think

that's

good enough.

Philip: How are we on timing, by the way?

, Aaron: we're okay.

Phillip and I

are

having.

our

partners meet

for

the

first

time

for

some

coffee

when

this

is

over.

Probably cut that,

but

maybe not.

Philip: Who

knows?

We'll

see.

Aaron: Maybe not, Because even though

we

started

as

competitors,

we're actually

Philip: Yes!

Aaron: And also,

part

of the

reason

I like craft

software

is

I

feel

like

I'm

instantly

friends

with

other people who are building craft

software,

and

that's nice.

Philip: Because we all go

through

the same

problems.

Maybe, coming

back

to

personal

website

builders.

What

is

something

that's

hard

about

building personal website builders

that

people

might

not

Aaron: The

hardest thing

about

building

a

personal

website

builder

is.

Helping

people

connect

their domain

to a

custom domain,

because

first of all

there used to be one

good

domain

registrar out there

and

that was Google Domains

and then

for some

stupid

reason,

they sold

it to Squarespace

and

whoever

was

responsible for

this,

I

want to have a

word

with.

because

Google

domains

was

so

good.

It

was

the

only

one

that

was

good.

I don't know why Squarespace bought it.

Squarespace is upping the prices we

hate it.

And

then you have

to

use

Namecheap,

which all the

developers

like, but it's not

user friendly.

We

use

Ionos

and

they're

good,

but

they're

not

as

good

as

Google

Domains

fundamentally

because people

still

have

to

Create

a

new

user

account

and

a

password

and

verify

their

email,

and

everyone

drops off.

It's

Philip: there's so

much

Aaron: more friction

I

like Porkbun.

Philip: Porkbun

is

a Yeah, I

Aaron: based Yeah,

they're

based

in

Portland,

Oregon,

it's the

one

that

Derek

Sivers recommends.

They're

wonderful,

They're

adorable

It's

not

as

good

as Google

Domain

because everyone

already

has a Google

account.

Philip: That's

the magic

of

Google.

is Everyone

knows what the

account

is

and

can

get back

in.

and

Aaron: Exactly.

Exactly.

I haven't

found

a

domain

registrar

that lets

you

authenticate

with

Google

yet.

So

that's

annoying.

Philip: Yeah.

Aaron: So

there's

just

no such thing as a good one.

it's

just

so many

people

are

so

intimidated

by

doing

this.

And if

you

want to make your

own

domain

registrar.

Have

fun paying

500,

000 to

ICANN

in

order

to

establish

one.

Philip: So Do you

still

offer

Entry?

Aaron: We,

so

we

love

this

company

called

Entry.

Philip: N

T

R

I

dot

com.

Aaron: Correct.

Philip: Postcard used
entry in there earlier.

So entry, to clarify, is like

those

flows

where you connect your bank by logging in
and then just everything kind of works.

Entry builds that for
domains where you can say

I want to connect my domain
and it finds the domain

registrar and puts in the right
records and it just works.

And I really like that.

Entries pricing though
is the reason I moved off

because

it

was

going to be

the

most expensive

piece of software

on postcard and

they

wanted to

put us on this

big enterprise contract.

And I love the

product and I'm seeing other people around

the internet use it.

I think

that

they

could

just figure out

pricing.

If they

had

utility

pricing,

Aaron: yeah it

would

Philip: great.

Aaron: And

as

much

as

I

love

'
'em because they raised

money,

it's

hard

for

them

to do.

some

of

these

nice

things that

I

bet

they

want to

do.

I

bet

they

want to

help the

little

guy start

out with some

low

usage

pricing.

But, But, I will, But,

I

will say

they

do

one

thing

very

well.

They're

basically,

they're

basically

Plaid,

which lets you connect to your banks.

Yeah.

They're

plaid

for domain DNS stuff.

I

suppose the other

thing

that's

annoying about

making a personal

website builder is just knowing
where the line is between.

Simplicity and complexity because

with a

personal

website builder

people

want

all of these

features.

A lot

of people

come

from Squarespace or

Wix

and

mind you

they

hated

paying 25

bucks

a month and they hated

How

their website got

out of date

and They hated

doing

it, but they're like,

ooh,

but Squarespace did this

one thing

Philip: Yeah,

Aaron: We

could add it potentially,

but also

as

you add things you

become

the thing you hate.

Philip: That's

absolutely an issue with products,
which is when you make something

that's simpler, people look at it
and that familiarity can help because

they know how

to use

it, but the familiarity can hurt you

because

they look

at

it and then

can say,

Oh, this is a personal website builder.

I

want multiple

layouts.

I want

a calendar

view,

whatever it

might

be.

And

that can

definitely harm

building.

software

that

is really familiar to

people,

you

can just

slowly

morph

into

someone

else

and then

you're always just playing catch

up.

Aaron: Yes.

In

general, I love products

where

the end result

is

90%

is good

for 9% of the effort.

Philip: Yes.

I

agree.

All

right.

We

should

wrap

up here.

Aaron: Yes.

Philip: 10

seconds.

what's a random idea of
something you might build

next?

For fun.

I got one for

postcards.

Okay,

Aaron: You

tell me your postcard one

Philip: Progressive web apps are
something I'm really into right now.

And I think I might make it so that

you

can subscribe to

push

notifications

from

someone's

website.

Sounds

crazy, but it's

something

you

can

do.

on

the

internet

now, I

added

it to

my

product

booklet, and I

think

it'd be

fun

to

be

able to

subscribe

to

updates from someone's

postcard

site

with

push

notification without having

to

install

an

app.

So

that's

something

I'm

thinking

about

adding.

Aaron: That's

really cool.

We

love that.

Philip: Steal

it if you want.

Aaron: So

I

don't

actually

think

that we

want

to

build

any

super

crazy

feature.

I

think real

Nice

is

pretty

much

feature

complete

and we're

pretty

good with

that.

There's

a

concept

of enough

and

I think it's

enough.

If we added

more,

it would

be

complex.

That

being

said.

We

looked

at

about

personal websites before

we built it to

find

one

that

would

work

for

most

people.

And

I would

say it's a

pretty

nice

design.

It's

a

out

of

in

terms

of

design.

I'm

proud of it for mine.

However,

I

do

think

that

we

could

add

some

really

slick,

really

snazzy

designs

for paid users.

So That's one.

Philip: That's what I

think

about for

postcard

Aaron: Yeah, nobody

thought

that

Partyful

was going to

work because there

were

like,

there's

so many

event

platforms,

but

Partyful

won on

design.

I

think

it's

very

possible

to win on

design.

So

design

is a

big

one.

Philip: Yeah.

Aaron: The

other

thing we

started

giving

away

a free

custom domain

to everyone

who signs

up, even if

they're not a

paid

user

for the first

year, cause that was

such

a

big

hurdle.

So now

if you sign

up

for

realness, you

get a free.

Custom domain.

I think That's

amazing

and

incredible.

So

you

can

literally

have

a

website

on

a

custom

domain

For

zero dollars we

want it

to

be

like

gmail

in

that

way.

So

that

eliminated

it.

And

this

one

was

philip's

idea

Forever.

I've

i've had

aaroncone.

com

Zoom

for my zoom link or Aaron Cohen

dot com slash calendar

for

that

and I

share that

one link all the time.

And

I

know that every time

someone

goes

to it, a certain number of people

are like,

oh, I wonder what's on

Aaron Cohen.

com.

So that's

a good way

to

share

it.

So

we're

just

putting

the

finishing touches on

that

one.

It was actually

really

easy

in bubble.

Philip: That's awesome.

Yeah.

And that idea

came from

my

mom who I

set up a

branded

Zoom

link for

her

and her clients wanted to do

something

similar.

Aaron: By the way, does

she

need

a website?

Philip: Probably.

Aaron: to

compete

for

her business.

But,

But,

I

Philip: to make my

Aaron: makemymommawebsite.

com.

so

Yeah.

And

also

Phillip,

I

just

want

to

say, we

started

as

competitors,

We're

ending

this

as

competitors.

I

don't

appreciate

you

trying

to

fish

for

inside

information

on what our big

feature is

going to be

so

you can

steal

it.

Unacceptable.

Philip: Oh man, No,

Aaron: I think

I

seriously,

I think

that.

Early

on

in

my

startup

journey,

I

obsessed

over

little

tiny

competitors

who

were

the same

size

as

me.

Like

my

first

startup

was

an on demand dry

cleaning and

laundry

thing.

And

we would

drive

ourselves crazy when a new one

would

come on the

block.

Five

years

later, all dead, The

winner

is Little Mom

and Pops.

Like, I think a

lot

of people Forget

that their real

competition is

everyone who

hasn't

heard

of

you.

Most

people

don't

Philip: know about you.

Aaron: about you

Philip: It's the status quo.

Aaron: that's the

set.

that's the competition.

Philip: Well,

it's been

fun competing with you and collaborating.

And I

think

we

both

have

gotten

better businesses

through the collaborations
than from fighting.

So,

thanks

for hopping on the

podcast.

We will.

Go

grab

some coffee and, maybe do this again soon.

All right.

See

ya.

Thanks for listening to this episode of
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