2025 Changes

I try to avoid publishing content that declares how the future will unfold. I much prefer writing about things my recent past and my takeaways (like my 2024 recap).

But this year, I'm thinking about my goals more like changes. Writing about them here helps me lock them into how I'm operating, going forward.

Here's how I intend to change how I work and how I build in 2025:

4-day work week

In my 2025, my work week will be 4 days long. Weekends will begin on Fridays.

I'm not making this change because I'm tired or feel I can't work 5 (or more) days per week. It's the opposite.

For years, I was relentlessly focused on building for a future big win (like a big exit), and pushing myself to make that happen. I had some base hits, but when the home run didn't come in the timetable I hoped for, it led to a lot of stress, which drove me to work more, which led to me burnout.

Now adopting a "win now" mentality. I want to reap the rewards of owning a bootstrapped and profitable business right now. I get to do work I love and take extra days off at-will and earn the same (if not more) income while I'm at it?

I'll take that as a win. Starting now.

Ship (a lot) more

I expect to build and ship many more new products in 2025.

In fact, my business model at Instrumental Products calls for it. Heading into its 2nd year, here's our business plan:

1. Self-fund profitably by building V1 products for clients.
2. Leverage our byproducts by crafting our own library of Ruby on Rails components.
3. Build out our own portfolio of small software products by leveraging our margin, our team and our tools.

Steps 1 and 2 are already working. It's time to get moving on step 3: Shipping our own new products.

Organic marketing

For years, a huge source of frustration for me has been my performance as a "marketer". It's always been the weakest part of my game.

Doing "marketing things" never felt right to me. Whether it's sending cold outreach messages to beg for someone's attention. Or paying exorbitant prices for a single click on advertising platforms. Or publishing "blog posts" that are nothing more than fluff stuffed with keywords. Or [insert any flavor-of-the-month marketing tactic here and I probably tried it].

It's no surprise that none of that worked.

But I managed to have some marketing wins in my career. Looking back, these are the things I did that attracted the most eyeballs, subscribers and customers:

• Shipping products that people find interesting (to talk about & recommend).
• Shipping products that happy customers tell others about (word of mouth).
• Positioning my products to resonate with their ideal customer, largely driven by... listening to them.
• Sharing my stories of building my businesses publicly, for years.
• Writing pieces that resonate with people (not search engines).
• Being a valued member of a few well-connected communities.

What do all of these have in common?

They are all natural byproducts of the work I do. And they all leverage my personal strengths as a builder, creator, and story teller.

I'm calling this organic marketing. It's a mindset where instead of asking "how can I get more eyeballs for this?", I should be asking, "what can I create that gets me fired up and others too?"

Organic marketing is about choosing where to allocate my energy. It's clear that when I choose to build rather than choose to beg or hope or roll a dice, the outcomes I want tend to come naturally.