Growth

January 1st, 2022. I made a resolution. “This year, I’m going to become a 10x better developer.” My plan: Learn 5 new frameworks Build 3 major projects Read 20 programming books Contribute to 10 open source projects Ambitious. Exciting. Completely unrealistic. By February 15th, I’d read half a book, started (not finished) one project, and felt like a failure. The problem: I was chasing big, dramatic improvements. The thing nobody tells you: Big improvements don’t compound. Small ones do. ...

September 2008. Dropbox had a problem. They were spending $233-388 to acquire each customer through Google AdWords. But each customer was only worth $99 (annual subscription). LTV:CAC ratio: 0.26:1 Translation: Lose money on every customer. Most companies would: Raise prices Cut acquisition costs Pivot the business Shut down Drew Houston did something different. He built a referral program: Give 500MB for each friend who signs up Friend gets 500MB too The result? ...