🧰 Side Project Playbook ➗ Release Ratio ⭐ The Downsides of Fame

This week’s Founder Finds includes:

Timeboxing
An alternative to Pocket
A content optimization suite
The Growth Mindset Workbook
11 reasons not to become famous
A playbook for launching side-projects
A framework for meaningful content consumption
And more…

🪶 Remember This

The more we value things outside our control, the less control we have.

🤓 Fav Finds

Tools, tweets and more from Trends Pro Members

➗ The Release Ratio shared by Breno Ferreira
A simple framework to make content consumption more meaningful.

🧰 Side Projects Playbook shared by davidacreates
A comprehensive guide to go from ideation to launching a side-project.

📖 Matter shared by Martin Slaney
A reading app that handles newsletters, Twitter threads, PDFs and more. Better than Pocket.

📘 Read This

11 Reasons Not to Become Famous

I rarely use Twitter and always saw fame as a net liability.

Since it’s easier to connect with a face than a logo, in the early days of building Trends.vc, I led the effort with my personal brand.

Micro-fame is cool. Being known in an environment such as Founder Summit.

But we don’t often think about what comes with general fame.

See Tim’s take on the downsides of fame.

🌟 Founder of the Week

Serg Valencia

“I have met fascinating people in Trends Pro. I like learning about the journeys of people who bring their ideas to life. From a distance, I cheer for the success of all Trends Pro members.”

Serg is building SergValencia.com. A medical content agency on top of his personal brand. As a producer of science-based content, he helps people make better health decisions. He is also a member of Trends Mastermind #0006.

What’s your most important habit?
My morning routine.

It takes about an hour and involves prayer, breathing exercises, journaling, and stretching. My morning routine puts me in the right frame of mind to accomplish great things.

What are you reading right now?
The Growth Mindset Workbook

I’m a psychologist, so I keep up-to-date with practical research. The need for a growth mindset almost sounds like a cliché in 2022. This book actually offers actionable strategies to achieve it.

What product or service do you wish existed?
A notes management tool I enjoy using. I’ve tried many of them, but I suspect that personal knowledge management depends heavily on what suits your needs and tastes, so I will probably have to build my own solution.

What product are you obsessively using right now?
I use MarketMuse almost every day. It’s a content optimization suite that speeds up my research process and helps my team create helpful and unique content.

What are you bearish on?
I’m bearish on the social convention of tolerating a job you don’t enjoy only because it pays the bills. I don’t want to dissociate how I make a living from the things I genuinely love.

What’s your favorite Trends Report?
🔁 Productized Services

It serves as a source of inspiration for offering value at scale.

🔧 Try This

Timeboxing

In the first two and half years of Trends.vc, my schedule was consistently inconsistent. A mix of community management, podcast interviews, admin, marketing and writing reports.

Now that we have a team, I have a sense of predictability and can use timeboxing.
If you’re at a stage where timeboxing makes sense. Try it out.

🏆 Trends Pro Member Wins

🆕 Andreu Osika, Hunter Coleman, fer, Abubakar Sheriff and Wadnes became Trends Pro Members

👥 Reme Ekoh, Akhil Kala, Martin Slaney, Hunter Coleman, Anderson Dadario, Alessandro Franceschi, Wadnes and Abubakar Sheriff unlocked 1:1 Founder Intros by joining daily standups

🏃 Martin Slaney launched Strategy Sprint Masterclass

📈 Yarty hit 350+ subscribers for FP&HEY

👨‍💻 Brett Lee onboarded 2 new employees at Idea-Refinery

‍
🎓 Jwalant Patel launched a new course on Shadowing.ai

🧍 Maciej Cupial reached a 300-day Standup Streak

Get Weekly Reports

Join 65,000+ founders and investors

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📈 100+ Trends Pro Reports • To make sense of new markets, ideas and business models, check out our research reports.

💬 1:1 Founder Intros • Make new friends, share lessons and find ways to help each other. Keep life interesting by meeting new founders each week.

🧍 Daily Standups • Stay productive and accountable with daily, async standups. Unlock access to 1:1 chats, masterminds and more by building standup streaks.

💲 100k+ Startup Discounts • Get access to $100k+ in startup discounts on AWS, Twilio, Webflow, ClickUp and more.

Startup Studios: Validating Ideas, Solopreneurs, Building Communities

“Don’t worry about failure; you only have to be right once.” – Drew Houston

Get Full Access to Trends Pro

❓ What You’ll Learn

How does cheap prototyping create a competitive advantage?
How do startup studios benefit from hackathons?
How to use community building to attract founders?
How to do a hardcore year?
How to validate demand?
How to use a services business to fund your startup studio?
How to build multiple businesses as a solopreneur?

💎 Why It Matters

Companies founded by startup studios tend to produce better returns and scale faster.

🔍 Problem

About 90% of startups fail.

💡 Solution

Startup studios take a systemized approach to building companies.

They apply accumulated knowledge and resources from building multiple companies.

🏁 Players

Startup Studios

Betaworks • Focuses on digital consumer products like Dots, Bitly, and Tweetdeck. Also an investor.
eFounders • One of the first enterprise-size startup studios focused on enterprise software.
NineTwoThree • Operates as an agency builder for funded startups and tech brands.
Human Ventures • Focused on businesses which ‘meet human problems’.
Idealab • Has created 150+ companies and 50 IPOs+ or acquisitions.
Rocket Internet • Builds and scales internet companies globally.
HVF Labs • Created by PayPal co-founder Max Levchin to solve problems on a longer time horizon.

Companies from Startup Studios

Crew • Facilitates the hiring process for moonshot missions. Backed by eFounder.
Katoo • Madrid-based mobile platform that connects restaurants and suppliers.
Playbook • Streamlines the financial planning process. Backed by Atomic.
GoTo.com • By IdeaLab. Created contextual advertising and was acquired by Yahoo!.
DollarShaveClub • Razor subscription club backed by Science Inc. and sold to Unilever.
Liquid Death • Trendy sparkling water brand backed by Science Inc.
Nestpick • Collects listings of fully equipped apartments around the world. Backed by Rocket Internet.

🔮 Predictions

Cheaper prototyping will make it easier for startup studios to try new ideas quickly.
- Matt Brezina from Sincerely launched 3 different versions of its product under different accounts. He never spent more than 4 weeks developing a release.
- Jim Zarkadas spent 1.5 hours designing and prototyping his iOS app for a client using Framer.
- Andy and Nelson explain how they iterated on Tettra after an unsuccessful first launch. It now generates hundreds of thousands in revenue.

Startup studios will host hackathons to attract founders. Entrepreneurs-in-Residence lead new startups within studios.
- DataTribe hosts its annual DataTribe Challenge to select potential recipients of $2m in seed funding.
- Crisis’ venture studio hosted the Hackathon for Homelessness to find people-powered approaches to ending homelessness.

Startup studios will focus more on community building to attract founders with big ideas.
- Founders Club began as a community of early stage investors which then decided to leverage its network to create MVP fund.
- Revelry attracts founders to its studio by focusing its marketing efforts on community building. They help founders deepen their networks by contributing to accelerators, universities, and other networks.

☁️ Opportunities

Do a hardcore year. Build your own mini startup studio.
- Jennifer Dewalt built 180 websites in 180 days.
- Pieter Levels launched 12 startups in 12 months. His businesses now make 2.7mm ARR and he was voted Product Hunt’s Maker of the Year.
- Kevin Leneway built A Startup A Day.
- Jon Yongfook planned to build 12 Startups in 12 Months. On month 7 he built Bannerbear which now makes 553k+ ARR.
- Gamwe6 built a directory of people who’ve taken the 12 startups in 12 months challenges.

Become an expert at validating demand. It’s easier to recruit and raise money when you have demand.
- Buffer built a landing page with features and payment plans before launching its product. They used email sign-ups to understand what customers wanted.
- Ryan Hoover built a 20-minute MVP using existing tools to test ProductHunt. He attracted 170 users in 2 weeks.
- Bram Kanstein built EarlyOnes after his fourth business was acquired to help Web3 startups validate demand for ideas.
- Ryan Yost is a developer who explains the process he used invalidate his automated assistant for ‘adult stuff’ with a landing page, surveys, and simple ads.
- Lachlan Kirkwood writes about his two-year process of learning to prioritize validation.
- Shane White uses no-code MVPs to validate SaaS ideas like Memory Share.

Run a services business to fund your startup studio.
- Muhammad Bin Sabir (A Trends Pro member) used a growth consulting and no code development services business to fund his studio. 4 of his 6 companies raised pre-seeds within 6 months.
- Late Checkout does 30 day design sprints with leading companies looking to become community companies. They get paid to learn.
- Unstuck Labs offers prototyping, development, and ‘rescue missions’ for products.
- Accenture helped Airbus optimize aircraft assembly and increase productivity 500%.
- Differential partnered with Big Ass Fans to drive sales through a custom platform. They partnered with TaylorMade to automatically track golf strokes to deliver insights to improve customers’ golf games.
- White Label has led product development and growth marketing for 50+ clients.

Build multiple low-maintenance businesses simultaneously as a solopreneur.
- Joe Procopio is the founder of Teaching Startup and Spiffy and writes about how to operate multiple startups simultaneously.
- Jakob Greenfield is an indie solopreneur who runs TweetsOnDemand, NewsletterStory, BusinessBrainstorms, EnrichMyList, and Newsletter Spy all at the same time.
- Damon Chen quit his job to make testimonial.to, seeyafuture, embed, and supportman. He’s surpassed $300k ARR.
- Lola runs a product studio called Lunch Pail Labs and curates the Integrations Directory.
- Dan Rowden created the twitter growth tool Ilo as well as Cove Chat and Codelet.

🏔️ Risks

Weak Incentives • Entrepreneurs-in-Residence give up an average of 36% equity to studios. That’s not including dilution from future fundraising. Founders with much less equity may not approach the business with the same level of devotion as other entrepreneurs.
Opportunity Costs • Studios are constantly forced to spend resources on ideas with a lower expected ROI than the leading product. A single successful startup shouldn’t need to compete for resources with lesser businesses.

🔑 Key Lessons

Join a venture studio when it will improve your access to talent, technology, or capital. Deepen your network with qualified and connected people.
Corporations should use internal startup studios to incubate new ideas that leverage their existing resources and advantages.
You can start a one-person startup studio as an indie hacker by building multiple products and seeing what sticks.

🔥 Hot Takes

Working at a startup studio is a safer choice than a startup. Your career is insulated from a single idea’s failure.
Corporate startup studios often restrict innovation by tightly controlling teams. Startups from corporate programs have a 3% lower success rate.

😠 Haters

“Isn’t this the same as an incubator?”
Incubators offer founders a workspace, investment and community to help validate their product. Unlike startup studios they are not core team members working daily towards helping the business succeed.

“Startup studios made sense when the barrier to entry for entrepreneurs was higher. Server costs alone used to be prohibitive! The value proposition for studios is gone now that anyone can build a startup.”
Things like no-code tools have made it easier than ever to build a product. But there is no substitute for experience when it’s time to go to market.

“Aren’t the weaker or failing companies in the studio consuming resources that would be better used to grow the successful startups?”
Yes. It’s the startup studio’s responsibility to validate products quickly and cut the ones that drain resources without sufficient traction. Studios that fail at this will likely fail altogether.

“Why would I give up so much equity to a startup studio as a founder when I can raise capital on my own?”
Raising capital is one of many advantages that a studio offers. But that doesn’t mean the studio approach is right for you. Ask yourself whether the resources, network and capital are worth the equity that you’ll give up.

🔗 Links

Startup Studios — Bullish or Bearish? • The tweet behind this report.
The Origin and Evolution of the Startup Studio • History of the startup studio.
Is A Career In Startup Studios Right For You? • Weighing the pros and cons of working at a startup studio.

📁 Related Reports

No-Code • Use no-code to test ideas quickly as a studio.
Micro-SaaS • Start a one-person startup studio with a multitude of small profitable products.
Agencies • Fund your startup studio with an agency.
Growth Hacking • Template your growth procedure for a variety of startups.
Presales • Presell to validate new ideas.

🙏 Thanks

Thanks to Shashank, Sam Hickmann, Jeff Dyer, Brian Ball, Sean Hua, Mike, Muhammad Bin Sabir, Stewart Townsend, Anthony Hernandez, Vajresh Balaji and Soma Mandal. We had a great time jamming on this report.

✏️ Harry researched and wrote this report. Dru researched and edited this report.

📈 What else?

Trends PRO #0101 — Startup Studios has more insights.

What you’ll get:

18 Startup Studios (157% More)
18 Companies from Startup Studios (157% More)
12 Predictions (300% More)
13 Opportunities (175% More)
6 Risks (200% More)
8 Key Lessons (167% More)
5 Hot Takes (150% More)
13 Links (333% More)

With Trends Pro you’ll learn:

(📈 Pro) How do startup studios use location to attract talent?
(📈 Pro) How do businesses expand to build flywheel effects?
(📈 Pro) How are people building startup studios for startup studios?
(📈 Pro) How are startup studios empowering marginalized communities?
(📈 Pro) What leads corporations to build their own startup studios?
(📈 Pro) How will governments use startup studios to develop new technologies?
(📈 Pro) What new jobs are being created specifically for startup studios?
(📈 Pro) How do founders use the holding entity model to fund studios?
(📈 Pro) How can you benefit from working for a startup studio?
(📈 Pro) How to find your niche?
(📈 Pro) How to leverage a startup studio’s network for your benefit?
(📈 Pro) How to use fractional talent for your ideas?
(📈 Pro) How can startup studios help you fundraise?
(📈 Pro) How does working at a startup studio reduce risk?
(📈 Pro) How to avoid bad deals with startup studios?
And much more…

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📈 Unlock Pro Reports, 1:1 Intros and Masterminds

Become a Trends Pro Member and join 1,200+ founders enjoying…

🧠 Founder Mastermind Groups • To share goals, progress and solve problems together, each group is made up of 6 members who meet for 1 hour each Monday.

📈 100+ Trends Pro Reports • To make sense of new markets, ideas and business models, check out our research reports.

💬 1:1 Founder Intros • Make new friends, share lessons and find ways to help each other. Keep life interesting by meeting new founders each week.

🧍 Daily Standups • Stay productive and accountable with daily, async standups. Unlock access to 1:1 chats, masterminds and more by building standup streaks.

💲 100k+ Startup Discounts • Get access to $100k+ in startup discounts on AWS, Twilio, Webflow, ClickUp and more.

🧠 Brainstorming Business Ideas 🤖 AI Tools in Browser 🎨 Design Patterns

This week’s Founder Finds includes:

A simple analytics tool
A collection of UI & UX design patterns
A browser extension for quick access to AI tools
A framework for coming up with great business ideas
How to get traffic, build marketing funnels and monetize your expertise
And more…

🪶 Remember This

Your level of success will seldom exceed your level of personal development.

🤓 Fav Finds

Tools, tweets and more from Trends Pro Members

🎨 Mobbin shared by Brett Lee
A collection of UI & UX design patterns that have been deployed in real applications.

🧠 How to Brainstorm Great Business Ideas shared by Elijah George
A framework for coming up with great business ideas.

🐻 Bearly.ai shared by Elie Steinbock
A browser extension for quick access to AI text tools to help with reading and writing.

🔧 Try This

LogSnag

A simple tool to help you understand your product and business.

We will try it out to understand community and newsletter events within Trends.vc.

🌟 Founder of the Week

Davida Pitts

“Unlocking the Trends Pro masterminds has literally changed my life. Having a place every week to bounce my ideas around has done wonders for my creative process. It’s helped me become more comfortable with asking for help and being vulnerable.”

Davida is building Orange Moon Creative. A solo Webflow studio helping brands shape and launch their marketing websites with confidence and ease. She is also a member of Trends Mastermind #0007.

What’s your most important habit?
My daily walk.

I picked this habit up at the beginning of the pandemic. It’s become my own personal daily stand up. Plus I found that starting with a nice dose of sun makes my day so much brighter (pun intended).

What are you reading right now?
The Practice: Shipping Creative Work by Seth Godin

I’m working on building my shipping muscle. I suffered from perfectionism for a long time which created a graveyard of unfinished projects. The way Seth thinks about the creative process as an act of service has helped me push through my own roadblocks.

What product or service do you wish existed?
An app that combines all the music from my subscriptions (Spotify, Tidal and Apple Music) as well as my own music library.

What product are you obsessively using right now?
Twitch. I follow some amazing DJs there that provide the soundtrack for my work day. I can pretty much pick any mood I want to be in and there is usually a DJ spinning what I’m looking for.

What are you bullish on?
Flipping no-code side projects. So many folks want in on entrepreneurship but don’t want to start from scratch. Sites like MicroAcquire and Tiny Acquisitions are opening up opportunities. If you can build something and get a bit of traction you have a good shot at getting acquired.

What are you bearish on?
Twitter. I’ve been on the platform since 2008. It feels like the trolls are winning.

What’s your favorite Trends Report?
👥 Audience-first products

I reread this report recently and it has influenced how I am approaching a new product that I am working on. The resources (links) at the end of the report were a gold mine for me to dig deeper into the topic. It was a perfect bouncing off point to go down the rabbit hole.

Exclusive Deal: Davida is offering Trends.vc readers over 50% off Figma to Webflow development for a single landing page. Mention TRENDS in the “How did you hear about us” section of the contact form.

📘 Read This

The Secrets Series

An actionable series of books from Russell Brunson on getting traffic, building marketing funnels and monetizing your expertise. No fluff.

🏆 Trends Pro Member Wins

🆕 Cameron Rambert, Elie Steinbock, Daniel Cleaves, Raj B, Reed Floren, Jean Lucas Lima, Brett Lee, Atul Yadav, Amardeep Parmar, Martin Slaney, Reme Ekoh and Akhil Kala became Trends Pro Members

👥 Tim Chan, Derrick Persson, Rafał Dołęga, Cameron Rambert, Elie Steinbock, Jean Lucas Lima, Raj B and Atul Yadav unlocked 1:1 Founder Intros by joining daily standups

🎪 KP is launching Build In Public Studio

💻 Brianna Brazle opened the waitlist for the beta launch of CultureLancer

🖼️ James Renouf launched AI Unlimited with close to 1000 sales

📅 Maciej Cupial hit 150 paying customers for Calendesk

⭐ Yuyu deployed Yuurrific.com

🧠 Joel Pickin unlocked Trends.vc Masterminds by reaching a 30-day standup streak

Get Weekly Reports

Join 65,000+ founders and investors

📈 Unlock Pro Reports, 1:1 Intros and Masterminds

Become a Trends Pro Member and join 1,200+ founders enjoying…

🧠 Founder Mastermind Groups • To share goals, progress and solve problems together, each group is made up of 6 members who meet for 1 hour each Monday.

📈 100+ Trends Pro Reports • To make sense of new markets, ideas and business models, check out our research reports.

💬 1:1 Founder Intros • Make new friends, share lessons and find ways to help each other. Keep life interesting by meeting new founders each week.

🧍 Daily Standups • Stay productive and accountable with daily, async standups. Unlock access to 1:1 chats, masterminds and more by building standup streaks.

💲 100k+ Startup Discounts • Get access to $100k+ in startup discounts on AWS, Twilio, Webflow, ClickUp and more.

🗓️ Annual Life Review ⌛ Timeboxing 📖 Shared Fictions

This week’s Founder Finds includes:

A free behavior analysis tool
How to conduct a life review
An essay about shared fictions
A time management technique
A social media management tool
And more…

🪶 Remember This

The most effective form of learning is practice, not planning.

🤓 Fav Finds

Tools, tweets and more from Trends Pro Members

🗓️ Annual Life Review shared by Tem
A framework to conduct your own self-paced annual life review.

⌛ Timeboxing shared by Swapnil Puranik
A time management technique for planning what you are going to do and when you will do it.

✨ Later shared by Jerome Green Jr
A social media management tool to plan, analyze, and publish content in advance.

🔧 Try This

Microsoft Clarity

A free alternative to behavior analysis tools such as FullStory and Hotjar. See heatmaps and session recordings for your sites.

🌟 Founder of the Week

Yarty Kim

“The Trends Pro community has been a treasure trove of insights and collaboration. I’ve met some of the smartest, friendliest, and most humble people here. I’m constantly learning from the community along with the Trends reports.”

Yarty is building Kick Ass Life. Inspiring founders and creators to live their most purposeful life by embracing challenges, taking action, and connecting with others in a meaningful way. He is also a member of Trends Mastermind #0001.

Yarty believes that growth happens when we push our limits. He thinks that we should become comfortable being uncomfortable, take on new challenges and most of all enjoy the ride.

What’s your most important habit?
Journaling.

It helps me distill my thoughts, be honest with myself, and see through the noise of my own judgment.

I journal daily. Each December, I write a long journal post sharing all the good (and bad) that’s happened. Then schedule to send this a year later. It’s always a pleasant surprise to receive it.

What are you reading right now?
Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire by Brad Stone

Big fan of Brad’s work and an even bigger fan of his previous book titled “The Everything Store“.

“The Everything Store” changed how I view my life and made me realize I was too comfortable. It prompted me to change my habits and led me to entrepreneurship and meeting new friends.

What product are you obsessively using right now?
Notion.

It has improved a lot over the past year. Everything from the app down to the databases. I use it daily, including my journaling habit.

If they could enable voice and video recording natively, that would be fantastic!

What are you bullish on?
Automation 100%.

The world of automation is here and is becoming more sophisticated every day.

Look at tools like Zapier, Make, and Pabbly. It’s incredible stuff and saves time for business owners and individuals alike.

It’s only going to get better with time.

What’s your favorite Trends Report?
🔁 XaaS: Anything as a Service

What else?
Be comfortable being uncomfortable. Take on new challenges. Growth happens when we push our limits. Most of all, enjoy the ride. Cheers!

📘 Read This

Legitimacy

Sapiens revealed shared fictions that we accept as truth. Taxes, nations, human rights, money and more.

I’ve found more shared fictions since then. Such as Caste from Isabelle Wilkerson and Legitimacy from Vitalik Buterin.

To understand legitimacy is to understand brands, cryptocurrencies, monarchies and more.

🏆 Trends Pro Member Wins

🆕 Brian Rey, Mingwei Gu, Le Paul, Karthik Vijayakumar, Sachit Adhikari, Brianna Brazle, Mark Wilcox, Byron Wilson, Michal, Francesco and Juan Pablo Roqueni became Trends Pro Members

👥 Brian Rey, Marcos Gorgojo, William, Mingwei Gu, Elijah George, Paul Tune, Karthik Vijayakumar, Le Paul, Brianna Brazle, Mark Wilcox, Reed Floren, Vatsalya Verma, Byron Wilson and Gabriel Limma unlocked 1:1 Founder Intros by joining daily standups

🤖 Joel Pickin launched ThisIsBuiltWith.ai

💰 Jwalant Patel launched a salary negotiation course

🎞️ Jerome Green Jr shared his workflow of using Descript to edit video. This is a 📈 Trends Pro Exclusive.

🤝 Tem closed a deal with a high profile lead

🧠 Shuyen Phoon unlocked Trends.vc Masterminds by reaching a 30-day standup streak

Get Weekly Reports

Join 65,000+ founders and investors

📈 Unlock Pro Reports, 1:1 Intros and Masterminds

Become a Trends Pro Member and join 1,200+ founders enjoying…

🧠 Founder Mastermind Groups • To share goals, progress and solve problems together, each group is made up of 6 members who meet for 1 hour each Monday.

📈 100+ Trends Pro Reports • To make sense of new markets, ideas and business models, check out our research reports.

💬 1:1 Founder Intros • Make new friends, share lessons and find ways to help each other. Keep life interesting by meeting new founders each week.

🧍 Daily Standups • Stay productive and accountable with daily, async standups. Unlock access to 1:1 chats, masterminds and more by building standup streaks.

💲 100k+ Startup Discounts • Get access to $100k+ in startup discounts on AWS, Twilio, Webflow, ClickUp and more.

AI Image Generators: AI-Generated Assets, Video Generators, Image Generation Jobs

“Everything you can imagine is real.” – Pablo Picasso

Get Full Access to Trends Pro

❓ What You’ll Learn

What will AI image generation professionals do?
How to launch NFT collections with AI image generators?
How are content creation platforms using AI image generators?
What businesses can you build with AI image generators?
How to generate a perfect image?
How to boost your productivity with AI image generators?

💎 Why It Matters

Now anyone can create quality images.

🔍 Problem

You have ideas for visual art. But you don’t have the ability to express them.

💡 Solution

AI Image Generators help you turn your ideas into high-quality images.

In seconds. Without technical skills.

🏁 Players

AI Image Generation Apps

Pollinations • Create unrestricted and customized AI media
DreamStudio • Create AI-powered images using Stable Diffusion
Craiyon • Free online AI image generator from text
NightCafe • AI-powered text-to-image generator
Deep Dream Generator • Combine text and images to generate photorealistic art
Artbreeder • Create images by mixing them together and editing their genes
ImgCreator.ai • Creating illustrations, anime and concept design images
Starryai • Turn text into images
SceneryAI • Edit and generate background scenery for your images
Bertha AI • Create images for your WordPress blog
Playground AI • Discover prompts for art, social media posts, posters, logos and more
WOMBO Dream • Create portraits and abstract images in different styles
Photosonic • Free online text-to-image generator

AI Image Generation Tools

AI Image Upscaler • Enhance image resolution with AI
DiffusionBee • Install Stable Diffusion on MacOS
Hugging Face • Build, train and deploy AI image generation models
MindsEye • Graphical user interface built to run multimodal AI art models for free
promptoMANIA • Online prompt builder
Grid Splitter • Split your AI image into single images
Colab • Run AI image generators in the cloud for free

AI Image Generation Models

DALL·E 2 • Create realistic images and art from text
Stable Diffusion • A latent text-to-image diffusion model
Midjourney • Create images from textual descriptions
DeepAI • AI Image Generator API
Big Sleep • Simple command line tool for text-to-image generation
Jasper Art • Create images for your ads, blog, website and social media

🔮 Predictions

We’ll see new jobs for AI image generation professionals. They will build, train and deploy AI models, write prompts, generate images and animations.
- Clone Lexica for $4,000.
- Build an AI image database for $750-1,500.
- Create an AI-powered avatar builder for $2,000.
- Become a Stable Diffusion coding expert for $5,000
- Add text-to-image generator to a website for $750-2,000.
- Teach advanced Midjourney techniques for $5-45 per hour.
- Create artwork for an art gallery platform for $8-15 per hour.
- Configure Stable Diffusion to create clothes for $8-$95 per hour.
- Help with Stable Diffusion and DreamBooth for $65-200 per hour.
- Create a custom DreamBooth and Stable Diffusion setup for $500.
- Create 5-second animated videos with AI-generated images for $30-250.

NFT collections will be launched with AI-generated art.
- SIGHTS is a collection of 500 artworks of shapes and colors.
- Dream Capsules is a collection of 1000 AI-generated dreams.
- DEEP JOURNEYS is a collection of 500 AI-generated animations.
- QUANTUM TENTACLES is a collection of 712 AI-generated art pieces.
- Artificial Intelligence Art is a collection of 1000 unique AI-generated NFTs.
- Stable Diffusion: Animabotics (Meow Edition) is a collection of 58 robo-cats.
- Chimerical Stories is a collection of 513 chimera specimens in both still and animated form.
- AI Generated Arts is a list of NFT collections depicting the universe, biology, landscapes, cities and more.
- AI Generated Art drops is a collection of 55 NFTs with unique combinations of styles, colors, shapes and more.

Content creation platforms will build AI image generation features. Users will be able to generate visuals for ads, blogs and social media.
- Canva launched a public beta for their Text-to-Image tool.
- neuroflash is working on its own royalty-free image generator.
- Jasper added Jasper Art to their AI-powered content creation tools.
- Picsart added a free AI Image Generator to their suite of creative tools.
- MyAiTeam integrated Stable Diffusion into their text generation platform.
- GoCharlie added text-to-image features to its content generation platform.
- Hypotenuse AI made an AI Image Generator for blogs, ads and social media.
- Simplified added a free AI Image Generator for blogs and social media visuals.

Companies will build side projects around AI image generators. This helps them boost brand awareness and get more leads.
- AISEO is an AI-powered writing assistant that made AISEO ART.
- Noonshot is an NFT shop builder that made Midjourney Prompt Tool.
- Shutterstock is a stock image marketplace that is creating Shutterstock AI.
- Creative Fabrica is a graphics marketplace that made its own image generator CF Spark.
- SocialBu is a social media management platform that made AI Blog Post Image Generator.
- PromptHero is an AI image database that made a Crash Course in AI Art Generation.
- AE Studio is a software development agency that created the GhostlyStock image generator.
- Writesonic is an AI content writing platform that made its own text-to-image generator Photosonic.
- TikTok is a video-sharing app that made AI Greenscreen. Which creates a background for your videos from the text.
- Vana is a decentralized platform for everyone to own, use and share their digital selves. Which created a self-portrait AI generator Portrait.

☁️ Opportunities

Sell prompt writingservices. Help people find the best prompt to get the perfect image.
- Miguel Angel Navarro writes complex prompts.
- Andre sells prompt engineering services for DALL·E.
- Finn creates image prompts with advanced generative techniques.

Sell AI-generated assets. Help users save time and money.
- Majestic sells AI-generated icons.
- Kristen creates custom art pieces with Midjourney.
- Infinity PBR sells thousands of AI-generated icons.
- Vladimir Chopine sells hundreds of AI-generated backdrops.
- Rokas sells AI-generated cover art for song albums or singles.
- Generated Photos sells AI-generated faces and custom datasets.

Create online courses on AI image generation. Help others learn the best practices of AI image generation.
- Scott Bromander teaches art generation with Create Beautiful Art with AI.
- Hasen Hafid teaches AI image generation with Create Stunning AI Images using Midjourney.
- A.I. Generated Art: Community Workshop was a live workshop on how to create and sell AI-generated images.
- The Ultimate Beginner’s Guide to MidJourney AI Art is a 7-part free video course on generating art with Midjourney.
- Joe Ndua teaches AI image generation with DALL-E 2: Complete Beginner’s Guide to Artificial Intelligence Art Generation.
- Oliver Theobald teaches image generation with Generative AI Art For Beginners: Midjourney & the tactics of killer text prompts.
- Samuel Boylan-Sajous teaches image generation using Generative Adversarial Networks with Complete A.I. Art Generation Course – Beginner 2 MASTER.
- Samson Vowles teaches AI art generation with Midjourney Mastery: Create Visually Stunning AI Art, DALL-E Mastery: Create Impressive AI Art and Create Beautiful Art with AI.
- Jonathon Parker teaches how to create, edit and animate AI-generated images with How to create AI art with Midjourney, How to use DALL-E 2 to edit and create images and AI Animation with DALL-E 2, Photoshop and After Effects.

Build a directory of AI image generator tools. Share new tools, models and services.
- AI Image Tools is a directory of AI image generators.
- Futurepedia is a collection of AI tools for image generation.
- Magic Tools is a directory of AI-powered tools for image creation and editing.
- ThisIsBuiltWith.AI is a curated collection of AI image generators and other AI tools.
- AI Generative Art Tools is a directory of tools and resources on generating art with AI.

Build browser extensions. Boost productivity with AI image generators without switching apps and tabs.
- DALL-E prompt helper is a prompt builder for DALL·E by Alex Wolkov.
- DALL-E 2 Image Downloader lets you download generated images from the DALL·E 2 website.
- This Chrome extension is an AI-powered prompt writing assistant that works much like Grammarly.

🏔️ Risks

Platform Risk • You are subject to the platform’s content policies. Getty Images banned AI-generated images due to copyright worries. Newgrounds endorses art made by humans. Fur Affinity banned AI-generated images due to a lack of artistic merit.
Copyright Risk • AI image generators are trained on real artists’ concepts, attributes and styles. It’s unclear who owns the rights to AI-generated images. Artists can use Have I Been Trained? tool to check if their art appeared in training datasets.
High Costs• You may go bankrupt if you don’t balance the supply and demand for your AI business. Especially during the early stage. Interior AI grew to 23 customers and $500 MRR. While the GPU costs grew to $1,000 per day. Which was 60 times more than its monthly revenue.

🔑 Key Lessons

Some artists don’t want to be used as training material. They fear AI will replace them. Greg Rutkowski says “when you type in my name, you see more work from the AI than work that I have done myself.”
Major AI image generators are trained on publicly available data. They use open datasets such as LAION-5B. Which scrapes sources such as Pinterest, DeviantArt, Getty Images and more.
Publicly available datasets may not be copyright-free. They may have images that have their rightful owners. LAION-5B and ImageNet explicitly say that images are under their own copyright.

🔥 Hot Takes

AI image generators will be used to create worlds for virtual reality and the metaverse.
We’ll see computer-generated movies that combine AI image generators and other AI tools to create characters, animations, scenes and more. This video was generated entirely by AI, using Craiyon, Midjourney and other tools.
Artists will embrace AI image generators. Beeple is fascinated by their capabilities. Claire Silver creates AI-generated art and runs paid contests for AI-collaborative artists.

😠 Haters

“Unrestricted, open-source image generators are subject to unethical use.”
This is true. They do what we tell them to do. Deepfakes could be used for doing bad and good things. The same is true for AI image generators.

“It can be hard to control the final result.”
Many AI image generators are pre-trained models that follow a strict set of rules. Learn the art of writing prompts to produce detailed outcomes. Use open-source tools to fine-tune your models if you’re a tech-savvy person.

“Digital artists may lose their value. It can be hard to distinguish between them and AI.”
While AI can copy artists’ styles, it lacks a human touch. Those who value human personality, story, creativity and passion will continue to appreciate non-AI art.

🔗 Links

Looking for AI Image projects • The tweet behind this report.
AI Image generators, a complete guide to this new technology • Introduction to how AI image generators work.
The Anatomy Of An AI Art Prompt • Guide on how to write a good prompt for AI image generators.

📁 Related Reports

AI-Generated Content • Learn about AI-generated texts, videos, voices and more
No-Code • No-code will make it easier to use generative AI
Productized Services • Launch standardized offers for AI image generation use cases
B2B SaaS • Solve business problems with AI image generators
Managed Marketplaces • AI-generated art is traded on managed marketplaces

🙏 Thanks

Thanks to Joel Pickin, Guillaume Tessier, Vlad R., Felipe Collins, Fausto Sá Teles, Sam Schrup, Stewart Townsend, Aja, Satish Jain, Frank Pei, Shashank, Marcos Gorgojo, Paul Tune and Marc Fletcher. We had a great time jamming on this report.

✏️ Emin researched and wrote this report. Dru researched and edited this report.

📈 What else?

Trends PRO #0100 — AI Image Generators has more insights.

What you’ll get:

37 AI Image Generation Apps (185% More)
25 AI Image Generation Tools (257% More)
19 AI Image Generation Models (217% More)
14 Predictions (250% More)
20 Opportunities (300% More)
6 Risks (100% More)
8 Key Lessons (167% More)
14 Hot Takes (367% More)
14 Links (367% More)

With Trends Pro you’ll learn:

(📈 Pro) How to create game assets?
(📈 Pro) How to illustrate books?
(📈 Pro) How to automate creative work?
(📈 Pro) How to find AI image generator hackathons?
(📈 Pro) How to use AI image generators to create NFTs?
(📈 Pro) How to create detailed image prompts?
(📈 Pro) How to restore old photos?
(📈 Pro) What are the benefits of building user communities?
(📈 Pro) How to sell AI-generated prints?
(📈 Pro) What are AI image generation plugins?
(📈 Pro) How to create AI-generated avatars of yourself?
(📈 Pro) What are open-source AI image generators?
(📈 Pro) How to set up an AI image generator?
(📈 Pro) How to create themed images?
(📈 Pro) How to monetize your expertise with AI image generators?
(📈 Pro) How to get predictable results?
(📈 Pro) How to turn 2D videos into 3D?
(📈 Pro) How to save money using AI image generators?
(📈 Pro) What work will AI image generators replace?
(📈 Pro) What are the limitations of diffusion models?
(📈 Pro) How to use prompt modifiers to generate better images?
(📈 Pro) What are the legal risks of using AI image generators?
(📈 Pro) What is the history of AI-generated art?
(📈 Pro) What tool raised $125,000,000 to build an AI image generator?
And much more…

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⌛ 10-Year Test 🦉 Guide to Wealth & Happiness 🤖 AI Avatars

This week’s Founder Finds includes:

AI avatars
The 10-year test
A collection of Naval’s wisdom
Carving out time to be creative
A tool to visualize numerical data
A tool to quickly build apps in your browser
And more…

🪶 Remember This

Follow your bliss.

🤓 Fav Finds

Tools, tweets and more from Trends Pro Members

📊 GRID shared by Bernardt J. Vogel
A tool to build beautiful, interactive visualizations from complex numerical data.

🦉 The Almanack of Naval Ravikant shared by Shuyen Phoon
A collection of Naval’s wisdom on principles for building wealth and creating long-term happiness.

👷 FlutterFlow shared by Sebastian Rohrmann
An online tool to build fully functional apps in your browser fast, accelerating time to market.

🔧 Try This

Profile Picture AI

Danny Postma’s ProfilePicture.ai is yet another sign of how fast Generative Tech is moving. Look out for this week’s report on AI Image Generators.

🌟 Founder of the Week

Lwany

“Trends Pro reports are my gospel, I confide in the community as if they are my priests, and I aim to practice everything Dru preaches. I’m grateful to have found a place to expedite my learning and be surrounded by such kind and generous entrepreneurs. I only wish there were more women.”

Lwany is building Petite Fashion Weekly. A curated newsletter for short fashionistas sharing the latest on all things style. Petite Ventures, the umbrella above Petite Fashion Weekly, will soon expand into other audience-first products like digital products and experiences. Lwany is also a member of Trends Mastermind #0006.

What’s your most important habit?
Getting an early start

The earlier I wake up, the better my day, so I’ve been waking up at 5 am, but I’m working on making that 4 am.

What are you reading right now?
Find Your Unicorn Space by Eve Rodsky

As with most women, I struggle with drawing boundaries and prioritizing myself, so I recently picked up Find Your Unicorn Space by Eve Rodsky. The book is an inspirational guide to carving out time and space to be creative. I’ll be reading the author’s first book, Fair Play, next which outlines how to divide household tasks and balance life.

What product or service do you wish existed?
A no-code tool for creating shoppable Pinterest-like boards that populates a product’s image, size availability, and price from affiliate links.

I’d love to set up concept shops based on my audience’s most frequent requests (loungewear, office attire, etc.) with a partial paywall.

What product are you obsessively using right now?
After a bad case of burnout, I’m gearing up to start creating content again, and Notion has been God-sent. It allowed me to create a strategy along with monthly, weekly and daily checklists.

What are you bearish on?
Sacrificing the present for a future goal because tomorrow isn’t promised and all we have is now.

What’s your favorite Trends Report?
🗂️ Directories

I considered selling a directory with 100+ retailers offering petite clothing, but ultimately decided against it. This report challenged me to re-evaluate my decision. The players outlined are incredibly inspiring, and the opportunities are pretty compelling.

❔ Ask Yourself

10-Year Test

I’m obsessed with the idea of compounding and by extension, long-term thinking.

I often ask: “Can you see yourself doing this for 10 years?”

This applies to friendships, business partnerships, hobbies and more.

Most of the benefits of compounding come later in the journey. It’s a question worth asking early and often.

🏆 Trends Pro Member Wins

🆕 Sebastian Rohrmann and Mehmet Gonullu became Trends Pro Members

👥 Mehmet Gonullu and Chris Vara unlocked 1:1 Founder Intros by joining daily standups

📈 Maciej Cupial reached $4,000 MRR with Calendesk

🥇 Fausto Sá Teles’ project was selected as a finalist in No Code Weekend

🎬 Uwe Dreissigacker published a new video for BlogHandy

🧠 Elena Vargas unlocked Trends.vc Masterminds by reaching a 30-day standup streak

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📈 Unlock Pro Reports, 1:1 Intros and Masterminds

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📈 100+ Trends Pro Reports • To make sense of new markets, ideas and business models, check out our research reports.

💬 1:1 Founder Intros • Make new friends, share lessons and find ways to help each other. Keep life interesting by meeting new founders each week.

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💲 100k+ Startup Discounts • Get access to $100k+ in startup discounts on AWS, Twilio, Webflow, ClickUp and more.

🤖 AI Tools 🔧 Building an MVP 🎓 The School of Life

This week’s Founder Finds includes:

The School of Life
A sales framework
6 lessons for building an MVP
An AI powered podcasting tool
A collection of JS letter animations
A categorized list of the latest AI tools
And more…

🪶 Remember This

If I had more time I would have written a shorter letter.

🤓 Fav Finds

Tools, tweets and more from Trends Pro Members

🎙️ Deciphr.ai shared by Sean Hua
An AI powered tool that timestamps and summarizes your podcast transcript or audio file.

🔤 Moving Letters shared by Yuyu
A collection of letter animation code to create beautifully animated text in JavaScript.

🤖 AI Tech Master List shared by Stewart Townsend
A categorized list of the latest AI powered tools, models and applications.

🔧 Try This

6 Lessons for Building an MVP

Tips on how to get started and build an MVP from KP. Host of the Build in Public Podcast.

🌟 Founder of the Week

Stanislav Bodiagin

“Trends Pro Masterminds help me find new ideas, support and stay motivated. It’s inspiring to be around founders who are doing what I dream of.”

Stanislav is building ExpertVill.com. A platform for hosting courses with a built-in funnel. He is also a member of Trends Mastermind #0004.

What’s your most important habit?
To not take up tasks immediately.

Instead I write it down and place it into a queue. Which helps me to stay focused.

What are you reading right now?
SPIN Selling by Neil Rackham

I consider sales to be an important skill for entrepreneurs. I recommend the book to those who have not worked in sales before and need a framework.

What product or service do you wish existed?
A service that would help to sell through DM.

It should help filter information and generate relevant questions at each stage.

What product are you obsessively using right now?
I use a Pomodoro timer to be more productive.

What are you bullish on?
I believe that artificial intelligence will replace low-skilled human labor in the digital world. Like machines once did in manufacturing.

What’s your favorite Trends Report?
🧪 Conversion Rate Optimization

I love everything about business mathematics and funnels.

👀 Watch This

The School of Life

This came up in a recent mastermind as someone made a “Request for Product” for a way to learn life skills. I shared The School of Life which teaches us about relationships, money, stress, anxiety, aging and more. The important things that you were never taught in school.

🏆 Trends Pro Member Wins

🆕 Dana R and Bernardt J. Vogel became Trends Pro Members

👥 Jayant Rao and James Renouf unlocked 1:1 Founder Intros by joining daily standups

📰 Mark Moore relaunched his weekly digest of Product Hunt products

📷 Fausto Sá Teles shipped his first No-Code product

🎙️ Simon Daley launched Bootstrapper Podcast on Product Hunt

🌴 Fausto Sá Teles’ tweet went viral

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📈 Unlock Pro Reports, 1:1 Intros and Masterminds

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🧠 Founder Mastermind Groups • To share goals, progress and solve problems together, each group is made up of 6 members who meet for 1 hour each Monday.

📈 100+ Trends Pro Reports • To make sense of new markets, ideas and business models, check out our research reports.

💬 1:1 Founder Intros • Make new friends, share lessons and find ways to help each other. Keep life interesting by meeting new founders each week.

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💲 100k+ Startup Discounts • Get access to $100k+ in startup discounts on AWS, Twilio, Webflow, ClickUp and more.

🚀 Growth Strategies ⚗️ The Science of Memes 🔴 Red Teams

This week’s Founder Finds includes:

Seeking critical feedback
Newsletter sponsors statistics
A study guide for visual design in UX
How stories and symbols are used to program us
A list of the most often recommended books on Reddit
And more…

🪶 Remember This

Perfect is a myth.

🤓 Fav Finds

Tools, tweets and more from Trends Pro Members

💌 Newsletter Sponsors Statistics shared by Breno Ferreira
An overview of brands buying ads and sponsorships in newsletters.

👩‍🎨 Visual Design in UX: Study Guide shared by davidacreates
A collection of articles and videos to learn about visual design in UX.

📚 Reddit Reads shared by Kevin Deol
A list of the most often recommended books on Reddit, categorized by subreddit.

🔧 Try This

Red Team

Feedback is a gift. You can sharpen your ideas and avoid blindspots by seeking critical feedback. I affix requests for feedback with “Be as blunt as possible.”

This gives my friends a chance to be completely honest and helps me build better products. Expose yourself to short-term discomfort for long-term gain.

🌟 Founder of the Week

Yuyu Salim

“Trends Pro keeps me accountable and it’s very comforting to be surrounded by like-minded people in the community.“

Yuyu is building ClinicGeek. A healthcare listing service that helps you find the right healthcare professional for your needs. He has also joined more than 550 daily standups.

What’s your most important habit?
Reading

What are you reading right now?
How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

This quote comes across my mind from time to time: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together”.

Communication and building relationships are 2 non-technical aspects that I hope to improve.

What product or service do you wish existed?
Competitor SEO Analysis.

A good SEO tool is expensive and sometimes you just need a one-time use to validate your idea.

What product are you obsessively using right now?
Copy.ai

I’m using it to improve copy and publish new articles for ClinicGeek

What are you bullish on?
AI-Generated Art

It opens up new opportunities for non-creative people to start creating their own art.

What’s your favorite Trends Report?
🧰 Side Project Marketing

I like the idea of building niche/small products to market your main product. It helps you validate new ideas at the same time.

📘 Read This

Virus of the Mind

Bad book cover. Great book.

I came across this while researching a meme marketing report (that’s still unreleased). It covers how stories and symbols are used to program us. This is what I call a “long-tail book.” It’s insane to think about how undiscovered it is.

🏆 Trends Pro Member Wins

🆕 Sammy Villarreal, Mark Moore and Aurélien Schvartz became Trends Pro Members

👥 Mark Moore unlocked 1:1 Founder Intros by joining daily standups

🚀 Yun’s newsletter highlighting growth strategies from Indie Founders hit 2,500 subscribers

⭐ Jwalant Patel launched a performance review course on Shadowing.ai

🧲 Cameron McGrane posted a case study of creating and launching a lead magnet. This is a 📈 Trends Pro Exclusive.

🎙️ Swapnil Puranik was featured on the SmartBranding.com podcast

👩‍💼 Lwany got her first consulting client

Get Weekly Reports

Join 65,000+ founders and investors

📈 Unlock Pro Reports, 1:1 Intros and Masterminds

Become a Trends Pro Member and join 1,200+ founders enjoying…

🧠 Founder Mastermind Groups • To share goals, progress and solve problems together, each group is made up of 6 members who meet for 1 hour each Monday.

📈 100+ Trends Pro Reports • To make sense of new markets, ideas and business models, check out our research reports.

💬 1:1 Founder Intros • Make new friends, share lessons and find ways to help each other. Keep life interesting by meeting new founders each week.

🧍 Daily Standups • Stay productive and accountable with daily, async standups. Unlock access to 1:1 chats, masterminds and more by building standup streaks.

💲 100k+ Startup Discounts • Get access to $100k+ in startup discounts on AWS, Twilio, Webflow, ClickUp and more.

Fractional Executives: Leadership-as-a-Service, CXOs, White-Label Solutions

“Hire people who are better than you are, then leave them to get on with it… Look for people who will aim for the remarkable, who will not settle for the routine.” —David Ogilvy

Get Full Access to Trends Pro

❓ What You’ll Learn

How to scale your talents as a fractional executive?
How to reduce your time to hire?
How to improve your lifestyle with flexible employment?
How to find KPIs for fractional executives to focus on?
How to save time and money with a fractional executive?

💎 Why It Matters

You can work with experienced executives on an as-needed basis.

🔍 Problem

You need expert help. But can’t justify the cost of hiring for a full-time role.

💡 Solution

Find a fractional executive and only pay for what you need.

🏁 Players

Fractional Executives

Maciej Cupial (Trends Pro Member) • Fractional CTO at Podcast Hawk which is run by Stewart Townsend (also a member).
Kevin Whelan (Trends Pro Member) • Fractional CMO who teaches about how to become an advisor.
Jeffrey Fidelman • Fractional CFO specializing in fundraising.
Neil Portus • Fractional CFO for growth companies.
Michael Truog • Fractional CTO with decades of experience at every level.
Tomislav Capan • Fractional CTO who specializes in cloud architecture.
Alex Kurkin and Andrii Gikalo • Runs a fractional CTO agency.

Hiring Platforms

byDesign • On-demand marketing subscription-based platform.
Shiny • Fractional talent marketplace.
Business Talent Group • Hire fractional executives.
Passionfruit • Hire a world-class fractional CMO.
Continuum • On-demand executive talent.
The Free Agent • Fractional strategic leadership recruitment firm.
Fractional Executive Solutions • Fractional executive agency.

🔮 Predictions

Fractional executives will launch agencies to scale and focus on high-leverage activities.
- Trevor Longino spent a decade as a fractional CMO before starting his own marketing agency.
- Anna Sullivan is a fractional CMO who started her own social media agency called The Creative Exchange.
- Andrew Deutsch transitioned his fractional CMO service into an agency called Fangled Tech.
- Daryl Dobrenz is a fractional accountant who is now the CEO of Kranz Consulting.
- Marissa Goldberg is a fractional Head of Remote who started Remote Work Prep.

Fractional executives will offer white-label solutions for common needs.
- Nick and Char offer white-label subscription and referral solutions for e-commerce businesses as fractional CTOs.
- Mark Preston is a fractional CMO who founded Stopgap SEO to offer a standard solution for link building and technical audits.

Startups and small businesses will hire fractional General Counsels. Lawyers are an expensive but necessary business tool.
- 1010 tires CEO Sophia Volpov hired a fractional General Counsel with e-commerce experience.
- ParticipACTION saved money on traditional legal fees by paying a fractional General Counsel an hourly rate without a retainer.
- Northbridge Financial was unsure about the volume of work needed and hired Steve Pasternak as fractional General Counsel on a tight deadline.

☁️ Opportunities

Reduce time to hire. Fractional executives can be hired quickly and save months of recruiting time.
- MVP Health Care Inc. pivoted to telemedicine. They needed to go to market without waiting to find the “right” CMO candidate. Arlyn Davich joined as fractional CMO to develop their marketing strategy immediately.
- The CTO of A.T. Cross quit unexpectedly. They hired a fractional CTO to solve critical systems issues and improve projects left in disarray.
- Joyce Ripianzi, CPA is a fractional CFO who joined a nonprofit in urgent need of a CFO. They realized they didn’t need a full-time CFO in the first place.

Become a fractional executive to improve your lifestyle with flexible employment.
- Beejeel Parmar became a fractional COO so that he could gain the independence to travel and homeschool his children.
- Nicholas Zeisler uses the flexibility of being a fractional Chief Customer Officer to spend time in the Colorado mountains and ski at his leisure.
- Mark Evans became a fractional CMO and was able to focus more on his writing and storytelling.
- Amanda Rabideau became a fractional CMO to gain autonomy over her clients and schedule.

Set specific KPIs for your fractional executive to focus on.
- Kinley Corp hired Robert Mohr as fractional CFO and reduced the time it took to complete month-end accounting by 50%.
- Jason Fehr from Timber Ridge Homes hired a fractional CMO who generated $24mm in quotable business and 158 trackable leads in 6 months.
- ConnectWise hired Angus Robertson as fractional CMO and increased their pipeline by 118% to $5.7 million.

Hire a fractional executive to automate workflows to save time and money.
- Lawline hired a fractional CFO to build an automated forecasting and budgeting tool for the leadership team.
- Shaun Ericson of Cireson hired Kristy Facchini as fractional CFO to implement automated cash flow processes and NetSuite for ASC606 compliance.
- Srikanth Vadrevu is a fractional CMO who specializes in automating SaaS marketing processes.

🏔️ Risks

Short-Term Mindset • Make sure that your fractional executive optimizes for long-term success. Short-term incentives harm long-term success.
Bad Fit • The executive you hire might not be right for you or your business. You may need to try multiple executives before finding the ideal team member.
Team Buy-In • Your team needs to understand and accept the value of a fractional executive.

🔑 Key Lessons

Learn from them. Fractional executives should be knowledgeable executives who have been in your shoes before. Solicit advice and input.
Hire specialists. One advantage of working with fractional executives is that you can hire a wider breadth of team members.
Integrate your fractional executive with the rest of the team. An executive will have a stronger impact if they have visibility into how the team operates.

🔥 Hot Takes

Fractional executives will accelerate the overemployment trend. Executives will overwork themselves to maximize income.
Fractional executives will create niche job titles. In-demand workers will be incentivized to commoditize and sell their best skill to as many businesses as possible.
Fractional executives will avoid office politics. They will be more focused on getting the job done with limited time.

😠 Haters

“How is a fractional executive better than hiring an agency?”
Fractional executives take on more responsibility than an agency. They take full ownership and act as a point person for areas of your business like budget-setting, hiring, firing, and building processes. They should be held more accountable than an agency.

“Fractional executives don’t have the same impact as a full-time employee.”
It’s true that they cannot make the same time commitment. In many cases, fractional executives will have a greater impact on a per-hour basis.

“Fractional executives won’t understand my company as well as I do.”
They aren’t supposed to. Fractional executives have specific skills which can be used in a variety of businesses. You and your full-time team members know your product inside and out. Specialists should be used to leverage that knowledge.

“Isn’t this the same as hiring an interim executive?”
No. Interim executives are hired on a full-time but temporary basis to effect immediate change until permanent leadership is found. Fractional executives are part-time leaders who should be working toward the long-term success of your business.

🔗 Links

Examples of Fractional Executives • The tweet behind this report.
How a Fractional Chief Operating Officer Can Help Your Business Grow Sustainably • A guide to hiring and correctly utilizing a fractional COO.
What Makes Fractional CIO Engagements in SMEs Successful? – A Research Framework • Academic research on analyzing the success of a fractional CIO.

📁 Related Reports

Remote Work • Remote work is accelerating the fractional executive trend.
Consulting • A fractional executive is similar to but less engaged than a consultant.
Agencies • Many fractional executives transition to running agencies.
Productized Services • A fractional executive is an example of a productized service.
Personal Brands • Succeeding as a fractional executive requires the cultivation of a strong personal brand.

🙏 Thanks

Thanks to Tem, Stewart Townsend, Wit S., Swapnil Puranik, Yarty, Vikrant Duggal, Ron Immink, Maciej Cupial, and David Steinley.We had a great time jamming on this report.

✏️ Harry researched and wrote this report. Dru researched and edited this report.

📈 What else?

Trends PRO #0099 — Fractional Executives has more insights.

What you’ll get:

30 Fractional Executives and Hiring Platforms (114% More)
10 Predictions (233% More)
15 Opportunities (275% More)
6 Risks (100% More)
4 Key Lessons (133% More)
6 Hot Takes (100% More)
11 Links (333% More)

With Trends Pro you’ll learn:

(📈 Pro) How to get help fundraising?
(📈 Pro) How to land a full-time job from a fractional role?
(📈 Pro) How to improve employee retention with fractional executives?
(📈 Pro) How to promote yourself as a fractional executive?
(📈 Pro) How to buy time to focus on higher-leverage activities?
(📈 Pro) How to expand your client base with referrals?
(📈 Pro) How to challenge your decisions and assumptions?
(📈 Pro) How to find budget-friendly, skilled fractional executives?
And much more…

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🗺️ Slow-Mading 🌌 Hyper-Freelance Model 📝 Supercharged To-do Lists

This week’s Founder Finds includes:

Slow-mading
A framework for freelancers
An integrated productivity app
A collaborative tool for digital marketing
How building businesses is like playing a game
And more…

🪶 Remember This

If you really want to escape the things that harass you, what you’re needing is not to be in a different place but to be a different person.

🤓 Fav Finds

Tools, tweets and more from Trends Pro Members

🧰 Simplified shared by Michael Pearson-Adams
An all-in-one collaborative tool for content creation and digital marketing.

🌌 The Hyper Freelance Model shared by Fausto Sá Teles
A model for freelancers to diversify their offerings and stop trading time for money.

📝 Amie shared by Ruben Dahmen
A productivity app integrating to-do list and calendar functions.

🎧 Listen To

Starting a Profitable Business After a Life-Changing Exit with Laura Roeder of Paperbell

Courtland and Laura talk about asynchronous work, how building businesses is like playing a game, SEO strategies, selling your company and more.

🌟 Founder of the Week

Eric Chou

“My experience has been great with Trends Pro. I have only missed one mastermind meetup in the last 6 months because I get a lot of value from talking to other mastermind members. I enjoy reading reports about topics that I did not know existed.”

Eric is building Network Automation Nerds. A learning community where network engineers learn, help each other and get inspired. He is also a member of Trends Mastermind #0005.

What’s your most important habit?
Staying productive using the Pomodoro method: 25 minutes of focused work with 5-minute breaks.

What are you reading right now?
The Right It by Alberto Savoia

What product are you obsessively using right now?
For the past 2+ years, I have been wearing my Apple watch daily. I find it helpful in tracking my health habits and it’s good enough for me to ditch my phone in many instances.

What are you bullish on?
I am bullish on Education Technologies.

The value proposition is straightforward and most people want to be better at something. So the market risk is lower. This allows us to focus on minimizing product risk i.e. ensuring that the product delivers what’s promised.

What are you bearish on?
I am bearish on manual computer work. For example, command-line-based network management or human-based monitoring systems. I think it is obvious that most of this manual work will be replaced by automation.

What’s your favorite Trends Report?
🔑 Token-Gated Communities

It’s something that I have always wanted to explore but found it difficult to narrow the scope. This report saved me lots of research time.

Exclusive Deal: Eric is offering Trends.vc readers a chance to join the Network Automation Learning Community for free. Use this invitation link to claim.

📘 Read This

The Catch Me If You Can

I’ve been slow-mading for nearly 2 years. Someone recently asked why. The shortest truth is that I do hard things to grow. Jessica Nabongo is the first black woman to visit all countries. Each book chapter covers one country and her experience there. It’s a fun read.

🏆 Trends Pro Member Wins

🆕 Ajit Singh and Joel Pickin became Trends Pro Members

👥 Kevin Galang, Paul Jansen, Ajit Singh and Joel Pickin unlocked 1:1 Founder Intros by joining daily standups

⚡ Simon Daley built Super Tech News as a weekend side project

✒️ Cameron McGrane and his wife performed a test launch of Expert Author Academy

🚀 Maciej Cupial posted the October monthly update for Calendesk

🧠 David K unlocked Trends.vc Masterminds by reaching a 30-day standup streak

Get Weekly Reports

Join 65,000+ founders and investors

📈 Unlock Pro Reports, 1:1 Intros and Masterminds

Become a Trends Pro Member and join 1,200+ founders enjoying…

🧠 Founder Mastermind Groups • To share goals, progress and solve problems together, each group is made up of 6 members who meet for 1 hour each Monday.

📈 100+ Trends Pro Reports • To make sense of new markets, ideas and business models, check out our research reports.

💬 1:1 Founder Intros • Make new friends, share lessons and find ways to help each other. Keep life interesting by meeting new founders each week.

🧍 Daily Standups • Stay productive and accountable with daily, async standups. Unlock access to 1:1 chats, masterminds and more by building standup streaks.

💲 100k+ Startup Discounts • Get access to $100k+ in startup discounts on AWS, Twilio, Webflow, ClickUp and more.