Podcasts by The Art of Product
The Art of Product is a podcast chronicling the journeys of two entrepreneurs building software companies. Hosted by Ben Orenstein and Derrick Reimer.
Further podcasts by Ben Orenstein and Derrick Reimer
Podcast on the topic Neues aus der Technik
All episodes
206: IRL at MicroConf from 2022-04-06T06:00
Derrick and Ben share updates from the Castos recording booth at MicroConf Growth.
Listen205: Wathan Stops By from 2022-03-30T06:00
Our favorite Canadian drops by to talk mobility, fancy A/V setups, what's next for Tailwind UI, and how we'll never find peace of mind.
Listen204: Miscellanea from 2022-03-23T06:00
Ben and Derrick riff on a variety of topics, including coffee brewing, retreats, MicroConf, design, finding business ideas, and interesting subreddits. Links:Sweet Maria's (https://www.sweetmarias....
Listen203: The Hiring Spree from 2022-03-16T06:00
The Tuple team has recently grown by three team members! Ben is looking forward to getting the Linux client out the door in the next month. Derrick is staying busy moving SavvyCal forward and bring...
Listen202: The Art and Pain of Design from 2022-03-09T06:00
Ben talks to Brian Lovin, a designer, podcaster, writer, and software tinkerer.
Listen201: Getting Things Done with Stephen Dolan from 2022-03-02T06:00
Ben and Derrick chat with Tuple's Chief of Staff and GTD expert, Stephen Dolan. They discuss Stephen's path from programming to sales to his current role and nerd out over methods for staying produ...
Listen200: The 200th Episode! from 2022-02-23T06:00
Ben recently had a Tuple team retreat. He is still in hiring mode. The Tuple product team is progressing on their Linux integration. Derrick ran a product-market fit survey for SavvyCal, and the r...
Listen199: Keeping Up With Courtland from 2022-02-09T06:00
Ben&Derrick chat with Courtland Allen from Indie Hackers. They discuss the challenges of building a community and finding fulfillment in work, among a variety of other topics. Resources:Indie Hacke...
Listen198: Leaving Room To React from 2022-01-26T06:00
Derrick and Ben catch-up about what's going on at Tuple and SavvyCal. Derrick had a fun customer experience on Twitter last week. Ben is still in hiring mode.
Listen197: Growth Mindset from 2022-01-12T06:00
Derrick&Ben catch up after a few weeks away for the holidays. Ben is still in hiring mode. He's considering ways to do more teaching (something he used to do a lot when he was a programmer by trade...
Listen196: The Hedonic Treadmill from 2021-12-22T06:00
Ben&Derrick chat about doing what you love versus doing what the business needs.
Listen195: Metric Obsession from 2021-12-08T06:00
Ben and Derrick catch up after a holiday break. Ben chats about his recent design hire and Stephen's promotion to Chief of Staff at Tuple. Derrick ran a successful Black Friday promo for SavvyCal a...
Listen194: The Future of AoP from 2021-12-01T06:00
Ben and Derrick plan for the future of the podcast.
Listen193: Feeling Ambitious from 2021-11-17T06:00
Ben and Derrick chat about their ambitions for building their companies and planning for the new year.
Listen192: This Is Not A Fire Drill from 2021-11-10T06:00
Ben tells the story about a recent Tuple incident in production. The guys discuss how they're putting planning into action after last week's chat with Adam about Shape Up. Derrick gives an update a...
Listen191: Shaping Up with Adam Wathan from 2021-11-03T06:00
Ben and Derrick talk to Adam about how to effectively plan and organize work.
Listen190: Unpacking Stripe, Continued from 2021-10-20T08:15
Penelope Phippen (https://twitter.com/penelope_zone) is back on the show to continue the conversation from Episode 180 (https://artofproductpodcast.com/episode-180) about how Stripe does with it does.
Listen189: Back In The Saddle from 2021-10-13T06:00
Ben is back home from the Vineyard and Derrick is back to 100%. Tuple is hiring a Product Designer (https://tuple.app/jobs/product-designer) and considering adding a bit more structure to their pro...
Listen188: Priorities, Priorities from 2021-10-06T06:00
Ben and Derrick strategize about how to allocate time and energy and staying in tune with customers.
Listen187: Wait, There Are How Many Time Zones?! from 2021-09-22T14:00
Ben and team are preparing to officially designate Tuple 1.0! Derrick is working on embedding SavvyCal more deeply in customers' workflows and is digging more moats around time zone handling.
Listen186: Investing In The Core from 2021-09-15T06:00
Ben is back on Martha's Vineyard enjoying some partial days off. The Tuple team just shipped a major overhaul of the app internals with better performance and less CPU usage. Derrick has been doing...
Listen185: Incremental Improvements from 2021-09-01T06:00
Ben is hanging out with two new team members in the office this week. The Tuple team is preparing to ship some big performance upgrades. Derrick launched the SavvyCal iCloud integration on Product ...
Listen184: Delete Your Backlog? from 2021-08-25T06:00
Ben and Derrick have been recharging with some vacation time the last few weeks. Ben is excited to onboard his new sales hire. Derrick shipped a Fastmail calendar integration and released a Zapier ...
Listen183: Soaking In Nature from 2021-08-11T06:00
Ben is excited to onboard a new team member to help with sales and customer success. Derrick shipped iCloud integration for SavvyCal and is continuing the shipping spree. Both have recently had the...
Listen182: Cutting Churn from 2021-07-28T06:00
Ben hired a new engineer to help with technical support and learn the ropes on native development. Derrick is thinking about strategies for reducing churn.
Listen181: On A Shipping Spree from 2021-07-21T06:00
At last, Ben found someone for the sales/customer success role at Tuple. Derrick is on a shipping spree with SavvyCal.
Listen181: On A Shipping Spree from 2021-07-21T06:00
At last, Ben found someone for the sales/customer success role at Tuple. Derrick is on a shipping spree with SavvyCal.
Listen180: Unpacking Stripe with Penelope Phippen from 2021-07-14T06:00
Ben&Derrick chat with Penelope Phippen all about how Stripe continues to relentlessly ship high-quality software. P.S. Stripe is hiring! (https://stripe.com/jobs)
Listen179: Riffing on Reform from 2021-06-30T06:00
Derrick is joined by Peter Suhm, founder of Reform, to share some updates and do some masterminding.
Listen178: Why Build A Business At All? from 2021-06-23T06:00
Ben&Derrick have an impromptu chat with Adam Wathan about all things business.
Listen177: On The Frontier from 2021-06-16T06:00
Ben and Derrick discuss shifting roles as their companies grow and evolve.
Listen177: On The Frontier from 2021-06-16T06:00
Ben and Derrick discuss shifting roles as their companies grow and evolve.
Listen176: Making the Rounds from 2021-06-09T06:00
Derrick has been sharing his story on various podcasts lately. Ben is continuing to refine his hiring process for the sales role at Tuple. Derrick is onboarding his first support hire and working o...
Listen175: Ben's Meetings from 2021-05-26T06:00
Derrick&Ben share updates on where they are spending their time moving their businesses forward.
Listen174: Everything Is A Vision Quest from 2021-05-19T06:00
Ben and Derrick discuss the nature of making decisions in the businesses and growing their teams.
Listen173: Shreyas Doshi on Product Management from 2021-05-12T09:00
Shreyas Doshi (Stripe, Twitter, Google) joins Ben and Derrick for a wide-ranging discussion on product management.
Listen172: Markidan on Marketing from 2021-05-07T03:15
Ben interviews Len Markidan, CMO at Podia about hiring a Head of Marketing for Tuple. Job description: https://tuple.app/jobs/head-of-marketing
Listen171: Humans Have A Lot of Drawbacks from 2021-04-28T06:00
Ben and Derrick discuss hiring support engineers and philosophies around customer support in general. They go deep on the topic of investing in your business, diversification, and allocating assets.
Listen170: Beautifully, Wonderfully Dissatisfied Customers from 2021-04-21T06:00
The Tuple team is close to shipping true 3-player mode without host&observer role limitations. Derrick launched the Outlook integration this week and is working on a bunch of smaller tasks that hav...
Listen169: The Startup Rollercoaster from 2021-04-14T06:00
Ben&Derrick chat about dealing with ups&downs in business, finding enough, decoupling fulfillment from business metrics, knowledge archival, dealing with feature requests, and slew of other topics.
Listen168: I'd Rather Commit Sins of Overambition from 2021-04-07T06:00
Ben&Derrick brainstorm a "rooms" feature for Tuple. Derrick is getting close to wrapping up the SavvyCal Outlook integration. Ben shares highlights from their latest team retreat and teases some ne...
Listen167: Crossing $10k from 2021-04-01T06:00
SavvyCal crossed an important SaaS milestone this week. Ben is continuing to delegate more responsibilities to his team and redefine his role with the company. The guys talk about Gumroad's recent ...
Listen166: Hello from Linux from 2021-03-25T06:00
The Tuple team made their first "Hello world" audio call from the new Linux client. Ben and Derrick talk through complex team billing structures. Derrick had a stressful couple of days when the Goo...
Listen165: The Art of Negotiation from 2021-03-18T06:00
Ben and Derrick chat about tools for collaboration and their recent experiences with negotiating deals. Ben wants to level up this year on the marketing front. Work is underway on the SavvyCal inte...
Listen164: We Love A Good Null Constraint from 2021-03-11T06:00
Ben and Derrick chat about joy of shipping features quickly that customers love. They also discuss architecting software to minimize painful changes in the future. The Tuple team is making progress...
Listen163: Catching Up With Paul Jarvis from 2021-03-04T06:00
Ben and Derrick hang out and talk shop with Paul Jarvis, co-founder of Fathom Analytics (https://usefathom.com/).
Listen162: Do You Even Clubhouse? from 2021-02-25T06:00
Ben is working on refining the Tuple company operating system. Derrick reflects on the kind of company he hopes to build and the merits of growing&managing a team vs staying tiny. The guys share th...
Listen161: The Podia Operating System from 2021-02-18T06:00
This week, Ben chats with Spencer Fry (http://www.spencerfry.com/), CEO and Founder of Podia (https://www.podia.com/). Spencer's smart. You should probably listen to him.
Listen160: Digging Moats from 2021-02-04T06:00
The Tuple team is releasing a batch of nice improvements and gearing up for taking on the Linux client project. Ben touched some code recently. Derrick is knocking out a swath of small features tha...
Listen159: Does Tuple Ever Crash? from 2021-01-28T06:00
Tuple's latest release is the least crashy of them all! The team is gearing up for the Linux client and feeling energized to take on the challenge. SavvyCal is now officially Derrick's highest gros...
Listen158: There's Nothing Like a Sharp Knife from 2021-01-21T06:00
Derrick&Ben chat about health, hobbits, and habits. Derrick reveals more numbers from the Product Hunt launch and talks through upcoming plans for the product. Links:Sweet Maria's (https://www.swee...
Listen157: SavvyCal Wins Product Hunt from 2021-01-14T06:00
The SavvyCal launch on Product Hunt (https://www.producthunt.com/posts/savvycal) was a success! Derrick chronicles the story of the launch and some early results. The Tuple team wrapped up their re...
Listen156: Reflections on 2020 from 2021-01-07T06:00
Ben&Derrick reflect on their journeys the past year and their plans for 2021.
Listen155: How Do You Buy A New Habit? from 2020-12-31T06:00
Ben wants to build a meditation habit and is considering ways to facilitate that. Tuple is still searching for a product designer. Derrick&Ben both saw success with their year-end annual upgrade pr...
Listen154: Courtland Allen Must Be Stopped from 2020-12-17T06:00
We're nominated for the SaaS Podcast Awards (https://microconf.com/latest/saas-podcast-award-nominees/) - go vote! The guys muse about the clever marketing behind the awards and their fellow nomine...
Listen153: The Value of Coaching from 2020-12-10T06:00
The Tuple team is finishing up 3-player mode. Ben is continuing to derive value out of coaching (this time with video games). Derrick shipped a 7-day free trial for SavvyCal and competitor comparis...
Listen152: Default Alive By Spring from 2020-11-26T06:00
Ben opened up a job listing for Senior Product Designer at Tuple. The Tuple team is working on full-featured multi-participant calls. Derrick shipped embedding SavvyCal links on websites and is wor...
Listen151: The One Comma Club from 2020-11-19T06:00
Derrick reached an important revenue milestone for SavvyCal. Ben is looking forward to an upcoming Tuple retreat.
Listen150: It's Like The Vinyl Of Telling Time from 2020-11-12T06:00
Ben and Derrick discuss some recent instances of founder CEOs stepping down from their posts. Derrick is shipping a unique feature this week. Ben is trying (but failing) to avoid getting into antiq...
Listen149: Check Your Business Privilege from 2020-11-05T06:00
Derrick has found a new groove working in public again. Ben is polishing a job posting for a Senior Product Designer role at Tuple. The guys discuss long-term visions and harvesting profits vs. rei...
Listen148: No Design Survives Contact With The DOM from 2020-10-29T06:00
Ben is enjoying working on marketing activities. Tuple is beginning their experiment of offering pairing coaching calls to customers. Derrick shipped a differentiating feature and received very pos...
Listen147: Incremental Shipping from 2020-10-22T06:00
Derrick shipped the next part of team functionality, which opened the door for expansion revenue. Ben is zeroing in on hiring a pairing coach for Tuple customers. In his down time, Ben is taking up...
Listen146: Growing Teams from 2020-10-15T06:00
The Tuple team is contracting with Thoughtbot for pairing and leveling up their Rails skills. Derrick is working on team permissions and thinking about working with a marketer after wrapping up mos...
Listen145: What's Next for StaticKit from 2020-10-08T06:00
Derrick is joined by Cole Krumbholz to talk about Formspree's (https://formspree.io/)acquisition of StaticKit (https://statickit.com/). They delve into Cole's history as a bootstrapped founder, de...
Listen144: Launching SavvyCal from 2020-09-24T06:00
SavvyCal (https://savvycal.com/) is officially launched! Derrick talks through how the launch went and how he's managing his freshly-restocked information pipeline. The Tuple team is nearing the fi...
Listen143: Networking Thoughts from 2020-09-17T06:00
Ben is trying out Roam (https://roamresearch.com/) for organizing his notes. He shares some tips for engineers applying for jobs. After manually onboarding customers for a few weeks, Derrick is sof...
Listen142: A Savvy Rebrand from 2020-09-10T06:00
Ben reflects on their latest all-hands meeting and a major upcoming release that will improve the Tuple internals. Derrick recounts the Mighty Cal rebrand to SavvyCal.
Listen141: Hiring Optimally from 2020-08-27T06:00
Derrick is continuing to manually onboard Mighty Cal users and is incorporating their feedback into the product. He is driving towards optimizing self-service onboarding to enable opening up signup...
Listen140: We Have Customers from 2020-08-13T06:00
Ben is looking to hire a WebRTC expert to prepare Tuple for multi-way calls and continue improving performance. Derrick has onboarded a handful of paying Mighty Cal customers and is rapidly iterati...
Listen139: Efficiency Starts With Groceries from 2020-07-30T06:00
Ben is taking his first day off in a while to recharge. He's experimenting with clustering calls on specific days to allow for more focus time on other days. Derrick finished the Zoom integration f...
Listen138: That's Not How Cults Work from 2020-07-23T06:00
Derrick has officially begun using Mighty Cal for his own scheduling needs. He plans to start onboarding early users this week. The Zoom integration is underway. Ben is considering ways to compensa...
Listen137: Approved! from 2020-07-16T06:00
Mighty Cal received Google API verification this week, which was a critical blocker to onboarding users. Derrick worked on scheduling link personalization this week. The Tuple team revamped their c...
Listen136: Feedback Is Everything from 2020-07-09T06:00
Ben ran his first all-hands meeting this week. Tuple got featured in a Stripe blog post about the customer portal feature that Tuple was beta testing. Ben has some observations about how Stripe app...
Listen135: Do We Really Need An Office? from 2020-07-02T06:00
Derrick is driving toward the first milestone of using Mighty Cal (https://mightycal.com/) for his own scheduling and is facing the reality of setting ambitious goals for the week. The Tuple team...
Listen134: Introducing Mighty Cal from 2020-06-25T06:00
Derrick details the launch of the landing page for his new scheduling app, Mighty Cal. The Tuple team took a retreat and did a feedback exercise modeled after the Great CEO Within. Tuple is officia...
Listen133: Perfect Is The Enemy Of Good from 2020-06-18T06:00
Derrick is dangerously close to shipping his MVP, but is also lamenting how long it's taking. He's committed to naming a public ship date by next recording time. Ben is on the hunt for an executive...
Listen132: Digging a Moat from 2020-06-11T06:00
We're back! The Tuple client redesign shipped and Derrick is going to help out with an overhaul of the Tuple onboarding process. Ben asked for users to record their first-run experience in exchange...
Listen131: Making Calculated Bets from 2020-05-21T06:00
Derrick had a productive maker week and is (hopefully) a few weeks out from onboarding his first customers for the new product. He is becoming well-acquainted with the Google Calendar API. The Tupl...
Listen130: Certainty Isn't The Goal from 2020-05-14T06:00
Tuple hired a firm for QA testing and is gradually ramping them up. Derrick is exploring how best to approach architecting the initial version of his new product (still in stealth mode) and is taki...
Listen129: Remember When Software Came on Floppy Disks? from 2020-04-30T06:00
Derrick explores the difference between the craft of software development and the building minimum-viable products (and why it's good to exercise both). Ben explores hiring a QA testing firm. They ...
Listen128: One Day At A Time from 2020-04-23T06:00
Derrick is enjoying work the last week by taking joy in setting and achieving small goals each day. The Tuple redesign project is nearing completion and has been a welcome distraction from the pand...
Listen127: A Tuple Growth Spurt from 2020-04-09T06:00
The Tuple team is growing as Ben kicks up sales efforts with help of an industry veteran and the engineering team onboards a new team member. Derrick is continuing to work in stealth mode on a new ...
Listen126: Tuple Takes Over from 2020-04-02T06:00
Ben and Derrick hang out with Tuple co-founders Spencer and Joel and talk shop. They discuss what it's really like to work with Ben, how they approach learning deeply technical things, ways they ar...
Listen125: Keeping Things in Perspective from 2020-03-26T06:00
Ben and Derrick are doing their best to focus right now with so much going on in the world. Ben is spending less time on Twitter these days. Derrick is working on hedging his opportunity bets by d...
Listen124: Back After A Break from 2020-03-19T06:00
Suntans and sunburns aside, Derrick’s winter escape to Mexico provided meaningful ideas and perspective on StaticKit. By reading, Competing Against Luck (https://www.amazon.com/Competing-Against-Lu...
Listen123: Customer Service as a Competitive Advantage from 2020-02-27T06:00
Ben put big and new priorities to the side to cover support for Tuple. By doing so, he discovered different opportunities to reduce the number of support requests received. It’s challenging to work...
Listen122: SaaS Sales with Matt Wensing from 2020-02-20T06:00
Even if a product, such as Tuple, is good and people don’t need to be convinced to buy it, there’s still plenty of work to be done. It involves communication, coordination, and collaboration. Ben’s...
Listen121: Futureproofing Your Business from 2020-02-13T06:00
Ben never wants to stop working on his startup company, Tuple. Despite some stress, it’s successful and satisfying. However, team members may be added to take over some of Ben’s responsibilities. B...
Listen120: Product Pricing with Adam Wathan from 2020-02-06T06:00
When’s the last time you read a manual or document to know how to use product features and functions? Ben’s new mantra: Write it down! Rather than repeat expertise, reuse content. Currently, Tuple’...
Listen119: Undoing a Twitter Addiction from 2020-01-30T06:00
If you’re spending too much time on Twitter, Ben shares some helpful advice. Fully lock and block it by setting parental controls and content restrictions. While attending Big Snow Tiny Conf (https...
Listen118: Reliability and Minimalism from 2020-01-16T06:00
Ben’s back from Tuple’s ski trip retreat, where survey responses were reviewed for strategic planning purposes. Turns out that those who value pair programming actively use Tuple. What’s Tuple doin...
Listen117: Our 2020 Roadmap from 2020-01-09T06:00
New Year’s Resolutions? Ben’s goal is to drink less coffee and get a survey out to Tuple customers. What do they want in the future for Tuple features? Are people using Tuple for reasons other than...
Listen116: Should We Be Setting Annual Goals? from 2019-12-26T06:00
In the last episode of 2019, Derrick and Ben focus on reflections and projections. Should they set goals for the coming year when it comes to Tuple and StaticKit? After all, nobody can predict the ...
Listen115: Debunking the Arrival Fallacy from 2019-12-19T06:00
Ben has turned out to be a terrific tweeter about Tuple on Twitter. So far, more than 750k impressions have been made regarding his post about the enterprise sales process. He also shared that Tupl...
Listen114: Building Today For Tomorrow's Growth from 2019-12-12T06:00
Ben describes how a recent Tuple tweet led to thousands of impressions and mentions, as well as possibly increased free trial sign-ups. Ben is experiencing the enterprise sales process where he cou...
Listen113: Rounding out the Product Roadmap from 2019-12-05T06:00
Derrick shipped a few things for StaticKit, including Mailchimp and ConvertKit integrations. What’s next? Stripe integration. For now, Derrick is targeting more technical users comfortable with cod...
Listen112: The Evolution of Product Positioning from 2019-11-21T06:00
Ben announced the release of a new version of Tuple. The app includes improvements to its Webcam feature and requires less CPU usage and bandwidth. Also, Ben decided to turn off payment notificatio...
Listen111: Continuous Improvement for Growth from 2019-11-14T06:00
Derrick shipped a revamped version of StaticKit’s homepage and plans to add a payments section soon. He’s eager to conduct another round of customer development calls. If you want to chat about you...
Listen110: The Importance of Mentors from 2019-11-07T06:00
Derrick shipped config file for StaticKit’s UI migration and shifted his focus to other areas of the product. He plans to deliberately and consistently test email messages to determine which genera...
Listen109: Split Test = Optimization from 2019-10-31T06:00
Some podcasts present terrible sound quality, yet garner tons of listeners. Ben and Derrick are professionals, and care about the sound quality of their AoP podcast episodes. Despite audio difficu...
Listen108: Getting Back to Growth Planning from 2019-10-24T06:00
Derrick returned from JAMstack Conf with a jolt of energy and excitement thanks to face-to-face conversations and strategic connections with potential StaticKit customers. Ben expressed interest i...
Listen107: Becoming a Multi-Product Company (with Amir Salihefendić) from 2019-10-17T06:00
Derrick and Ben welcome Amir Salihefendić, founder and CEO of Doist. Ben was able to break away from Slack and uses Doist’s Twist app at Tuple for team communication.Also, Ben and Derrick share upd...
Listen106: Creating Growth Key Metrics from 2019-10-10T08:00
Derrick spent his birthday at the north shore of Lake Superior to disconnect and getaway. Yet, he found some time to brainstorm and problem solve for StaticKit. Ben’s back from Martha’s Vineyard, ...
Listen105: Exploring Freemium from 2019-10-03T06:00
Ben is living his best life with walks on the beach and wonderful weather. On the Tuple side, he shipped some code, got a pull request (PR) merged, and is now on the devise authentication gem. Derr...
Listen104: Tiny Conferences, and Business Growth Challenges from 2019-09-26T06:00
Ben is finding it easier to plan meetings to talk about challenges, and how he appreciates consistency. He describes his recent experiences with NanoConf and TupleConf. Derrick understands how pers...
Listen103: Code Quality and Balancing TDD from 2019-09-12T06:00
Ben’s been adding variety to work by biking to breakfast and the beach, while working in-between during his stay on Martha’s Vineyard. He’s feeling lucky to work remotely, and still be able to conn...
Listen102: Single Sign On (SSO) for Tuple? from 2019-09-05T06:00
The true life of an entrepreneur! From backgrounds to beards, change is in the air for both Ben and Derrick. Ben is a 36-year-old man who is back living with his parents temporarily to save some ca...
Listen101: Mentorship Momentum with Matt Wensing of SimSaaS from 2019-08-29T06:00
While Ben’s on vacation, Derrick welcomes Matt Wensing, founder of SimSaaS and co-host of the Out of Beta podcast. Matt was also the co-founder and CEO of Stormpulse. Derrick credits Matt for givi...
Listen100: A Cool 100th Episode: Celebrating With Our Past Guests from 2019-08-22T06:00
One of the benefits of having a podcast is being able to interview interesting people. Being a podcast guest is the best gig in the universe. Spew some knowledge, or just ramble. It’s time to cele...
Listen99: The Binge Is Real, Countdown to the 100th Episode from 2019-08-15T06:00
There’s no need to ask them who they are, what they do, businesses and products they built because listeners know them through their stories. After a lot of random, but worthwhile conversations, th...
Listen98: Adam Covers for Derrick from 2019-08-08T06:00
Derrick’s short notice about not co-hosting this episode because of being on a plane, and Ben not knowing or planning what to discuss, who and what’s left? Updates and reports on Tuple and Tailwin...
Listen97: To Build, or Not to Build - Jane Portman of Userlist from 2019-08-01T06:00
While Ben’s on vacation, Derrick welcomes another podcast host who can commiserate with him about email automation. Jane Portman is a UI/UX expert and consultant who hosts the UI Breakfast Podcast...
Listen96: Tuple Official Launch and Taking Time to Unplug from 2019-07-25T06:00
Is something bugging you? Need to get away from everything? Derrick can’t wait to once again ride rugged waters on Minnesota’s many lakes. Not unlike startups, it isn’t always easy to stay afloat w...
Listen95: What Really Happened to Screenhero from 2019-07-11T06:00
While Derrick is away, Ben welcomes Don Goodman-Wilson, who was the first hire at Screenhero in 2013. Don shares his version of Screenhero’s incredible journey, its migration to Slack, and Tuple ...
Listen94: Seeking Clarity from 2019-07-04T06:00
Summer is in full swing. Ben spent a fun and productive day talking about work at a Red Sox game. It was an own-your-own business startup moment. Derrick can see clearly now, thanks to SMILE laser ...
Listen93: Company of One with Paul Jarvis from 2019-06-27T06:00
After a QuickTime error eradicated Paul Jarvis’s conversation with Ben and Derrick for an Art of Product episode, he’s back with an update on his recently published book, Company of One. Should Pa...
Listen92: Slack Leaves the Market from 2019-06-20T06:00
The world received amazing news in the form of a great gift: Slack is making a major change in the market—it’s leaving! Ben and Derrick share their thoughts on Slack’s reasonable and rational deci...
Listen91: Feeling Superhuman with Rahul Vohra from 2019-06-13T08:00
Derrick’s feeling “superhuman.” Fortunately, he’s a user and lover ofthe Superhuman product. Maybe that’swhy today’s guest is Rahul Vohra, co-founder and CEO of Superhuman. Today’s Topics Include:R...
Listen90: The Mom Test with Rob Fitzpatrick from 2019-05-30T06:00
Ben and Derrick welcome Rob Fitzpatrick, author of The Mom Test: How to talk to customers and learn if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you. It’s not your typical non-fiction ...
Listen89: Go Big, or Stay Small? from 2019-05-23T06:00
Ben announced a medium-sized step forward for Tuple. A bug where the video portion would freeze at the start of or during a call was replicated and resolved. It was a double bonus: Fixed the bug an...
Listen88: Will They Make the Jump? from 2019-05-09T06:00
Recently, Ben felt gloriously empty and described how nice it was to have nothing going on. In his stomach, that is. He successfully finished a 48-hour fast. It was difficult, but pleasurable. Now,...
Listen87: Meta Podcasting from 2019-05-02T06:00
Ben boldly admitted to doing a “weird” thing. He started listening to “us.” Not necessarily for quality control, but to spark his memory about topics Derrick and he talked about in previous AoP ep...
Listen86: The Importance of Paying Customers in Product Feedback from 2019-04-25T06:00
Ben had another good week. He signed up 25 new trials and about five conversions for Tuple. Are you one of the 500 chosen by Derrick to get access to Level? Be sure to check your Inbox on Monday fo...
Listen85: The Hype Is Real from 2019-04-18T06:00
The hype about Tuple is real! Ben’s been busy adding a bunch of new customers. He’s selling and delivering the dream. Derrick is back after mentally struggling in the midst of moving, which meant...
Listen84: Developer Mindset with Brian Casel from 2019-04-11T06:00
Who’s the mystery voice that only gets better as you listen to this episode? Actually, you’re probably already familiar with the work of the man behind the microphone. Derrick is busy moving to a ...
Listen83: The Biggest Lever to Pull in Your Business from 2019-04-04T06:00
Ben and Derrick are back from MicroConf. There were plenty of solid talks and takeaways to help them think, theorize, and hypothesize about moving forward with their products. Also, Ben presented t...
Listen82: Idea to Validation to Launch: MicroConf 2019 from 2019-03-28T06:00
Derrick and Ben have descended upon Las Vegas for MicroConf and an audience hungry for valuable tips on how to successfully start and grow a business. Ben will have two Starter Edition sessions: Q&...
Listen81: Sane and Sustainable Growth with Ben Curtis from Honeybadger from 2019-03-25T06:00
Derrick is still traveling. So, Ben’s co-host for this episode is Honeybadger Co-founder Ben Curtis. Honeybadger offers an application health monitoring tool featuring an easy-to-use platform with ...
Listen80: Rediscovering Deep Work from 2019-03-21T06:00
Derrick’s been traveling and finding inspiration from re-reading Deep Work, a kind of manifesto of what Level stands for. He’s discovering how to position and market Level, as well as recognize thi...
Listen79: Moving out of Alpha from 2019-03-18T06:00
Ben shares that Tuple is now out of alpha and into beta, which is an arbitrary marker of stability and feature ability. The move is working as planned by serving as a way for customers to choose to...
Listen78: Ultraworking with Sebastian Marshall from 2019-03-14T06:00
We all freak out about things from time to time. Ben becomes neurotic about feedback, but fellow Tuple team members have different triggers that put them into a tailspin. Fortunately, Ben has found...
Listen77: Reset Your Perspective from 2019-03-07T06:00
Ben’s been checking in with Tuple users to find out how things are going. Things aren’t working perfectly with the product. Before this feedback, he was feeling pretty good about things. It’s not t...
Listen76: The Scotch Budget from 2019-02-28T06:00
Derrick’s been on a startup roller coaster. It’s been one of those weeks for him. So, he’s grateful for Scotch! He just factors it into Level’s budget. Along the same lines, Tuple bought lunch toda...
Listen75: Lots to Be Grateful For from 2019-02-21T06:00
Ben is thankful for Tuple’s success so far. It is helping companies improve efficiency and countries improve the quality of their residents’ lives. Derrick also expresses gratitude for companies b...
Listen74: The Only Way To Learn from 2019-02-07T06:00
Do you lack energy or motivation at work? Ben tried a new service called, Work Gym from Ultraworking. He found it worthwhile and got a lot of work done on Tuple that he had been putting off for qui...
Listen73: Helping Early Access Customers Get Value Quickly from 2019-01-31T06:00
Ben has been experiencing a mix of emotions. Thanks to Tuple, his calendar is packed, and he’s getting more emails, people, and trials. It feels nuts, but it feels like things are working with the ...
Listen72: How to Know If a Product Is Ready from 2019-01-24T06:00
Derrick set Jan. 21 as the date to start onboarding some pre-order people for Level. He is trying to keep things in perspective when it comes to both positive and negative feedback. So, he is prepa...
Listen71: Beyond Alpha from 2019-01-17T06:00
Ben has been busy. The alpha launch date for Tuple was Jan. 7. He was nervous about it, but so far, it’s going well. One participant said, “I’m sort of surprised you’re calling this an ‘alpha,’ bec...
Listen70: Refactoring UI: Concept to Launch from 2019-01-10T06:00
If you listen regularly to the Art of Product podcast, then you’re probably familiar with the ongoing joke: How long does it take before we mention Steve Schoger and Adam Wathan? Well, today is you...
Listen69: Sound, Actionable Advice with Jason Cohen from 2018-12-27T06:00
Derrick is away, so Ben welcomes Jason Cohen, CTO of WP Engine and four-time entrepreneur. Jason knows a thing or two about startups and mentoring them to achieve profitability and growth. Jason i...
Listen68: Creating Differentiating Features from 2018-12-20T06:00
Derrick continues to make progress and work toward his self-imposed deadline for Level. He was able to implement and ship batched notifications for the product, which replaces the instantaneous pus...
Listen67: Refining Level Notifications and Tuple Alpha Users from 2018-12-13T06:00
Derrick had an interesting week with Level. He focused on important features that will be a part of the product, including notifications dependent on team members’ jobs. Some may want more asynchro...
Listen66: TinySeed Updates with Rob Walling from 2018-12-06T06:00
Ben and Derrick are joined by Rob Walling to share updates - their favorite part of most podcasts! It’s been a good week in Tuple marketing land. Thanks to Ben’s tweet announcing the release date f...
Listen65: Effectively Managing Launch Day from 2018-11-29T06:00
Ben launched Habits for Hackers, a workshop that cultivates habits that lead to an impressive and fulfilling dev career. He incorporates books written by others and makes that content applicable to...
Listen64: Habits for Hackers from 2018-11-21T00:00
Derrick shipped Level’s Daily Digest feature, which includes a summary of unread/read posts, sampling of posts/replies, and call to action. Also, thanks to Derrick killing it on Twitter, Art of Pro...
Listen63: Running Successful Early Access Programs from 2018-11-15T06:00
Ben and Derrick were hoping to share a great conversation they had with author, designer, and consultant Paul Jarvis. But, without warning, all was lost when Paul’s audio for the episode could not ...
Listen62: Avoiding Negativity from 2018-11-08T06:00
Derrick had a productive week with Level. His deadline of late October to have alpha users try it was looming. So, he has been a bit stressed out. But thanks to relaxation techniques that work for ...
Listen61: Unconventional Growth Tactics with Julian Shapiro from 2018-11-01T06:00
Ben is working on marketing plans for Tuple and it’s associated Pair Programming Guide. So, what does someone he admires think of his growth and content marketing plans? In this episode, Ben’s spe...
Listen60: Celebrating the Small Wins from 2018-10-25T06:00
The feeling of accomplishment you get from doing hard things has become Derrick’s way of living recently. Building a startup like Level is hard, but he feels good when he makes small wins. It’s rew...
Listen59: Pros and Cons of Working Alone on a Product from 2018-10-18T06:00
Adam Wathan, a software developer, writer, speaker, and entrepreneur joins Ben and Derrick on this episode. Adam is also the creator of Nitpick CI, author of Refactoring to Collections, and host of...
Listen58: Evolving Roles as a Startup Founder from 2018-10-11T06:00
Ben and Derrick are joined by Brian Casel, podcaster, cofounder of Big Snow Tiny Conf, and known as “Mr. Process.” The three are fans of podcasts and conferences because they offer time to build re...
Listen57: Finding the Right Marketing/Product Balance from 2018-10-04T06:00
Ben recently returned from an entrepreneur retreat that featured sessions and activities focused on various topics, from projects people were working on to troubles with cofounders. Attendees were ...
Listen56: Finding Your One Thing from 2018-09-20T06:00
Ben is back from retreat #2 for Tuple. It may not have been as good as the first retreat, but was still above baseline productivity. The team worked on refactoring the app. Then, he went to CocoaHe...
Listen55: The Entrepreneurial Rollercoaster from 2018-09-13T06:00
Derrick is in Washington for ElixirConf. Like Elixir, he is becoming more comfortable with stability, as opposed to constant churn and new stuff all the time. He knows you have to show restraint to...
Listen54: Continuous Learning from 2018-08-30T06:00
Ben has been focusing on MacOS development and writing code. There’s so much he doesn’t know. But that’s ok. He strives to regularly learn things - just keep making progress for it to feel less int...
Listen53: Launching Transistor.fm with Justin Jackson from 2018-08-23T06:00
Today’s guest, Justin Jackson, just launched a podcast platform called, Transistor.fm. Justin describes the time he spent working with co-founder Jon Buda to get it ready to go live. Launching invo...
Listen52: Tuple Native App and Level Inbox Workflows from 2018-08-16T06:00
Ben is back from a productive retreat with his Tuple co-founders. It was deep concentration work that didn’t feel like a chore, but a feeling of joy. They experienced a milestone - scrapped the ele...
Listen51: Recast - The Origin of Level from Startups for the Rest of Us from 2018-08-09T06:00
Ben is out of town on a retreat with his Tuple co-founders, and Derrick is deep into building Level. So, this episode features Derrick as a recent guest on the Startups for the Rest of Us podcast. ...
Listen50: Doing the Hard Things First from 2018-07-26T06:00
Derrick continues to reinvent himself with his new product, Level, and sporting a, “I work for myself beard.” He took a vacation to canoe and camp instead of code. It’s always a refreshing experien...
Listen49: The Evolving Tech Stack from 2018-07-12T06:00
Derrick continues to code to make progress on things he will need to build at some point for his product, Level. Also, he spent a lot of time in Elm land for refactoring and additions. Will Elm cod...
Listen48: When Is the Right Time to Take Outside Funding? from 2018-07-05T06:00
Derrick was hoping to finish mock-ups for communication flows inside Level to get feedback, but that turned out to be a lofty goal that he is still working on. The process of designing Level has ge...
Listen47: Pacing Yourself When Starting Up from 2018-06-28T06:00
Despite being in the process of building new companies and products, Derrick and Ben understand the importance of sustainable pace - being able to unplug and get some rest to make smart decisions. ...
Listen46: The Importance of Trust with Your Audience with Justin Jackson from 2018-06-14T06:00
Today’s episode features guest Justin Jackson, who is building a new podcasting startup called, Transistor.fm, and runs MegaMaker training and books for SaaS and indie software companies. He’s disc...
Listen45: The Value of Teaching from 2018-06-07T06:00
He’s back! Ben returns from traveling to Hong Kong. He shared his rails knowledge by helping someone who is building a business and using a rails app. He made performance improvements and refactore...
Listen44: Exploring the Open Source Business Model from 2018-05-31T06:00
Rob Walling, co-founder at Drip, MicroConf organizer, and host of the Startups For the Rest of Us podcast, continues to co-host with Derrick while Ben is in Hong Kong. Rob is becoming a believer in...
Listen43: Strategizing Product Validation from 2018-05-24T06:00
Rob Walling joins Derrick once again as a guest co-host while Ben is traveling in Hong Kong. Rob was Derrick's co-founder at Drip, runs MicroConf, and hosts the Startups For the Rest of Us podcast....
Listen42: Fostering a Culture of Creativity with Rob Walling from 2018-05-17T06:00
Ben is away, so Derrick invited a special guest for this episode. Rob Walling was the co-founder of Drip and is the co-host of MicroConf. Rob recently removed Slack from his phone, and is waiting f...
Listen41: MicroConf 2018 Takeaways from 2018-05-10T06:00
Ben and Derrick are recovering from days of being in Las Vegas for MicroConf. They spent time reconnecting with old friends, and making new friends. Knowledge floats around, and you can soak it all...
Listen40: MicroConf, Equity, and Corporate Entities from 2018-05-03T06:00
Ben and Derrick are together again, at MicroConf and working on their new products and businesses. From making T-shirts to thinking about finding funds, things are continuing to move forward. Derri...
Listen39: Another New Beginning from 2018-04-26T06:00
Derrick discovered his marketing and promotional tasks were eating up too much of his time and mind, so he took a break from them. He shifted his focus to the actual development of his product, Lev...
Listen38: Choosing Tech Stack and Taking Preorders from 2018-04-19T06:00
Derrick is still moving in the right direction with the product he is developing called, Level. He used Product Hunt’s Ship to set up a landing page. He plans to promote his upcoming product and co...
Listen37: Pairing and Building In Public from 2018-04-12T06:00
Ben is now a Level contributor! Ben has paired with Derrick and his team communication and management tool called, Level - which is officially open source. Also, Derrick recorded himself building a...
Listen36: Building Level from 2018-04-05T06:00
Derrick continues to talk with customers and gain insights about a team communication and management tool he is developing called, Level. Derrick is developing personal connections with people inte...
Listen35: Conducting Customer Development Interviews from 2018-03-29T06:00
As part of his new business journey, Derrick requested that customers schedule time to talk with him about Level, a team communication and management tool he is developing. Luckily, about 40 people...
Listen34: Maker vs. Manager from 2018-03-15T06:00
It’s a Snow Day for Ben, and Derrick shares his woes about setting up his home office with two new, Dell monitors and his MacBook Pro featuring only two USB-C ports for a hub. You would think that ...
Listen33: The War on Developer Productivity from 2018-03-08T06:00
Derrick recounts his last day at Drip - from being locked out, the elevator breaking, turning in parking passes, wearing a shirt saying “Quit Your Day Job,” to happy hour. Although he has a feeling...
Listen32: Big Changes from 2018-03-02T12:00
Some significant changes are going on in our professional lives and today is full of updates. Ben shares some of the details of his new job at Mackey Research Management Software. It’s providing hi...
Listen31: Mental Health for Startup Founders with Sherry Walling from 2018-02-08T06:00
Today’s special episode features guest Sherry Walling, author of The Entrepreneur's Guide to Keeping Your S**t Together, to be released February 21, 2018. Sherry explains how her book came to life...
Listen30: Nailing an Interview, and the New Drip Design from 2018-01-25T06:00
Ben has moved into his new apartment and had an interesting discussion about fitness with the movers. Derrick got back is Bod Pod results and is formulating his precise fitness goals for fat loss a...
Listen29: Fitness and Code Quality in 2018 from 2018-01-11T06:00
Ben and Derrick welcome the New Year with this first episode of 2018. Derrick provides an update on his fitness goals for the first quarter of 2018 and plans his Bod Pod evaluation this week. Derri...
Listen28: Quarterly Goals, and Why They're Better Than Annual Goals from 2017-12-28T06:00
Ben is having a successful push for the new cohort of The 30-Day Code Quality Challenge. He is also looking to improve future iterations of the challenge and is preparing to move to a new home outs...
Listen27: 30 Day Code Quality Challenge, and Elm Development from 2017-12-14T06:00
Ben is entering the last week of The 30-Day Code Quality Challenge. He has enjoyed getting the challenges out each day and seeing participants engage with the content. In the future he is deciding ...
Listen26: Optimizing Team Structures from 2017-12-07T06:00
Drip successfully sailed through Black Friday and Cyber Monday unscathed with no queue backups or problems. Derrick has been thinking about shifting the Drip team structures after Black Friday week...
Listen25: Chaos, and Growing an Engineering Team from 2017-11-30T06:00
Ben introduces The 30-Day Code Quality Challenge and updates us on the progress of his first cohort. He has been receiving positive feedback and participants are engaging with the exercises and com...
Listen24: Tailwind CSS with Adam Wathan from 2017-11-17T03:45
Ben and Derrick are joined by guest Adam Wathan, an esteemed software developer, writer, speaker and entrepreneur from Ontario, Canada. He is the creator of Tailwind CSS, author of Refactoring to C...
Listen23: Refactoring Rails Launch Breakdown from 2017-11-09T06:00
Ben keeps us posted on the Refactoring Rails course launch progress and shares his continuing sales metrics and marketing strategies. He is considering experimenting with free samples, bundling and...
Listen22: Finishing the Year Strong from 2017-11-02T06:00
Ben’s course sales are still going strong, and he shares his updated sales metrics and the purchasing trends of his customers. He also spoke on the Ruby on Rails podcast recently to discuss the cou...
Listen21: Launching Refactoring Rails from 2017-10-26T06:00
Ben has officially launched his course Refactoring Rails. He is pleased with his choice of back-end tools including Gumroad for fulfillment. Ben shares his course launch metrics including email suc...
Listen20: The Ups and Downs of Working From the Road from 2017-10-19T06:00
Ben is set to launch his course and is using the looming deadline as an efficiency booster. He recently spoke at Rocky Mountain Ruby, and spent time prepping the talk with a friend at a beach house...
Listen19: Gourmet Ruby with Avdi Grimm from 2017-10-12T06:00
This week Ben Orenstein is interviewing guest Avdi Grimm, Founder of RubyTapas, which is a subscription service that provides screencasts of “gourmet” ruby programming. Avdi discusses the topic of ...
Listen18: Preparing for Black Friday from 2017-09-28T06:00
Ben has finalized the logo for his Refactoring Rails course and is currently getting the intro/outro animations and the sales site designed. He also finished the notes for all the videos and was ve...
Listen17: Launch Planning and Speaking at Conferences from 2017-09-21T06:00
Ben is coming back from a restorative vacation in Martha’s Vineyard and loves the vibe there. He is enjoying his Vitamix blender and the Dr. Rhonda Patrick micronutrient smoothie. In Refactoring Ra...
Listen16: Going Viral and Customer Driven Products from 2017-09-07T06:00
Ben and Derrick are back from vacation this week are feeling refreshed. Ben tweeted something that went viral and has dealt with some people’s misinterpretation and bias. He is working on hiring a ...
Listen15: Lessons in Scaling SaaS from 2017-08-31T06:00
This week Ben is on vacation and Derrick is here to share some fresh knowledge behind the scenes at Drip. They’re experimenting at Drip with how to scale the system to handle more customers and wha...
Listen14: The Power of Simplicity from 2017-08-24T06:00
This week Ben has been managing his projects and to-do list with OmniFocus, which helps as his business and stress level continue to increase. He has outlined and will be recording his last video a...
Listen13: Crossing the Chasm from 2017-08-17T06:00
This past week Ben has hit a mental slump in the final phase of his course. However, he is moving through it and will be recording another video today towards the new final goal of 8 total course v...
Listen12: Free Trials and Live Streaming Video Lessons from 2017-08-10T06:00
This week Ben discusses his experiment live-streaming a practice recording of his next video. He received helpful feedback and saw a spike in email subscribers, so it was very successful. He now ha...
Listen11: The Founders Dilemma from 2017-08-03T06:00
Derrick is coming back from a much-needed vacation in San Francisco and enjoyed walking tours thanks to the Detour app. He returns refreshed and was able to get back into the swing of things and ev...
Listen10: Dynamic Website Personalization with Brennan Dunn from 2017-07-27T06:00
Today Ben’s guest is Brennan Dunn, co-founder of RightMessage, a tool that allows you to personalize your website based on user information and behavior. This allows you to customize your messaging...
Listen9: Deep Thinking and Finding Your Groove from 2017-07-20T06:00
This week Ben is adjusting to jet-lag from his travels to Las Vegas and Martha’s Vineyard last week. He did however manage to release another episode of his sample campaign that was recorded before...
Listen8: Different Paths to Software Development with Ian Nance from Drip from 2017-07-13T06:00
This episode Ben is on vacation and we have a guest, Ian Nance, a Drip team member here to talk about his backstory and how he got into software development. Ian has an interesting story about how ...
Listen7: Learning from Successes, and Failures from 2017-07-06T06:00
This week Ben has been trying new productivity techniques and studying different systems of workflow. He finished a new course video on Page Objects, and has sketched out a second video to hit his ...
Listen6: Refactoring Rails and Shareable Workflows from 2017-06-29T06:00
On today’s episode we discuss Ben’s release of the first video in his Refactoring Rails course, on the benefits of following Rest in Rails applications. He goes over how he produced the video, sent...
Listen5: Ways We Maintain Focus from 2017-06-22T06:00
Today we talk about how Ben just launched his new landing page and set up the domain for his new Rails video course. Ben’s also feeling pretty good about being committed to the first thing and now ...
Listen4: Always Talk With the Decision Maker from 2017-06-12T12:30
In this episode, Derrick is broadcasting from California as he visits his family. Ben went to Vermont last week and quickly realized how relaxing it is to be outside and see greenery. Such a differ...
Listen3: New Pricing Strategies from 2017-06-05T13:45
Updates and pricing strategies highlight today’s episode. Ben did yoga this morning, and he is feeling relaxed as he is settling in with his new lifestyle. Next week Ben is closing his first part-t...
Listen2: From Good to Great from 2017-06-01T18:00
Welcome to the Art of Product podcast. Derrick is rocking his “I ♥ yoga” shirt because he started practicing yoga at a studio down the street. He also gives us an update on new changes and features...
Listen1: Welcome to The Art of Product from 2017-06-01T12:00
Welcome to the Art of Product podcast. This is episode 1, and just the beginning of the journey. This is a show with Ben Orenstein formerly from thoughtbot and Drip co-founder Derrick Reimer. Ben r...
Listen