
Iβm not going to make the argument that building in public is for everyone, itβs not. But I would argue that if done well, it can be a force multiplier for a startup.
We raised our $12.5M Series A in just 6 days
Our team has deep personal relationships with hundreds of our users online
We receive tons of qualified candidates for each new role we promote
I receive a dozen emails every day from funds who want to invest in beehiiv
I can seamlessly broadcast updates to thousands of current and potential users for free
Our team routinely receives and addresses invaluable real-time feedback
None of those things would be possible if I chose to build beehiiv in stealth.
I actually do the complete opposite β Iβm an open book. I openly share everything weβre building and doing at the company to anyone who takes 2 seconds to follow me (Twitter / LinkedIn / Instagram).
I even shared materials from our most recent board meeting before the board even got a chance to see it.
in preparation of our upcoming board meeting I'm throwing together some pretty neat charts I've never analyzed before @beehiiv
worth noting we proactively hired a ton and doubled the team from july to december
I fucking love data
β #Tyler Denk π (#@denk_tweets)
9:27 PM β’ Jan 24, 2024
This entire newsletter is actually built on the premise of sharing what Iβm learning in real-time. So hereβs my building in public newsletter about building in publicβ¦
Why does building in public work?
Itβs human nature to want stories and follow narratives. Itβs the reason we watch movies and read books. People want to follow people (not brands).
I think this tweet actually sums it up pretty well.
Thereβs a simple reason why, on X, all of Airbnbβs feature announcements come from Brian Cheskyβs account firstβnot the company account.
Just look at the numbers for the 2023 Winter Release (it's wild).
From Cheskyβs X account:
β 2.5M impressions
β 5.4K likes
β 810 repostsβ¦ twitter.com/i/web/status/1β¦β #Tommy Clark (#@tclarkmedia)
3:23 PM β’ Jan 3, 2024
Just like any other form of content, itβs all about finding an audience and providing value or entertainment. For me personallyβ¦
Audience: anyone interested in startups, entrepreneurship, tech, or newsletters
Value: sharing real-time strategies, growth tactics, hiring practices, fundraising tips, and updates
New business applications and startup funding has been growing for decades.

And the appetite for startup related content is likely growing in lockstep too.
There's huge demand to learn from others to gain a competitive edge (or at least avoid common mistakes others have already made).Β
Following those who are building in public offers a unique combination of entertainment via a new storyline, while also learning applicable lessons for your own life and business.
For me personally β whether you hope that we succeed or crash and burnβ¦ you can follow the narrative in real-time all while learning from our progress and mistakes.
Why audience matters.
Once again: people >> brands.
Kylie Cosmetics
Feastables by Mr. Beast
Skims by Kim Kardashian
Prime by Logan Paul
Iβm not saying Iβm 0.0001% as notable or influential as Kim Kardashian, but Iβm trying.
Thereβs a reason these brands are competing head to head with the incumbents β they have massive advantages with free distribution. Itβs a superpower to be able to broadcast to millions of potential customers for free.
I donβt have plans to release a sex tape anytime soon, so my best bet is continuing to create content about startups that others find valuable.
Building beehiiv literally provides me with an unlimited supply of content. Whether the results of an A/B test we ran on our landing pages, or some new hiring practice we put into placeβ¦ sharing what weβre doing is so simple and enjoyable to me. Especially if it can help others.
Providing value β more engagement β more followers β more distribution.
And the more people I can reach, the more opportunities we have to win new users and scale the business.
The types of content I shareβ¦
Iβd probably categorize the content I share into five main categories:
Company milestones
Product updates
My vision
Lifestyle
Promoting our users
Company milestones
Milestones act as a scorecard and help you gain credibility. If the company wasnβt doing well and growing, I donβt think anyone would want to follow my advice or strategies.
$5m ARR and we're just getting warmed up @beehiiv
14 months: $0 β $1m
3 months: $1m β $2m
2.5 months: $2m β $3m
2 months: $3m β $4m
1.5 months: $4m β $5mβ #Tyler Denk π (#@denk_tweets)
4:25 PM β’ Sep 29, 2023
Product updates
One of our core competitive advantages at beehiiv is our ability to address customer needs and quickly ship new features. We release a handful of new features every week, of which I always share across social channels.
This accomplishes a few things:
It educates existing customers about new functionality.
It acts as marketing material to entice potential new customers to sign up.
It provides an opportunity to collect real-time feedback and gauge user sentiment.
Iβll also share smaller updates on the fly like this.
new upgrade pages for paid newsletters just went live on @beehiiv
credit card widget now on the same page to optimize conversion π
β #Tyler Denk π (#@denk_tweets)
10:10 PM β’ Dec 12, 2023
My vision
Being able to tell stories and actively engage others is a remarkably undervalued quality of most leaders. I do what I can to share my vision for the future and bring others along for the ride.
2024 goal for @beehiiv is dead simple: $20m in revenue
should break even / be slightly profitable on the year
vamos βΌοΈ
β #Tyler Denk π (#@denk_tweets)
2:21 PM β’ Jan 10, 2024
Lifestyle
Iβm using lifestyle as a broad term to categorize things I share that are a bit more tangential to the journey of building a company.
Whether half joking but entirely seriousβ¦
they donβt want you spending friday nights in the arena
β #Tyler Denk π (#@denk_tweets)
1:10 AM β’ Sep 9, 2023
Or the worst experience of my lifeβ¦
impossible to express the immense pain I feel sharing the sudden passing of our CTO, Andrew Platkin
the entire @beehiiv community has always shown us such tremendous support, and I felt they deserved to know about the guy responsible for so much of what made beehiiv great
β #Tyler Denk π (#@denk_tweets)
3:46 PM β’ May 2, 2022
I donβt shy away from humanizing the journey. Itβs all interconnected.
Promoting our users
I could sit here all day and talk about how great our product is, but Iβd rather let our users do the talking. I routinely engage with all of our users and try to celebrate the wins alongside them.
INSANE couple of days/weeks for the newsie
π§±π§±
See you on the π
Tysm, @beehiiv gods π
β #Eli Weiss (#@eliweisss)
7:27 PM β’ Jan 22, 2024
Power in numbers.
There are several compounding benefits to building momentum on these social platforms. Outside of this newsletter, I primarily depend on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Whenever users share a milestone, like Eliβs above, or praise the product, Iβm incredibly quick to engage and repost.
Have been building a newsletter on @beehiiv for the past few days
What a wonderful product to use
Actually delightful to use and there hasn't been a single feature I wanted that I didn't eventually find
β #Adam Miller (#@Adam_CV_Miller)
6:34 AM β’ Jan 26, 2024
It seems benign, but if done consistently it accomplishes quite a few things:
Itβs a positive feedback loop and directly acknowledges the user who went out of their way to post something positive
Itβs free unbiased marketing directly from the peers of your target customers
Other users will see the CEO and brand accounts reposting these, which incentivizes them to also share their milestones
β¦which also get shared and reposted
β¦which begins to compound and build a narrative on these algorithmic feeds that everyone is using beehiiv and loving it
Free alpha.
By doing everything Iβve stated above in this post, myself along with most of the beehiiv team have made ourselves very available and very online.
Users know that weβre actively engaging with people on social channels, so theyβre quick and comfortable to share feedback, feature requests, bugs, and other issues.
So many startups struggle to collect useful feedback from users in hopes to make their product better. We have the opposite problem β we receive an endless supply of feedback directly from our users each week, and can acknowledge them seamlessly and publicly online.
Hey @denk_tweets...loving @beehiiv so far for the syndicate investor mailing list for @BorderlessVC and looking forward to implementing it for other projects.
Quick feedback. Requiring a "state" field for addresses is very US-centric. Most of the world doesn't use them forβ¦ twitter.com/i/web/status/1β¦
β #Ξthan Pierse (#@EthanPierse)
4:08 PM β’ Jan 27, 2024
Opportunities.
I mentioned at the top that we raised our Series A in just 6 days. I owe a lot of that to building in public (and investor updates, but thatβs next weekβs post).
Because I have been sharing our milestones, product launches, updates, and customer success stories so publicly onlineβ¦ anyone whoβs been following along knows nearly everything about the trajectory of the business (and how I operate and think about things).
You can think of building in public as the top of funnel. Thousands of investors have followed the journey in real-time and have reached out via email. Once I made the decision to raise a Series A, I had an entire pipeline of βwarm leadsβ to reach out to.
The same could be said for hiring. Weβre able to fill positions very quickly with some of the most talented people in the world because many have been natively following along.
Not to mention the inbound for corporate partnerships, podcast interviews, sponsorships, events, and more.
If you enjoyed this post or know someone who may find it useful, please share it with them and encourage them to subscribe: mail.bigdeskenergy.com/p/building-in-public


Credit: Raymond Todd
Wall Street meets the Bahamas... is this what the FTX office looked like? Shoutout Raymond for the reader submission π€.
Reply with your own AI generated office and Iβll feature it in an upcoming issue.

Turn on, tune in, drop out. Click on any of the tracks below to get in a groove β each selected from the full Big Desk Energy playlist.

Some of my favorite content I found on the internet this weekβ¦
Elon Musk is also building in public, sharing that the first human who received a Neuralink implant is (allegedly) recovering well (Twitter)
My boy Austin Rief was on My First Million talking about bingo and meats (MFM)
Is Zyn the new Juul? Being a zynfluencer seems like a decent resume builder (NYT)
This is so dumb but Iβm addicted to any sort of futuristic renderings ππ½
Public transportation of the future?
β #Figen (#@TheFigen_)
12:59 PM β’ Jan 29, 2024

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