There’s a quiet graveyard out there filled with products that were never seen, not because they weren’t good, but because no one ever knew they existed. They were labored over in silence — in dimly lit bedrooms, weekend cafés, and cloud folders no one ever opened. These weren’t bad ideas. These were invisible ideas. And that’s a tragedy.
We glorify the myth of the “big reveal” — the Apple-style keynote, the jaw-dropping product launch, the perfect moment when all your effort suddenly shines. But here’s the cold truth: no one cares about the thing you’ve built if they never got to see the story behind it. You’re not Apple, you’re not launching to millions. You’re a builder, a creator, a solo founder grinding it out. And in this game, silence is death.
People don’t follow perfection. They follow process. They follow scars. They connect with the messy, behind-the-scenes reality of building something in the real world. If you want attention, you don’t get it by hiding — you earn it by showing up, even when you’re not ready.
Look at someone like Arvid Kahl. He didn’t wait until FeedbackPanda was perfect. He built it in the open. He tweeted the challenges, shared the tradeoffs, asked his community questions. By the time he launched, people already felt like they were part of the journey. They were rooting for it, not just buying it. Rosie Sherry did the same. She didn’t just build a community — she grew inside it, vulnerable, present, and human. That kind of transparency? That’s what builds loyalty. That’s what makes people stay.
So why don’t most founders build in public? Fear. Fear of looking stupid. Fear of being wrong. Fear that if they post and no one engages, that silence will echo louder than they can handle. But the truth is — being unseen because you never tried is far worse than failing publicly.
You don’t need thousands of followers. You need ten people who care. Ten people who can give you feedback, amplify your voice, and be your early advocates. You find those ten not by hiding your work, but by inviting them in.
Marketing isn’t manipulation — it’s conversation. It’s storytelling. And it starts the moment you sketch that idea on a napkin, not the day you flip the “launch” switch.
Building in public is not a trend. It’s a survival tactic. It’s how you stay alive long enough for your product to matter. It’s messy, yes. But it’s also magnetic. When you let people into your world, they don’t just use your product — they believe in you. And that’s the leverage you’ll never get from building in a vacuum.
If you build quietly, you’ll die quietly. And you? You didn’t come this far just to disappear. Start today. Share something. A thought, a lesson, a bug you’re fixing. Because that’s how it begins. One post at a time. One human at a time.
The world won’t discover you by accident. You have to leave breadcrumbs.
– Michael Ratnam
re-engineer-it 