Alex Beck

Why You Need Automated Social Media Reports (Even If You Hate Reports)​

I’m not the best at Social media, which mean it sucks a lot of hours from me, AI is helping but there’s tonnes of tools that can help you monitor, track and improve outcomes.

The solution for me has been automated social media reports and social media analytics dashboards. It helped me to stop making gut decisions, and invest in things that were working. You see what moves the needle.

What Is a Social Media Reporting Dashboard?​

Your social media reporting dashboard is your single source of truth.
It shows you what’s working and what’s wasting time.

What is a feature of a social software system dashboard?

• Data pull: Connect multiple channels — Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, X — plus paid ads and website conversions.
• Live updates: Your social dashboard refreshes automatically.
• Easy share: You don’t need a BI team to build slides.
• Custom views: Drill into what matters — like an Instagram dashboard template for Reels saves or Stories taps.

Social Dashboard vs Social Media Management Dashboard: The Real Difference​

Your social media management dashboard is where you plan content, schedule posts, collaborate with your team, and keep track of approvals.

Example from Hootsuite

When done right, your social media management dashboard connects directly to your social media reporting dashboard — so you see if what you planned actually worked.

Example from EchoDash

A Simple Instagram Dashboard Template (That Doesn’t Suck)​

Too many people chase likes. Your Instagram dashboard template should track metrics that actually show traction:

✅ Saves & Shares — a big signal the content is useful
✅ Link clicks — are they visiting your site?
✅ Sticker taps & Stories flow — what makes people watch more?
✅ Follower growth vs reach — did the reach translate into real growth?
✅ Conversion — sign-ups, shop purchases, DMs

Bundle this into your wider social media analytics dashboard. Even if Instagram’s only one part of your funnel, it’s the channel that eats the most hours for many brands — so it pays to do it right.

Case Study 1 for Automated Social Media Reports: A Quick Case Study​

I know a small ecommerce brand that grew its DTC sales 400% by ditching guesswork and setting up automated social media reports.

Before: they’d post 3–4 reels a week, run ads, but couldn’t tell what was converting.
After: They built a social media analytics dashboard pulling Instagram, Meta ads, Shopify, and Klaviyo. Within weeks they realised only a fraction of their reels led to sign-ups. They doubled down on the format that converted, killed the fluff, and grew profits — not just followers.

Case Study 2: How One Team Uses Automated Social Media Reports​

One small agency I know runs automated social media reports for 10 clients.
Before they did, every end-of-month report meant someone losing a whole Friday to screenshots, spreadsheets, and endless “where’s that data?” Slideshow hell.

Now their social media reporting dashboard pulls metrics from Facebook Ads, Google Analytics, Shopify and Instagram.
They built one dashboard template for ecommerce clients, one for SaaS, and one for local services.
With this, their clients know in 5 mins:

• What posts drove actual revenue
• Which channels gave the best ROI
• Where to put ad spend next month

This is what a social media optimization company should do for you.

DIY or Social Media Optimization Agency? Here’s When Each Works​

Should you keep your social media project management in-house, or hire a social media optimization agency?
It depends.

✅ Do it yourself when:

• You have a tight budget or you’re early stage
• You only run 1-2 channels
• You have the time and skills for content
• You’re using a good social media management dashboard and have basic data skills

✅ Hire a social media optimization company when:

• You have multiple channels and paid campaigns
• You need high-volume social media content creation services
• You want advanced targeting, testing and data insights
• You’d rather focus on your product than do everything yourself

Either way, you still need a solid social dashboard and automated social media reports.

How Digital Marketing Apps Plug In​

Your social media dashboards are only as good as the data you feed them.
That’s where smart digital marketing apps make or break you.

A few I love:

• Databox: All-in-one dashboard, good for solopreneurs and small teams.

• Geckoboard: Great if you want to throw your social media analytics dashboard on a TV screen for the whole team.

• Looker Studio: Free and customisable but needs more setup.

• EchoDash: We’re building a feed-first alternative to the classic dashboard, with automated social media reports alongside everything else.

These digital marketing apps make sure your social dashboard doesn’t rely on copy-paste from 5 tools. Automate it once, then get back to work.

How Social Media Project Management Connects to Your Dashboard​

You can’t optimise what you can’t see.
Your social media project management tool should feed directly into your social media analytics dashboard.

How?

1. Plan posts — use ClickUp, Notion, or Airtable.
2. Schedule & publish — buffer, Hootsuite, or your platform of choice.
3. Track real results — plug the data into your social media reporting dashboard.
4. Optimise — feed back into the plan.

That loop is what a good social media optimization agency does for you: combining social media content creation services, execution, and reporting.

Social Dashboard Mistakes To Dodge​

Tracking everything: Focus on 5–7 metrics, not 50.
Forgetting conversions: Reach doesn’t pay the bills.
Static reports: If you’re sending PDFs every month, they’re not automated social media reports — they’re homework.
Ignoring costs: Ad spend ROI should be in every social media analytics dashboard.
No ownership: Whether you do it yourself or hire a social media optimization company, keep control of your data.

FAQs​

Q: What is a social media analytics dashboard?
A: It’s your live view of key metrics — clicks, reach, conversions — all in one place.

Q: What is a feature of a social software system dashboard?
A: Automation. A real social media management dashboard updates in real time. No more copy/paste or static charts.

Q: How do I choose a social media optimization agency?
A: Ask for a demo. Do they provide automated social media reports? Do they tie creative back to real metrics? Do they show you your actual ROI?

Q: Do I need a separate Instagram dashboard template?
A: If IG drives sales for you — yes. Instagram insights buried in a general social dashboard often miss the nuance of Reels saves, Stories taps, and link clicks.

Final Word: Your Next Step​

If you run any business online, you need clarity.
A simple, clear social media reporting dashboard, plus automated social media reports, will save you hours.
You’ll spend less time guessing, more time doubling down.

If you’re scaling up, a solid social media optimization agency or social media optimization company can be worth every cent — especially if they wrap in social media content creation services that plug straight into your social media management dashboard.

Whether you run a solo hustle or an agency, get your social dashboard right. Use the right digital marketing apps, automate the grunt work, and stop making blind guesses.

Want to see how we’re doing it at EchoDash? Drop me a note — I’ll show you how to get automated social media reports set up for free.

Your next best post is out there. Build your dashboard, watch what works, and make every post count.

TL;DR​

These are the best productivity apps I actually use (and keep using). If you want to cut distractions, and organise (if you’re like me, the multiple to do lists, youtube videos, documents and others in one place.) — especially if you’e on the ADHD spectrum like me — this list’s for you. Most are free or cheap. Most are cross-platform.

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Why Productivity Apps Usually Suck​

Every “Top Productivity Apps” article shills a bunch of complicated or costly solutions, everything im talking about is free!. If you’ve got ADHD, decision fatigue is real. I used to fall into this trap — trying 5 tools to plan my day and still getting nothing done.

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What I Use (and Why)​

I’ve cycled through so many apps, most last 2-3 weeks before I forget and revert to paper, forgetting, or ical reminders, sending myself emails (which I never check). Here’s what’s stuck. Some ADHD- and OCD friendly

EchoDash, Notion, Pomodoro Timer, Toggl, Dashlane

1. EchoDash – One Inbox for Your Entire Business​

You know how it feels opening 17 tabs just to figure out what happened overnight? Stripe, Slack, Notion, Google Analytics, CRM, Matomo, Jira… It’s a time sink.

EchoDash solves this by pulling your tech stack data into one place.

Why it’s one of the best productivity apps:

• Reduces dashboard time by up to 10 hours/week
• Solves the “notification blindness” problem
• Lets you build your own alert system (without needing Zapier or a dev)

Bonus: If you’re juggling client sites or running async teams, the email digests are a game-changer. I use it every day.

Also arguably one of the best apps for farm productivity (seriously, we’ve had people run irrigation alerts through it).*

2. Notion​

I was late to the Notion hype, but now it’s my go-to for:

• Meeting notes
• Roadmaps
• Documents like contratcs, tax documents, important admin docs
• Journaling (when I remember)
• Marketing, Sales, CHannels, strtagey work and to do’s lists. Basically everything high level.

If you’ve got ADHD, this is one of the few apps that feels flexible enough to support your brain, without punishing you for not being consistent. Great on iPad too — makes it one of the best iPad productivity apps for me.

Pro tip: Use linked databases and views — sadly the spreadsheets aren’t as robust as Gsheets but great to attach documents in a spreadsheet, which isn’t possible on Sheets.

3. Pomodoro Timer* –​

Pomodoro timers, any free Firefox or Chrome extension works, definitely never pay fort it. Fot me Pomodoro is the best ADHD productivity app, It helps me not get distracted by random shit. It’s great because it’s a time 25 minutes hard work, seeing the timer go down and me not having done much works well for me. Then you have a 5 minute break then 25 minutes and a break, then 2t5 minutes and a 15 min break. It works really well for me, to focus and then use the breaks to do whatever.

5. Toggl – Tracking Time​

Why Toggl is one of the best productivity apps for ADHD and founders alike: It is Dead simple: big “Start” button, easy to stop/start, no bloat. It’s Multi-device: works on Mac, iPad, phone — so I can track wherever I actually work.. Visual breakdowns: See exactly where time is going each week. If you run a team, freelance, or study, time is literally your inventory. When you know where it’s going, you make better calls. Toggl turns fuzzy “I’m so busy” into cold hard data.

6. Shortcuts (iOS/macOS) – Automate the Dumb Stuff​

I have shortcuts that:

• Turn off Slack, email, and Twitter
• Start “Deep Work Mode” (Do Not Disturb + timer + music)

For ADHD brains, reducing the number of decisions you make daily is critical. Shortcuts help you build routines that don’t require willpower.

Use it to shave 5–15 mins/day. That’s productivity software that works invisibly.

7. Dashlane – Passwords one Placr​

I need a password manager otherwise I will spend at least 20 minutes procrastinating looking a password, or lying to myself that I need to find it in some book somewhere. Dashlane is safe (I’ve sadly had card data stolen) and cheap and super easy to use to login to the multitude of places you need to for work.

8. Stickies – For Deep Work, Research and Thinking​

Stickies is one of my favourite mac productivity apps because it’s dead simple. No tabs, no distractions — just virtual Post-its stuck to your desktop. When I’m in deep work mode, researching or brainstorming, I jot ideas down fast, drag them around, colour-code if I need to, and that’s it. Unlike Notion or bigger tools, Stickies stays in your face so you don’t lose context. For ADHD brains, that’s gold. Sometimes the best mac productivity apps are the ones that do exactly one thing well — and Stickies nails it.

9. Google Cal – ADHD-Focused Productivity Timer​

Google Calendar is still one of the best productivity apps for my scatterbrain. It’s free, dead simple, and works on every device. For ADHD folks, time blocking in GCal turns a fuzzy to-do list into actual slots on your day (or reminders to go somewhere ot do something) — so you’re less likely to drift off-task. It’s great whether you’re a student or running a team.

10. Apple Notes / Reminders – Still Underrated​

Sometimes the best productivity app is the one you already have. Apple Notes and Reminders are underrated but some of the best mac productivity apps and best iPad productivity apps I keep coming back to. Fast capture, Siri voice input, instant sync across iPhone, iPad, and Mac — no learning curve, no extra logins. Also you can also now (since a new update) hide sections of notes, making it great for larger notes with sections.

Bonus: Best Apps for Farm Productivity​

This one surprised me — we’ve had EchoDash users who are managing farm alerts via webhook. Think irrigation errors, livestock gate opens, drone footage uploads — all piped into a daily email digest.

The key is not the app. It’s how customisable the workflow is. Farmers using automation are running smart farms without needing to open a dashboard.

Want to keep your eyes on the paddocks, not the screen? EchoDash might be your unexpected MVP.

Final Thought​

If you’re neurodivergent, overworked, or just tired of being a productivity app guinea pig — keep it simple.

The best productivity apps aren’t about features. They’re about reducing friction. They help you:

• Focus without effort
• Prioritise when your brain doesn’t want to
• Catch important stuff before it becomes urgent
• Save time across all your devices

If the app adds more steps or makes you feel bad for not using it “right” — nix that shit.

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Business Intelligence Alerts​

A lot of businesses still use dedicated slack channels, dashboards, standup meetings, GitHub, notion and a plethora of tools to get a pulse of WTF is happening across increasingly distributed landscape, that we all work and live in. This work is urgent and necessary but often time consuming and not optimised. Compiling business intelligence alerts, Github notifications, dashboard pings and others can take you away from the important less urgent tasks.

Speaking to 100s of founders, one of the main issues is notification blindness. Maybe you’ve never heard this but I’m sure straight away you know what I mean when you see that little red bubble with 3 digits, this has me nopeing out till later, that kind of notification overload has meant I’ve missed some pretty crucial things in the past, one I still remember, a particularly high value client needing help, being unintentionally ignored and churning.

We’ve been working on a solution, 100% custom to your business email alerts. Skip to how to setup them up free, here

What Are Email Digests in EchoDash?​

Dashboards are great — but for many they aren’t customisable enough, you still gotta tab jump and then stitch this together.

EchoDash Email Digests gives you a curated summary from across your entire software stack. You choose the source, the event, and the frequency. Kind of like the emails you get from everyone else but one that’s entirely about your business.

EchoDash is already your feed for everything: GitHub commits, Stripe payments, Notion comments, downtime alerts — all live, filterable, and searchable. You want an easily digestible summary.

That’s what Email Digests do:

• Pull events from multiple tools
• Cut down on notification overload
• Group them into a clean daily or weekly report
• Control when and what you’re alerted to

Think of it as your daily command centre update. Basically you can automate your business alerts with email digests.

Why Use Email Digests?​

The most common thing we’ve heard in every founder would love to reduce notification overload. Pretty much had one or more of these issues:

• Checking 12 tools daily just to get a pulse on what’s happening
• Relying on Slack bots and miss 90% of what matters
• Drowning in emails that aren’t summarised or structured
• Missing important activity because no one checks business dashboards
• Slack notifications not working

Customised email digests solve all of these problems.

What’s Inside a Digest Email?​

Each email digest includes:

• Top-line stats (event volume, sources)
• Summary header (number of events, active sources)
• Grouped sections by source (Stripe, Notion, Cloudflare, etc.)
• Each event's title, timestamp, and top-level data
• Direct links to jump into the feed and view the full event

It’s all signal, no noise.

Managing a Digest Email​

Change your mind later? No problem.

You can:

• Revisit the Email Digests settings tab anytime
• Add/remove sources and event types
• Change delivery frequency
• Or hit “unsubscribe” from any digest email to stop them entirely

What is a Webhook Notification?​

It’s a question that would have stumped me not so long ago, honestly before working with Jack I had no idea WTF a webhook was. let alone a web hook notification. Basically what makes them so cool is they’re packets of data sent out from any service you use but that allows you to clip, cut and trim and format to give you only the data you need.

Webhook Notifications are a way to get alerts from services that don’t even have APIs. Webhook notifications are basically files with data that EchoDash can turn into meaningful insights. Better yet even I, a code illiterate, can integrate a Webhook into EchoDash, so they’re very easy to use to build your custom emails, custom dashboards and of course to utilise EchoDash’s free business dashboard feed.

Slack vs Email Notification?​

Slack is a pretty useful tool and we’ve sang it’s praises, most teams we spoke to use it for at least something and many use dedicated slack channels to intake their webhook notifications. Which can be great if all those alerts are meaningful and don’t overwhelm of notification overload you.

However in many cases these dedicated slack channels work very well for the first months but as your business grows so does the noise, and we’ve heard how often “slack notifications not working”. Our Email digests Can solve both of these issues.

Why Email Digests Work?​

We didn’t build digests because email is cool. We built them because not everyone wants another Slack ping or lives in a dashboard. Email has been around for more than 50 years because it’s pretty darn flexible and of course path dependance, alas we all still (until AI is good enough to be a real PA) need to use emails.

Most of you we spoke to wanted to reduce notification overload with a readable, one glance-and-go update that’s curated.

That’s what we built and we love it (and use it personally because:)

• You don’t need to be in the app — info comes to you
• You can scan, not search — summaries beat dashboards for quick updates
• You set the schedule — daily, weekly, or only the most critical updates (so ad hoc when they occur.)
• You choose what’s relevant.

How Does this Apply to Me? Use Cases by Role.​

• Time saved: >5 hours/week

Instead of jumping into the native alerts and activity feeds of;Stripe, Notion, Slack, GCal, etc., you get a single email summarising key activity:

• New customer payments
• One email shows payments, outages, comments, alerts
• Failed transactions
• You get a filtered, high-signal pulse every morning
• Comments or doc changes
• Important alerts (e.g. downtime, bad reviews)

Get a high-signal pulse on the business each morning without jumping between tabs. The ultimate timely and no nonsense business Intelligence alerts

• Time saved: 1–2 hours/day

Email digests can give a view of:

• Open vs closed tickets
• Negative reviews or refunds
• Missed follow-ups
• Unresolved chats

All of this can help you:

• Support issues that are mega urgent
• Triage customer issues without checking 4 inboxes
• Spot churn risks early

• Time saved: 2–3 hours/week

Your email digest could cover:

• Daily overview of sales, top SKUs, failed payments
• Spot fulfilment bottlenecks or customer complaints early
• New orders + fulfillment status
• Out-of-stock alerts
• Failed payments

• Time saved: 1–2 hours/day

Digest could include:

• Module completions
• Drop-off points
• Missed goals
• Student question
• Quiz failures
• Progression below target

All of this allows you to:

• Track completions and progress without logging into LMS
• See who’s behind, who’s stuck, who’s acing it
• Focus on the students that need your help most

• Time saved: Hours of context-switching

These digests are one of the ultimate engineering visibility tools. Stay on top of errors without opening monitoring tools. Our Email Digests allow you to monitor webhooks without a dashboard or even get cron job alerts by email as well as:

• Pull requests merged
• Deployment errors
• New issues or bugs
• High-severity alerts
• High CPU usage alerts

Allow of this allows you to:

• Get a daily roll-up of deploys, pull requests, uptime alerts
• Create engineering team email updates
• simplify GitHub notifications

Benefits: Less talking to people more time coding and staying inside.

Problem: Leads falling through the cracks
 Time saved: 3–5 hrs/week


Digests could include:

• New lead created

• Inactive deal alert
• Sales email reply
• Demo request

How email digests help:

• Stay on top of follow-ups
• Know which deals are stalling
• See activity across multiple CRM

Problem: Too many sources Time saved: 1–2 hrs/day

— ads, email, SEO, socials, and analytics


How email digests help:

• One digest shows your campaign performance across tools
• Focus on underperforming campaigns
• Track spikes without checking dashboards all day
• Budget exceeded
• Negative feedback

Time saved: 2–3 hrs/week
 Problem: Payment failures, invoices, and billing spread across systems


How email digests help:

• Track incoming payments, overdue invoices
• See transaction issues early
• Stay ahead of cash flow gaps
• See if Invoice unpaid > 7 days
• Subscription failed
• Payment complete
• Refund issued

Time saved: 4–6 hrs/week


Problem: Juggling alerts across client tools
How email digests help:

• View client site issues, plugin updates, and requests in one place
• Manage multiple clients without logging in 10 times
• Assign alerts to the right team member
• See Client ticket opened

• Get Downtime alerts

Real-World Example: Cutting Dashboard Time by 10H a Week.​

A solo founder we closely worked with went from:

• “I spend the 2 hours of every day checking Stripe, Notion, Slack, Matomo, and my inbox... just to see what broke overnight”

To:

• “One email digest at 9.30AM, and I know exactly what’s happened, what needs a reply, and if anything’s broken.”

That’s 10+ hours back every week.

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Why This Works​

• You don’t need to be in the EchoDash app
• You can scan, not search
• You set the schedule
• You choose the content

This is the antidote to notification fatigue and inbox chaos.

Email Digests are especially useful if you:

• Use 5+ SaaS tools and waste time switching tabs
• Run async or distributed teams and need visibility without micromanaging
• Work in CS, dev, ops, product or marketing and want a single view of what matters
• Manage clients or properties and don’t want to log into 100 instances a day

If you’ve ever said “I wish I had one place that just told me WTF is going on”,this is that place.

Finding Product-Market Fit: Lessons From Doing the Hard Way ( My Skull vs Concrete)​

"Product/market fit occurs when you feel like you're strapped to a rocket. Not because you landed a $15K pilot, not because 50 people told you your idea is great, and definitely not because a company said they would pay $1,000 (but meant $100, yep these all actually happened, to add to it that stakeholder left, so remember who you interview and sell to and what happens if they leave really matters). PMF isn't revenue, even bad products or services can make money.

It's repeat usage. Retention. Pull from the market, not push. Not customer acquisition costs that's more than Life time value.

How do I know?

• I’ve chased vanity signals, people want to be nice, they’ll tell you they’d use it. They lie.
• I’ve burned months building features that I wanted to believe were painkillers, but were vitamins and or the unit economics didn’t work, thinking I could brute-force my way to product/market fit.

This post is what I wish I’d read earlier. A no-BS guide to product market fit stages, lean product development, and the frameworks that actually help you get traction.

Why You’re Probably Faking It​

You can spend months building a thing, get a few signups, and convince yourself it’s working. I’ve done it. I’ve also seen other early-stage founders fall into this trap: you get excited by noise— mentions, meetings, even investors. None of this matters at all. Don’t let this be your fuel it will leave your burnt out.

Product Market Fit Stages​

1. Problem/Solution Fit – Have you found a real problem worth solving? Can you solve it manually And vet that your idea can even solve that problem? And if so is it really as big a problem as you think?
2. Problem/Solution/Customer Fit - Have you solved for your niche? Is this customer segment the right one? Do they care? Is the problem big enough and costly enough/worth the time?
3. Product/Market Fit – Do people keep using it? How much, what are your DAU/MAUs (daily/monthly active users) is this number growing, how many of those do you retain and what’s your churn (number of people who signup and don’t come back.)
4. Scale – Make the big bucks.

I get asked by people I mentor: “Is using a product once an indicator of product/market fit?”​

No. That’s called curiosity.

Repeated use of a product is an indicator of product/market fit. Frequency. Retention. Expansion. PMF shows up in the metrics—use, engagement, referrals.

Problem-Solution Fit Comes First​

You’re not hunting PMF right away. First, you need problem- solution fit. Can you describe the user, the job to be done, and a painful problem that they acknowledge?

This needs to be detailed, who are they, what age, job, kids, name, why it sucks, How they solve the problem now, what does it cost in hours, cash, hair transplants?

This is the phase for customer interviews. Talking. Listening.

NO PITCHING. Just: who are they, what do they do, what’s broken? Problem interviews are really repetitive. When 30 out of 45 people give similar answers, you’re getting close. It can be boring, but do this right and you have all your marketing copy ready, and your sales strategy: where, how, why they buy or solve this is super valuable.

How to Know You Have Customer Fit​

• They describe the problem before you do.
• They’re already paying for bad alternatives.
• They have some horrible manual process.
• They've built some hacked together solution.
• They've hired someone to handle it.

When you feel you're green on at least a few of these you're ready to move onto prototyping your first version.

Product Market Fit Questions to Ask First​

• Is this customer problem worth solving?
• Who has this problem most acutely?
• How do they solve it now?
• Will they pay for something better?
• Is this customer segment worth chasing?

Do Things that Don't Scale​

Paul Graham is a legendary founder behind YC, and mentor to Mr Altman of OpenAI. His great advice is do things manually to learn more about your problem solution fit, if you can make it look like the product even if it's more a service to start. It doesn't need to scale to 1000 users, but does it to 10, and does it solve all 10? Do they pay you?

This is a great first Minimum Viable Product step, it costs your time and helps you learn alot about the problem and the user.

The next step would be looking into iterative MVP building a la:

Lean Startup & Lean Product Development​

Achieving PMF is hard, but this is where lean comes in. The Lean Startup approach, popularised by Eric Ries, is all about rapid experimentation, customer feedback, and iterative dev. It’s basically build-measure-learn in quick cycles.. Lean product development originated in manufacturing but translates brilliantly to startups: cut out the bullshit, iterate quickly, and respond to real user needs. Lean prioritises validated learning – every feature you build should have a hypothesis behind it and evidence.

Now, how does lean compare to other development methodologies? The old-school way was Waterfall: big upfront specs, long cycles, and inflexible plans. In contrast, Agile and Lean methods favor short iterations, continuous feedback, and flexibility. Agile development (think Scrum sprints or Kanban flow) is actually very complementary to Lean – both embrace change and customer feedback. Lean focuses on reducing waste at every step, while Agile centers on iterative deliver. For example, instead of a year-long roadmap set in stone, a lean/agile team might plan just a few weeks ahead, build a small feature, release it, gather data, and then adjust course. This is often visualised in an agile methodology diagram.

The key is continuous improvement: every sprint or iteration, you learn something and improve the product.These methods rely on people over process.

What is an agile team? People that overcommunciate, work together well, work on insight not feeling, can wear many hats, and aren’t set on product.Agile teams thrive in a lean startup environment because they can pivot mega fast when new user feedback comes in or when experiments show an unexpected result.

Business Model Canvas & Strategy​

A part of the validation process is validating not only the customer problem and solution, biut viability in the market. This is where tools like the Business Model Canvas popularised by Strategyzer and has nine components: Key Partners, Key Activities, Key Resources, Value Propositions, Customer Relationships, Channels, Customer Segments, Cost Structure, and Revenue. Why bother with a canvas? Early-stage founders can get tunnel vision on product and forget the bigger picture. The BMC forces you to acknowledge known and unknowns.

One footnote here, this does not need to be in any order, obviously the caveat is focus on problem first and solution last, but if the format doesn’t work take the titles and use in notion/cut them out and put them on 9 walls, whatever works best. You just want to know the answer to all them inside out. If the BMC is too jargony, try the Lean canvas Model below suited more to tech, same idea:

Here’s the most searched terms for the business canvas model: • Customer Relationships business model canvas: This defines the type of relationship you establish with your customers, is it like Stripe, great product and UX/UI and you self serve, or are you always in the loop. (You need to be in the loop in the beginning of any product but long run?) • Channels business model canvas: How do you sell? Where? Are you selling via Instagram, do you need to be on Salesforce webstore? Do you have a referral programme?What’s the barrier to join that channel? You need to work out the best place to be, and workout how much the channel costs. • Key Activities in business model canvas :What do you do? If you’re software do you also build your own servers? Or buy from AWS? Do you white label big parts of the stack? Do these key activities actually tie into the “Value Proposition” part of the canvas (AKA unique selling proposition, or competitive advantages.) • Key Resources business model canvas: Anything you need to sell, be it Smart Devs, IP, sales budgets, warehouses, contracts with key logistics suppliers? • Cost Structure business model canvas : What does building, maintaining, shipping, securing, selling your product cost, this should be every cost you can think of. Your time counts, favours count, is the products cost justified in the price you can sell it for in “Revenue streams in the business model canvas?”

Mapping your business with the Business canvas or lean canvas model helps in justifying your product’s in areas outside of customer interviews. It makes you consider if all parts of the model align. For instance, if your channels cost more to acquire a customer than that customer ever pays you, probably not a business (maybe a charity though?).

What’s a PMF Startup?​

A PMF startup is one that prioritises traction over polish. You’re not optimising yet—you’re validating. Interviews, Non scalable prototypes, BMC are all different ways to assumption test your business and build towards product market fit. Your roadmap should be shaped by what users are doing, not what you or your developer think would be awesome.

What actually is Product Market Fit?​

Product/market fit occurs when a business continues to grow due to customer demand—not because you're pushing harder or spending more on ads. Real PMF means customers are pulling your product into the market, not you pushing it onto them. After building (and killing) a few products that went nowhere, I learned that understanding PMF and lean product development isn't just startup jargon—it's the difference between building something people actually want versus burning through your runway on a glorified hobby project.

PMF is constant, not static, everything you do is working out what moves the needle.

The Four Stages of Product Market Fit​

1. Nascent Product-Market Fit

• You have some early customers who love what you're building
• High focus on customer satisfaction but limited scale
• Lots of exploration and learning happening
• You're still figuring out if this thing has legs

2. Developing Product-Market Fit

• Growing customer base with improved processes
• Beginning to establish scalable systems
• Market validation is getting stronger
• You're seeing patterns in who uses your product and why

3. Strong Product-Market Fit

• High market demand with operational efficiency
• Strong customer retention and growth
• You're becoming known in your market
• Revenue growth is substantial and predictable

4. Scaling Beyond PMF

• You've proven the model works
• Focus shifts to expansion and optimisation and scaling.

A Product Market fit (PMF) Quiz you can give yourself​

• Are users truly dependent on your product? (For example, would 40%+ of users be very disappointed if they could no longer use it?)
• Do you have high retention and repeat usage? (If users keep coming back on their own, that’s a great sign. High engagement and frequent use mean you’re a part of their routine.)
• Is organic growth happening? (E.g. referrals, word-of-mouth, or usage growing without huge marketing spend – a true PMF startup often sees organic traction.)
• Are customers willing to pay? (Strong PMF usually comes with an ability to monetise – users see so much value they’ll pay and maybe even tolerate price increases.)
• Do new features or products get pulled by the market? (When you talk to users, are they asking for more?) Remember each new feature starts back at the beginning of the validation cycle

Product Delivery & Continuous Exploration**​

Validation never stops, even when you find PMF for a feature or product keep applying Lean principles and agile methods. In fact, they become even more important as you grow. Product delivery in a startup context means getting new value into customers’ hands quickly and reliably. If you’ve achieved PMF, you want to double-down by improving the product, adding features customers are asking for, and scaling up without breaking things.One development methodology worth adopting is Continuous Exploration. This comes from lean-agile at scale (e.g. the Scaled Agile Framework). Why? Because markets and customer preferences aren’t static – especially after you hit PMF, competitors will emerge and customer expectations will evolve.

Practically, you achieve continuous exploration by engaging with users regularly (through interviews, surveys, usability tests), monitoring analytics for new usage patterns, and keeping an eye on industry trends. This informs a living product roadmap. It’s the opposite of “set it and forget it.” For example, maybe your app achieved PMF for one use-case, but through continuous discovery you realise users are trying to use it for a slightly different purpose – that could open up a new feature or even a new market. Continuous Exploration is tightly coupled with agile product delivery. In agile, we often talk about a dual-track approach: Discovery (exploring what to build) and Delivery (building it). The discovery never stops. When done right, this approach means you’re never flying blind – you always have some evidence for what you’re doing. It reduces the risk of big, wrong releases and ensures you keep that precious product-market fit as you expand the product. It’s much easier to course-correct in small increment.. period.

Also, as you grow, don’t lose the habit of measuring. Keep an eye on those PMF indicators: retention, engagement, conversion rates, churn, customer delight.. Staying lean means continuously learning and adjusting, at 1000 customers just as you did at 10 customers.

Real Life Examples You can Follow​

Two of my favourite successful builders are Levels who's behind some very successful $100K MRR businesses and Tibo who has an $8M exit and builds MVPs in public.

Key Takeaways​

• Continuous Exploration and Agile Product Ideation is key because Markets shift, users lie (without meaning to), and preferences change. Continuous exploration keeps you close to truth.
• Don’t build before problem solution fit. You’ll waste time and money.
• “Used once” is not PMF. Look for repeated use and demand-led growth.
• Use lean product development to minimise waste. Don’t confuse movement with progress.
• Your BMC should make sense before your prototype. Otherwise, you’re winging it.
• Development methodologies are tools, not rules. Use what works, ditch what doesn’t.
• Validate with users constantly. Continuous exploration > assumptions.

Final Thought​

Every founder wants PMF, and honestly it can be boring to run the same interviews 1000s times, And if you’re introverted it’s frickin’ hard too. That said it will save you tens or hundred of thousands, and delivers the BEST ROI Of almost anything you’ll ever do as a founder. So. Talk to users. Kill shit that doesn’t work. Iterate. Then iterate again.

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What is a Product Strategy Framework?​

A product strategy framework is a structured approach to planning, developing, and launching products that will actually sell. It's basically the roadmap that gets you from cool idea moment to actually making something for your customers and they actually love it (which usually means pay.)

Now this is mostly aimed at creating Product Strategy Framework's and not finding Product Market Fit or Problem Solution Fit, you should of course you should you apply a very similar rubric to new product too. Which in it's most basic form is:

• Who is this product for? (your target market or user personas)?
• What problem are we solving and what value will the product offer?
• Why will users care (what's our unique value proposition or differentiator)?
• How will we succeed?
• When and in what order will we roll things out (major milestones or phases, a.k.a. your product roadmap)?

And it should go without saying talking too 100s of clients, customers, users and finding common problems is always always always the way to start this.

Think of the product strategy framework as the bridge between your product vision and your execution strat like the product roadmap and development sprints. It's not about listing every feature you'll ever build; it's about setting guardrails/KPIs and context. This way, even when your team is busy building and iterating, they understand the context and ultimate goal. This differs from a public product roadmap in it's much more inclusive and covers off internal private things, ideas, more precise timelines, team planning, asset allocations but still high level.

Tl:dr A product strategy framework is essentially a structured approach to defining what you're building, why you're building it, who it's for, and how you'll make it successful. It's the high-level plan that connects your product vision to the nitty-gritty of development and go-to-market execution.

Source

Why Do You Need a Product Strategy Framework?​

If you're a founder or product lead, you might wonder, "Can’t I just iterate quickly and figure it out as I go?"

You can try, but flying blind is a risky way to build a business. Speaking from experience, did that and we built a product now long dead that did exactly nothing useful.

Here are a few big reasons a product strategy framework is worth your time (even if the term sounds like corporate BS):

• Clarity and Focus: A product strategy framework forces you to clarify your product's purpose and niche. Instead of saying "we're building a project management tool for everyone," you’ll articulate something like "we're building a project management tool for freelance designers that integrates with design software and solves the issue of client feedback chaos." That clarity keeps you chasing your tail with random 'good idea' features that nobody wants.

• Alignment: A documented strategy framework is the great equaliser. It gets everyone on the same page about the product direction. When tough decisions come up, you can refer back to the strategy: "Does this new feature idea support our plan or distract from it?"

• Prioritisation and Roadmap Guidance: Filter all the cool to have vitamin bs Feature idea. It helps you prioritise what to build now vs. later. By mapping features to your goals, it makes it muchhh less likely you'll overpromise and underdeliver, and more likely to launch on time.

• Easier Product Launches: Having that strategic groundwork makes launch planning much smoother. Your value proposition and target customer (defined in the strategy) directly inform your marketing campaigns and sales playbook.

• As a bonus it can really help build confidence with your team, users or pesky investors . It shows that you have a a plan, not just a cool idea.

Broad Overview of a Product Strategy Framework​

• Product Vision: You start with a big vision (your "why" and ultimate goal). For a SaaS founder, this might be something lofty like "help small businesses manage their finances effortlessly."

• Product Strategy: Next, you formulate the strategy to achieve that vision. This is where the framework comes in. You decide on your target users, pinpoint the core problem you'll solve, figure out your key differentiators, and set success metrics/KPIs. Essentially, you're crafting your product management strategy here – aligning what you'll build with business goals and market needs.

• Product Roadmap: With the strategy in hand, you create a roadmap. This is a high-level plan of features and releases mapped over time, who, how, when. More broad than a public product roadmap but stays high level (accessible to read in 5minutes.)

• Development & Iteration: Now your team executes, following whatever development framework you prefer (Agile sprints, etc.). Because you have a clear strategy, even as you iterate and adapt, you can check if new ideas support the strategy or not. (This is where having those guardrails saves you from "feature creep" or chasing every shiny object.)

• Product Launch: basically a plan for how you'll introduce the product to the market (which channels, messaging, pricing, etc.). It should align with your overall product strategy.

Common Product Strategy Frameworks​

1. Jobs-to-be-Done (JTBD)​

Source

This framework focuses on understanding the "job" your customers are "hiring" your product to do. It's less about what features your product has and more about the progress your customers are trying to make in their lives.

How it works:

• Identify the job your customer is trying to accomplish
• Understand the circumstances and context around that job
• Design your product to fulfil that job better than alternatives

JTBD is fantastic for focusing on real customer needs rather than shiny features. Companies like Intercom have built their entire product development approach around this framework, and they're crushing it.

I'll give you a real example, I think Reid Hoffman is the one I need to credit. A Snickers bar and a KitKat have very different jobs to do. The Snickers is often bought to satiate hunger, the nuts, the chocolate, the fats, it's a quick hit to keep driving that truck. KitKat is not doing that job, its about leisure, or stress relief, it's not to help work.

2. Lean Product Development​

Source

Born from the Lean Startup methodology, this framework emphasises validated learning and rapid iteration based on customer feedback.

Core components:

• Build a minimum viable product (MVP)
• Measure how customers respond
• Learn from their behaviour
• Iterate based on those insights

This approach is great for resource-constrained teams who need to be sure they're building something people want before investing too heavily. It's why so many startups use this framework—it reduces risk and wastage.

A great example is a landing page with a signup form. It's cheap and fast, can I get 200 people to sign up to this service and give an email. If no, it's not worth it, if yes what's MVP2? ASAP you want them to pay or use your service but proxies for demand early are crucial for learning.

3. Outcome-Driven Innovation (ODI)​

Source

Similar to JTBD but more structured, ODI breaks down customer needs into specific desired outcomes and then prioritises product features based on how well they deliver those outcomes.

Process:

• Define customer-desired outcomes
• Measure importance and satisfaction for each outcome
• Identify opportunities (important but unsatisfied outcomes)
• Create solutions for those opportunities
• Test those solutions with customers

If you're data-driven and want a methodical approach to product development, ODI gives you the structure to make evidence-based decisions.

4. Kano Model​

Source

The Kano Model helps you understand which product features will delight customers versus which ones just meet basic expectations.

Feature categories:

• Basic needs - Must-haves that cause dissatisfaction if missing
• Performance needs - Features where better performance = higher satisfaction
• Delighters - Unexpected features that create delight but aren't missed if absent

This framework is particularly useful when deciding which features to include in your next release. It prevents you from over-investing in things customers don't care about.

5. OKRs (Objectives and Key Results)​

Source

While not exclusively a product strategy framework, OKRs provide a clear structure for setting and measuring product goals.

Structure:

• Objectives: What you want to achieve
• Key Results: How you'll measure success

For example:

• Objective: Launch a product that becomes the market leader in customer satisfaction
• Key Results:
  • Achieve NPS score of 40+ within 3 months of launch
  • Reach 30% week-over-week user growth for first quarter
  • Maintain less than 5% churn rate

Google, Intel, and countless other successful companies use OKRs to keep their product teams aligned and accountable.

How to Choose the Right Product Strategy Framework​

There's not a right choice here, any of these could work for you, jobs to be done is especially important in physical product world whereas lean product is for those earlier stage teams without much of anything.

These questions while help you figure it out:

1. What's your company size and structure?

   • Larger companies might need more structured approaches like ODI
   • Early Stage Startups should go with Lean Product Development

2. What's your product maturity?

   • New products: Focus on frameworks that emphasize market validation
   • Established products: Consider frameworks that help optimize and expand

3. What's your team's expertise?

   • Technical teams might prefer more data-driven frameworks
   • Design-led teams might work better with JTBD or Kano

4. What's your market situation?

   • Competitive markets: Use frameworks that help identify differentiation
   • Emerging markets: Focus on frameworks that help discover needs

5. What's your business model?

   • SaaS: Frameworks that emphasise ongoing value and retention
   • One-time purchases: Frameworks focused on initial value delivery

Implementing Your Product Strategy Framework​

• One-Page Strategy in Notion or Confluence: Write down your key points (vision, target, problems, etc.) in a concise one-pager. Notion, Confluence, or even Google Docs works great for this. The idea is to make it easily shareable and updatable. Many startup teams maintain a "Product Strategy" wiki page that everyone can refer to.

• Visualise : Sometimes it's helpful to sketch out the framework visually. You could draw a simple diagram showing how your vision leads to strategy which leads to the roadmap. Tools like Miro, MURAL, or Whimsical are perfect for making a quick flowchart or even a mock strategy canvas. Think of it like a lightweight version of a Business Model Canvas tailored to product strategy.

• Templates and Canvases: Consider using a template or canvas that guides you through key elements. For example, you might use a Product Vision Board or Product Strategy Canvas or a Lean Canvas. These templates prompt you to fill in sections like vision, target users, problems, and unique value, ensuring you cover all the bases.

• Keep It Simple & Review Often: Whatever tool you use, keep the framework itself simple. We're talking high-level strategy, so resist the temptation to dive into the weeds of solution design in this document. Also, set a reminder to revisit the strategy framework at key intervals, it's not useful if it's not actually used.

So!!! Encourage a culture where team members actually read and reference the product strategy. It's not meant to be a beautiful PDF that sits in your file sharing platform of choice and is never opened again. Incorporate it into onboarding for new team members. Bring it up in planning meetings. Send annoying automated emails with updates, make it something people think about when they're having insomnia, the way I do about regsirating for things in Germany.

Who Actually Makes a Product Strategy Framework​

You'll probably thinking "f... I don't have time for this, who's gonna do this?" In a small startup, the founder or CEO often wears the product strategist hat, it's about the most urgent and important job you'll always have. In larger teams, a product person or dedicated product strategist will formulate the product strategy framework. So, what is a product strategist exactly? It's basically a person (or role) focused on the big-picture vision and long-term plan for the product

This person makes sure that the product direction aligns with market opportunities and business goals, keeping the team on track.

In practice, whether or not you have someone with "Product Strategist" on their business card, the responsibilities are usually shared among the leadership and product team:

• Founders bring the vision and deep understanding of the problem space (often they are the target user or have firsthand experience with the problem).

-** Product managers** (or Heads of Product) take those insights and structure them into a strategy framework, asking the hard questions and validating assumptions with research.

• Marketing and sales contribute by ensuring the strategy makes sense for go-to-market, and that there's a clear value proposition they can communicate to customers.

• Developers will 100% weigh in to sanity-check that the strategy is feasible within technical constraints. Most of the time the first version will not be, try again. (I see you CTO).

The important part is that someone is driving the strategic discussion and documentation. If you're a founder without a product manager, you're the default product strategist. (Trust me don't skip this just because you're by yourself; even a one-person startup benefits from writing down the strategy in a framework, it challenges your assumptions.)

Conclusion​

Here's why having a framework matters:

• It aligns your team - Everyone understands what you're building and why (even if you're team.)
• It helps you prioritise - You know what features/deliveries matter most and what can wait
• It reduces waste - You build what customers actually need, not what seems cool
• It creates accountability - Clear goals = clear metrics for success
• It makes decision-making easier - When in doubt, refer back to your strategy

For this to be useful, you have to remember this framework isn't a static document. It's meant to be revisited and refined. Maybe you discover during beta testing that users absolutely love one feature you thought was minor, and they don’t care about another you thought was key – that feedback might lead you to tweak the strategy (and that's okay). The framework should be a living guide that evolves with new information.

Gmail

What is an LMS​

An LMS, which stands for Learning Management System, is basically a digital hub where people can create, share, and track learning or training materials.

Think of it as an online classroom or training center. It's used by anyone from large uni's to smaller coaches, one person coaching businesses, online trainers, personal trainers, and nearly anyone sharing learning content or resources with their clients and students. LMS's can also be used just by you to manage your class, be it in person or digital.

Core Uses:

• Makes Learning Easy to Organise: You can build courses, upload videos, add quizzes, and organize everything in one place.
• Delivers Content Online: Learners can log in from anywhere on their computer or phone to access lessons, watch videos, or take tests.
• Track Student Progress: The system keeps tabs on who’s completed what, how everyone is doing in for example; quizzes, and even sends reminders if someone falls behind.
• Communciations: Many LMSs have forums, chat, or messaging so students and instructors can ask questions, share ideas, or work together.

Best Free LMS for Small Business​

Some of the best LMS's that are free, are open source. Unfortunately, with everything in this life, free doesn't always mean free. Whilst the software itself is free, the cost to implement these open sources platforms can come in hosting costs, development or configuration. They're great if you have a very large course and need a lot of flexibility and configurability. As one Redditer puts it:

"..real LMS systems are expensive to implement, tough to get right and require the dedication of a development and support team to help you get the most from your learning platform investment.There are plenty of free-ish options (WordPress. Moodle, etc.) but you trade off spending money for spending time configuring and managing the solution. You shift the cost from an LMS license fee to server hosting fees, sys admin costs, plugin fees, etc."

That said if you're looking for a low cost, low time/stress LMS for your small business. The best bet is via WordPress which will cost you a domain and hosting anywhere from $15+ a month.) using a Plugin like LifterLMS or LearnDash

LifterLMS​

LifterLMS includes:

• Course creator.: Simple to use course builder with quizes, Lessions and Sections.
• Memberships and Payments: You can lock down your course so your students need to pay and you can collect payments via Stripe, WooCommerce or other payment gateways.You can offer ourses or even full site access through flexible membership options. Features include automatic enrollment, exclusive member pricing, and more. Students can pay using credit cards, set up recurring payments, or choose from custom pricing plans to suit their needs.
• Student Engagement: Keeping students motivated and satisfied is key to retention and success rates. With LifterLMS, you can boost engagement by awarding achievement badges, fostering social learning communities, enabling direct messaging, offering private coaching, and much more.

Pros and Cons of LifterLMS

LifterLMS Pros

• The drag-and-drop course builder is pretty easy to use.
• It's really great for video based lessons and has great integrations with YT and Vimeo.
• It offers lots of payment options from cards, recurring, and is highly customisble.
• The student part of the LMS has great UI and is really easy to use.
• Managing pricing and student access it pretty easy.
• Built-in analytics, certificates, and engagement triggers help you track student performance and boost motivation

LifterLMS Cons

• Costs can add up fast if you need several add-ons or advanced features. Payment gateways and email integrations are sold separately, and bundles can be pricey compared to other plugins like LearnDash.
• The initial setup isn’t always straightforward. Even with lots of documentation, some users find getting started a bit confusing and wish onboarding was clearer.
• Free users get limited support, while priority is given to those with paid bundles. This can be frustrating if you run into issues and don’t have a paid plan.
• Some users have noticed performance slowdowns on larger sites, and there can be compatibility hiccups with certain PHP versions.
• The free version is missing many advanced features, so you’ll likely need paid extensions if you want a more complete learning platform

LearnDash​

Is another WordPress plugin, which is also free. That said it's limited to content and course creation, you will need to download plugins to do marketing, hosting videos, and to accept payments. If you're a small course creator it may work but it suffers from a similiar issue as Lifter. You'll need to stitch together alot of plugins and that adds complexity.

That said it's pretty simple to setu[ and use, cheap and has decent engagement and learning retention tools.

LearnDash includes:

For Leaners

• FocusMode (to avoid distractions), video progression (allows learners to restart where they left off.) Automated notifications (instant feedback wqhen they achieve a score), and challenge exams.

For Builders

• Drag & drop course builder super easy to use and no coding whatsoever (pheww.)
• AI course builders, assignment management, course dashboards, course dashboarhs, advanced quizes with lots of quiz question types, virtual and in person lessons and dynamic content delivery (drip feed lessons or set linear progressions.)

LearnDash Pros

• Great for boosting student retention and course completion rates
• User-friendly interface integrated directly into the familiar WordPress dashboard
• Built-in student certification tools
• Optional managed hosting and security services available for an additional fee
• Intuitive course builder featuring a hassle-free drag-and-drop design

LearnDash Cons

• Focuses solely on learning management, without any additional functionalities (marketing, payments etc)
• Costs can quickly add up, as essential integrations often require significant extra investment
• Does not provide video hosting or built-in payment processing capabilities
• Tracking analytics can be challenging due to reliance on multiple integrations
• Missing advanced features such as high-converting funnel templates, CRM tools, or integrated help desks
• Lacks access to a third-party marketplace for professional services

Moodle​

Moodle provides a completely free, open-source LMS with unlimited courses and users for maximum control over your training infrastructure. The platform supports extensive customization through plugins and includes a mobile app with offline access capabilities.

Pricing: Free open-source software (hosting and support costs only).

Moodle Pros:

• Completely free with unlimited users and courses
• Full customisation capabilities
• Extensive plugin library
• Fantastic mobile app with offline access

Moodle Cons:

• Requires technical knowledge to set up and maintain
• Self-hosting adds costs and complexity
• Can be complex for beginners to run
• Dated user interface

TalentLMS​

TalentLMS offers a flexible learning platform with intuitive course creation tools and frickin awesome gamification elements. The system includes AI-powered content generation, comprehensive mobile access, and customizable learning paths for streamlined employee development.

Pricing: Free plan for up to 5 users and 10 courses. Paid plans start at $69/month (Core), $109/month (Grow), and $139/month (Pro), with 20% discount for annual billing.

TalentsLMS Pros:

• Flexible pricing with a decent free tier
• Intuitive interface designed for small businesses
• AI-powered course creation tools
• Gamification elements that increase engagement

TalentsLMS Cons:

• Flex add-on costs extra for managing fluctuating user numbers
• Limited customisation on lower-tier plans
• Mobile app experience not as robust as desktop version

iSpring Learn​

iSpring Learn delivers distance learning with minimal setup time and includes a PowerPoint-based course editor. The platform supports mobile learning with offline access and features integrated content development tools for creating interactive materials.

Pricing: Starting at $2.94 per user monthly (billed annually), with pay-per-active-user model.

iSpring Pros:

• Straightforward pricing with no hidden fees
• Excellent mobile learning with offline access
• PowerPoint-based course editing for easy content creation
• Clean, intuitive interface

iSpring Cons:

• Full functionality requires separate purchase of iSpring Suite
• Limited built-in interactivity options
• Less robust community features than some competitors

Coassemble​

Coassemble specialises in code-free course development with interactive elements and AI-powered creation tools. The platform focuses on microlearning with a login-free experience (using MagicLink).

Pricing: Free plan for single creator. Solo plan at $10/month, Pro plan at $15/month, Business plan at $25/month.

Coassemble Pros:

• Strong AI-powered course creation
• Code-free course development with a lot of flexibility
• Login-free learner experience
• Mobile browser compatibility

Coassemble Cons:

• No dedicated mobile app
• Limited reporting capabilities on lower tiers
• Fewer integrations than enterprise solutions

EasyLMS​

EasyLMS focuses on compliance training with robust certification features and assessment tools. The platform includes customizable certificates, randomized questions, and strong accessibility compliance for inclusive learning experiences.

Pricing: Flat-fee model: Business Owl ($105/month), Corporate Owl ($159/month), Enterprise Owl ($275/month) with annual discounts.

EasyLMS Pros:

• Excellent certification and compliance features
• Flat-fee pricing instead of per-user costs
• Strong accessibility features (WCAG 2.1 compliant)
• ISO 27001 certified for security, which makes it a fantastic tool for bigger organisations or if you sell to larger clients.

EasyLMS Cons:

• No dedicated mobile app
• Limited customisation options
• User interface feels a tad 90s compared to newer platforms

Groundwork1​

Groundwork1 delivers training directly to email inboxes, eliminating the need for additional software or logins. The system supports various content types from videos to quizzes, all accessible through familiar email interactions.

Pricing: Starts at $29/month for up to 50 people ($0.58 per employee).

Groundwork1 Pros:

• Email-based delivery eliminates need for new software
• Extremely affordable for small teams
• Automated reminder system
• No login barriers for employees

Groundwork1 Cons:

• Limited interactive content types
• Basic reporting capabilities
• Less comprehensive than traditional LMS platforms

Connecteam​

Connecteam combines learning management with powerful communication tools specifically designed for non-desk teams. The platform includes onboarding workflows, in-app chat, and a comprehensive recognition system to boost engagement.

Pricing: Free plan for up to 10 users. HR & Skills plans start at $29/month for first 30 users.

Connecteam Pros:

• All-in-one platform combining training and communication
• Mobile-first design ideal for non-desk teams
• Built-in recognition and rewards system
• Comprehensive onboarding workflows

Connecteam Cons:

• Can be overwhelming with too many features
• Additional costs for users beyond initial 30
• Steep Learning curve for administrators

LearnWorlds​

LearnWorlds combines sophisticated learning tools with marketing features to help businesses create and sell courses. The platform includes white-labeling options, AI course creation tools, and robust monetization features for selling educational content.

Pricing: Starter ($29/month with $5 transaction fee), Pro Trainer ($99/month), Learning Center ($299/month).

LearnWorlds Pros:

• Easy to use and flexible course monetisation features
• Complete white-labeling options
• AI-assisted course creation
• Branded mobile apps (add-on)

LearnWorlds Cons:

• Transaction fees on starter plan
• Higher entry price than some competitors
• Learning curve for utilizing all features

Gurucan​

Gurucan delivers a comprehensive platform with strong branding control across web and mobile experiences. The system includes membership features for recurring payments, branded mobile apps, and live session capabilities for real-time learning.

Pricing: Creator ($39/month), Expert ($99/month), Pro ($149/month), Guru ($199/month).

Gurucan Pros:

• White-label mobile apps without coding
• Strong membership and subscription features
• Live session and webinar capabilities
• Marketing automation tools

Gurucan Cons:

• Higher price point for mobile app features
• Limited third-party integrations
• Less intuitive interface than some competitors

Deel Engage​

Deel Engage combines learning management with performance tools and features AI-powered content creation. The platform can generate micro-courses in seconds and includes automation features that save time for resource-constrained teams.

Pricing: $20 per employee per month.

Deel Engage Pros:

• AI course builder generates content very quickly
• Combined learning and performance management
• Strong automation features
• Solid compliance tracking

Deel Engage Cons:

• Limited customisation options
• No free tier available

360Learning​

360Learning focuses on collaborative learning where employees can contribute content and identify training needs. The platform transforms how training is created and shared, with AI-powered authoring tools and bottom-up learning approaches.

Pricing: Team plan at $8 per registered user monthly (up to 100 users), custom Business plan for larger teams.

360Learning Pros:

• AI-powered authoring tools
• Bottom-up learning approach
• Comprehensive feedback and analytics

360Learning Cons:

• Limited features on Team plan
• Custom pricing needed for larger organisations
• Learning curve for collaborative approach

SkyPrep​

SkyPrep delivers a clean, modern interface with knowledge reinforcement tools and extensive integration capabilities. The platform features a customizable dashboard with modular functionality and innovative learning tools like Knowledge Booster for content reinforcement.

Pricing: Tiered plans include Lite, Premium, and Enterprise with dedicated support options.

SkyPrep Pros:

• Clean, intuitive modern interface
• Knowledge reinforcement tools
• Extensive integration capabilities
• Strong customer support

SkyPrep Cons:

• Limited pricing transparency
• Some advanced features only available on higher tiers
• Less innovative than newer platforms

Tovuti LMS​

Tovuti LMS features extensive gamification options and AI-powered course creation to make training more engaging. The platform includes over 40 interactive content types and access to thousands of ready-to-use training resources through an optional content library.

Pricing: Subscription-based with small, medium, and corporate business options.

Tovuti LMS Pros:

• 40+ gamified content options
• Cloud-based with no downloads required
• AI course generation
• Extensive ready-to-use content library

Tovuti LMS Cons:

• Limited pricing transparency
• Steep learning curve for administrators
• Some features require additional subscriptions

Thinkific​

Thinkific enables businesses to create, market, and sell online courses with strong monetization features. The platform includes AI tools for course outlines and quizzes, plus robust analytics to track business performance and learner engagement.

Pricing: Multiple plans from Basic to Plus with 14-day free trial.

Thinkific Pros:

• Complete platform for creating and selling courses
• Strong marketing and sales tools
• AI course outline and quiz generators
• 100+ integrations with standard applications

Thinkific Cons:

• More focused on selling courses than internal training
• Advanced features require higher-tier plans
• Limited gamification options

TalentCards​

TalentCards specializes in microlearning through a card-based system delivering bite-sized training to smartphones. The platform can generate complete microlearning courses instantly and uses spaced repetition algorithms to help employees master difficult material efficiently.

Pricing: Free plan for up to 5 users. Standard ($50/month for 50 users), Premium ($75/month for 50 users).

TalentCards Pros:

• Specialised microlearning approach
• AI-generated content in seconds
• Mobile-first design for frontline workers
• Content translation into 100+ languages

TalentCards Cons:

• Limited to card-based learning format
• Less comprehensive than full LMS solutions
• Limited customization options

Conclusion Finding Your Ideal Small Business LMS​

Before making your decision think about:

• Budget constraints: Evaluate not just initial costs but long-term scalability as your training needs grow, open source may see an easy option but may drain time resources and cost more in the mid term.

• Content creation needs: Assess whether you need sophisticated authoring tools or just uploading your own content.

• Learning experience: Determine if mobile access, gamification, or self-paced options matters to you?

• Administrative requirements: Consider reporting capabilities, compliance features,payments and certification tracking

Ever wondered why some tech companies nail product development while others leave their users guessing? You can find some answers in, which companies publicly broadcast their roadmaps, which is a pretty effective marketing tool as well as one that actually helps product direction, feedback and engagement. It’s also crucial for building trust with users and bringing them along for the journey.

However, it can be a double edged sword, too much information will likely, from my experience, not be the best for your developers. If you announce features with a strict deadline, all you’re doing to do is overpromise and underdeliver.

Even small firms can benefit from a public roadmap (something I’ll go into greater depth in our next blog post) but start High level and engage your users to actually help you prioritise. Things like a feature leader board, can you help engagement but you needn’t commit to all, and also help you start conversations.

What is a Public Product Roadmap?​

A public product roadmap can serve as a strategic communication tool that publicly outlines your product plans. It’s almost always a visual representation reveals what a company is currently working on, recent releases, and their general product strategy—which anyone can freely view.

Benefits of Public Roadmaps​

Best Tools for Small Business: The Basics​

To get started you’re most likely going to need an email address, I probably don’t need to elaborate on why, but very quickly email is where you’ll deal with nearly all of your suppliers, customer sand pretty much all other communications. For email there are a few free options:

Proton Mail - Security and privacy focused.

Proton Mail is a Swiss email provider focused on privacy and security, they claim, unlike other providers, they don’t scan your emails to build a profile of you which others sell to marketers. They also provide end to end encryption, so only you can see your emails. They state they cannot view the contents of your emails or attachments. The downside of the free plan, is you can’t use a custom domain. So you’ll end up with an email @proton. Proton in my opinion is one of the best apps for small business, it’s as easy as Google to use and it’s nice to know your data is more protected.

What is a Dashboard?​

When referring to a dashboard in software world, it is the command centre of your business. Much like a car dashboard, you see the key things speed, revs, miles travelled, oil temperature and any red flags. Unlike a car’s dashboard, you get to decide what you’re tracking. Is your north star only number of customers? Or do you need to track hot inventory and adapt your store as trends shift? A dashboard allows you to have an overview of your business without sifting through lots of data, spreadsheets or sales data.

Your dashboard is the key thing you need to know about your business on a daily, weekly and monthly basis.

Running software businesses today can get complex quickly, especially because we all rely on multiple software tools to run them. Personally I'm using Gmail, GCal, Stripe, Slack, Notion, Jira, Figma, Matomo, GA, Cloudflare and AWS and the team at EchoDash use many more. We've spoken to developers and business owners that use as many as 30+ tools to manage their businesses and projects.

It's a lot of pings, alerts, notifications and emails to keep track of everything going on. That's exactly why Jack (of WP Fusion) founded EchoDash. He was spending hours a week jumping between open tabs to check all the different software tools he was using to run WP Fusion. All this happens across multiple software providers, so it's a lot of work to understand what's going on. Did some one leave a ticket or a review? Are there any payment failures or churn? Did someone abandon a cart? Is there a PHP error or another error that has your site performance flagging or worst down?