Dan's Daily

You can either be selling painkillers or vitamins.

Painkillers solve a need; a painful problem the customer is struggling to get rid of.

Vitamins solve a want; they’re a nice-to-have, but aren’t essential.

The odds of your product succeeding are higher if you find a problem, preferably a big one, and solve it well.

Whether it’s medication, exercise, or preparing for that upcoming exam, in most situations there is a minimum effective dose. Doses below the minimum won’t yield results. And depending on the activity, the dose required can be high.

For example, running the London marathon requires a significant minimum effective dose of training each week compared to, say, the local park’s 5km fun run.

Decide on the goal, and be aware of the minimum effective dose required.

I watched the Women’s World Cup Final this morning between England and Spain. The game was decided by a 1st half Spanish goal—a sublime strike by Carmona.

The game today, and its tight margin throughout, reminded me that winning is not just about stepping up in the big moments to make the big play. It’s also about consistently avoiding errors: both the unforced and the fatal.

A bold charge by England defender, Lucy Bronze, up to the centre of the pitch and her subsequent loss of the ball left the a gaping hole for Spain to launch an attack into. Spain still had to execute, but the England error was what opened the door in the first place.

Intelligent and immense consistency from the Spaniards; a well deserved World Championship victory.

It doesn’t matter if it’s fungus gnats or spider mites, neem oil is a great bet to getting rid of the bugs and keeping your indoor plants pest free.

When we had a plant pest invasion a few years ago, we tried everything from drying out the soil, to yellow sticky traps, to buying nematodes.

But none worked as well as a teaspoon of neem oil mixed with water and a drop of dishwashing liquid.

Give it a try the next time.

My family moved homes more than ten times during the first twelve years of my life. It was never a move overseas, or even to another part of town. We always moved between properties in the same suburb.

At the time, I enjoyed moving. Being in a new house, on a new street, where I could make new friends with kids in the neighbourhood; all of it was exciting. And at the end of a long day playing, I’d always have my home and my room to come back to.

Since I left home ten years ago, Mum has always kept a room in the house for me. Sometimes it has been used as an office, or for storage, but when I’m home, it’s mine.

There’s something comforting about her saying, “there’ll always be a room for you,” no matter how far away I am, or how long I spend away from home.

This is when the product is simple, easy to use, and the business behind it is honest and straightforward.

However, the product with hidden terms, caveats, and a complicated message is more likely to have some gotchas.

Strive to build things that do what they say on the tin.

The Segway is a great piece of technology. When it was announced, it was meant to change the way humanity moved.

The problem was the Segway wasn’t designed to handle stairs.

And stairs, well, they’re everywhere.

No matter how great the technology is, if it fails at an important, critical hurdle, it won’t have a shot at success.

H/T: Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey Moore.

Not every post makes it to publish.

Not every idea ends up working.

Not every product gets traction.

Embrace the duds.

They’re part of the journey.

Apparently, you should repot your indoor plants every 2 years.

For ours, it had been 3 years.

So as we pulled all of our plants out of their pots this weekend (we repotted every plant in the house!), we saw how the roots had swarmed and sprawled to the edges of their pots. The poor things were starving more space and soil.

I couldn’t help but see the metaphor for our own journeys. We’re always growing and changing, and eventually we outgrow the pot we’re in and require a change. That change can be stressful, and selecting the right sized pot and right type of soil is critical.

I have a pretty good hit rate when it comes to picking out Venus in the night sky. It usually looks like one of the brightest and largest stars, and typically hugs the horizon.

I enjoyed this article covering the only photos we have from the surface of Venus—the last being from 1982.

I find it fascinating that Venus is one of our closest planets (Fun fact: Mercury is in fact the closest planet to Earth), yet we have no photographic evidence of what Venus’ surface looks like other than a 57-minute photoshoot from 40 years ago.

The photoshoot lasted less than an hour because Venus’ surface temperature fo 450 degrees Celsius and atmospheric pressure of 90 atmospheres (equivalent to a depth of 900 metres), made it extremely difficult to get even a few photos.

Think about all of life on Earth, and everything that has ever existed on this planet, and imagine if the only image you’ve seen was from a 57-minute photoshoot, on a random day, in a random place somewhere on the planet.

Of course, our planet is lucky to be teeming with life and much more interesting that Venus. But these photos got me thinking a lot about perspective.

I was watching the Australia vs. France women’s World Cup quarter final match this morning. Australia’s captain and the world’s best female player, Sam Kerr, has been hampered by a calf injury and has not started in any games this World Cup. However, she has been brought on in the final 30 minutes in the past two games to give her team an edge.

In the 65th minute, one of the commentators mentioned how the intensity of the game lifted once Kerr came on the field. I thought it was an excellent example of how a leader can raise the intensity, performance, and spirit of their team when they lead from the front and jump in to do the hard work.

I spent two months in Ecuador in 2013 and I took my Lonely Planet guide with me everywhere. Although I don’t use their books much anymore, that book on that trip made me a fan of Lonely Planet for life.

Every recommendation was high quality; from food, to accomodation, and experiences. And through it I discovered experiences that I never would’ve otherwise found. One of those was biking ‘La ruta de las cascadas’ or route of the waterfalls in Baños—a 2-hour, 18km downhill cycling journey through a valley with 11 waterfalls along the way.

Close friends are about to embark on a multi-month journey through South East Asia, when I saw their stack of Lonely Planet books, I was confident they’d have an amazing time.

A friend recently gave me a helpful piece of advice: increase your surface area for serendipity.

In a world where success is a combination of talent, hard work, and luck—and usually more luck than we care to admit—creating moments where more luck can happen is important.

Staying in our shells, in our comfort zones, and within the safe confines of what we’ve always known reduces the chance we may meet someone, learn something, or try something that may change our lives for the better.

Whenever possible, increase your surface area for serendipity.

I enjoy reading Paul Graham’s essays on start-ups and building companies. In his most recent post, he talks about the importance of following your interests and curiosity when wanting to do great work.

I especially liked this sentence, “There’s a kind of excited curiosity that’s both the engine and the rudder of great work. It will not only drive you, but if you let it have its way, will also show you what to work on.”

Curiosity is both a driving force, and a guide. That resonated.

My grandparents had a plum tree in their backyard a few steps away from the veggie patch. Every summer they would pick the plums, give away bags to family and friends, and grandma would make plum jam to last all of us all the way through the winter. Granddad and I used to hang CDs from its branches to keep the birds away from the ripening fruit.

A few days ago my sister went back to the property to pick something up from the new owners, and the plum tree was still there. My sister told them stories about the special role that tree played in our family’s story, and it brought her joy to hear the new family were making their own memories with that old plum tree.

It brought me joy too.