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I applied to YC, tried to use Hinge to find a cofounder and discovered country music

And other lists I made this week

Author

Lillie Sun
April 13, 2023

Welcome to Easy, Breezi.

Your friend who sends you a weekly update on what she's working on, reading through, and thinking about – in a list.

I have one rule to this newsletter, lists only. The only exception is this yellow box. I'll use this to say anything that needs to be said in a full paragraph. I took a break last week and somehow in the short week that I was gone, this newsletter gained 200+ new subscribers ... should I be gone more often?

In case you're wondering what I've been up to these last two weeks:

  1. I'm back at home in Toronto

  2. I've been obsessed with running as my main form of exercise and currently doing about 30-40 km a week

  3. I applied to YC, as a solo founder building a consumer product

  4. Finally set up my domains and new Google Workspace account

  5. Meaning [email protected] is officially live

  6. I updated my Hinge profile to try and find a cofounder in sf

  7. It's actually ...working?

Why I decided to submit an application to YC

  • There's no denying that Y Combinator is one of the best startup accelerator in the world

  • Some of my most admired companies have gone through the program: Airbnb, Stripe, Reddit, Twitch, DoorDash and Coinbase

  • A few of my good friends have shared their personal experiences with YC and encouraged me to apply

  • Chris Wang, co-founder of Shimmer (YC S21), expert ADHD coaching for adults

  • Jonathan Fudem, founder of OneText (YC W23), text to buy for Shopify

  • Sophie Wyne, co-founder of Ariglad (YC W23), AI ticket management for HR teams

  • So I did!

How was the YC application process?

  • I spent two days writing the application

  • Sent the application over to 5 of my smartest friends and mentors

  • Made a few edits to get a final version

  • Recorded the founder video (took probably 15 tries)

  • Sent it in the day before deadline

I've always been curious of people's answers, here's one of mine in case you wanted to see

💡 I really did think about writing the whole application in the form of lists but then thought it was too quirky for YC so stuck to paragraphs

What is your company going to make? Please describe your product and what it does or will do.

Breezi is an app that makes it easier for you to share your lists. Not everyone wants to post a selfie or make a TikTok – but everyone has lists. However, sharing them with others has always been a painful process. We tweet lists, email lists, text lists, send links to lists, screenshot our lists, post stories of our lists – it’s disorganized and we can never find what we need.

Breezi is a better solution because it’s your online profile for all your lists. Create your Breezi account, move all the existing lists in your Apple Notes over with one click. Then, add your friends and see what they’re up to in real time by viewing their lists.

Perhaps you’re looking to get into running, one search for “running” and you’ll find a list of best running shoes, a list of favorite SoundCloud mixes for cardio and a list of post-running protein snacks – created by your friends.

Getting feedback was interesting, everyone had different opinions about everything but here were my 5 main takeaways

  • Keep everything concise: "There's some good info in this answer but a lot of fluff. You need to be more concise or they simply won't read it"

  • Provide direct answers: "YC doesn't like market-y language or beat around the bush. Would describe exactly what the product is. What benefit it provides, who it serves"

  • Benefits > features: "I think you're describing here a lot about FEATURES, would try to talk about BENEFITS and why its solving a real pain for people and how it'll change lives"

  • Demonstrate ship fast mentality: "YC wants to see that you're scrappy, launching asap, and getting user feedback from the app itself – don't be planning for a launch that's not happening for months"

  • Sell the opportunity: "You want to be selling them on the idea that lists are a huge opportunity with full conviction"

I've always found YC Startup Library guides extremely helpful, here are the 3 that I found insightful this week

So how is the Hinge/ co-founder thing going?

  • Last week, I decided to update my Hinge profile and set it to SF

  • Honestly, I wasn't expecting to actually find a potential cofounder, I feel like meeting someone on a dating app to cofound your company with you is nothing but a recipe for disaster

  • The real reason I tried this tactic was because I thought it would be a good growth hack and a good way to experiment

Here are 3 things I accomplished from this Hinge/Cofounder experiment

  1. Made 4 new friends in SF: I've never been to SF before and only know a handful of people there, but through this experiment, made a few new friends who are also in the startup space who I can now reach out to and connect with next time I visit

  2. Acquired 150+ new waitlist signups in five days: I think there were a lot of people who came across my profile, wasn't interested in being a cofounder, but was curious about the product and went to sign up – I wasn't expecting it to be this high but I'm pleasantly surprised!

  3. Had six FaceTime user interviews: Not your typical first date but I love talking to users, showing them Breezi mockups, asking for feedback and demo-ing our prototype. And if I'm being honest, these calls were better than some actual dates I've been on

💡 The Takeaway: Find ways to "ask" without asking

If I had made my prompt "sign up for our waitlist", I don't think anyone would've actually signed up. It comes across extremely sales-y and people don't like that.

When you reframe it as "I'm looking for a cofounder, btw here's my waitlist if you're interested", it comes across as casual and approachable. People sign up out of choice, instead of being told what to do.

If you want people to do something, try to find a way of telling them to do so without being explicit – I promise your conversion rate will be much higher.

Current apps on my phone that I've been obsessed with

  1. Introspect: an AI powered journal that acts like a co-pilot for your thoughts, built by my friends Vidy, Michael and team

  2. Strava: where I track all my runs, and follow my friends on their activities

  3. Stoic: an app that helps me keep my mind organized, healthy and happy through teaching of stoicism and mindfulness*

*Very cool to find out that Stoic was actually a YC-company from S19

I have thoughts – does anyone else relate?

  • I usually despise country music but for some reason, as soon as the weather gets warm, I start blasting Morgan Wallen like it's nobody's business – does anyone else relate?

  • I never online shop from one store at a time, I almost strictly shop from marketplaces like SSENSE, Nordstrom or Revolve – does anyone else relate?

  • Wearing my Apple Watch actually makes me less productive, the constant buzzes and notifications distract me from getting my work done – does anyone else relate?

  • Almond milk is way better than oat milk – does anyone else relate?

What to look forward to in the next newsletter

  • How my Webflow experience is going as I'm trying to build our website (💀)

If you found anything in this newsletter helpful, I'd love to connect on Twitter – tweet me a screenshot of your favorite part and let's chat 👋

I'll be back next week with more lists!