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The most sophisticated growth team no one talks about: @WishShopping
1. The #1 shopping app in 40+ countries
2. Rumored to often be the #1 spender on FB and Google
3. 2 million items sold daily

I sat down with @cplimon to learn about the notoriously secretive company. Read on 👇

 1/ Your brand constraint is Wish's opportunity

Wish's superpower is leaving no room for taste or opinion. It's what happens when a machine builds a company based on data. The founder didn't plan to sell cheap goods to low-socioeconomic customers, but where the data took him.
"Until you work at a place like Wish, you don't know what data-driven is. Everyone else is data-driven when it's convenient, when it agrees with your opinions. Wish is great at ignoring their own emotions. It's data-driven with as much intellectual honesty as possible."
For example https://t.co/ZFgEbFisGO
2/ Differentiate by serving the under-served

Most of Wish’s initial sales came from places like Florida, greater LA county, and middle-America. Specifically, zip codes with 95% Spanish speakers. Later, Africa, Latin America and Eastern Europe (avg household income $18,000/year)
"Wish sales grew in cities everyone else ignored, we didn't care what our friends or VCs thought, we blindly listened to the data."
3/ Think full-funnel

Even though Wish grew primarily through paid ads, they recognized they also had a perception problem. e.g. The top Google search result for Wish was "is Wish a scam." So they invested in brand campaigns, partnering with respected brands.
"The Lakers were the most prestigious sports brand in the world, and the greater LA area was Wish's top market. I did the deal the year they didn't make the playoffs, so it was priced low, and Magic promised me we'd get a big-time star next year...which turned out to be Lebron"
4/ Play to your leadership strengths

The founder, Peter, is the Michael Jordan of growth & performance marketing. He understands how every moving piece impacts every other piece. But with that, he maintains complete control of what everyone does at the company.
"If Peter said to do it, no one got in your way. No one knows what other teams are working on. Only Peter was allowed to connect dots between teams. The benefit is there is no bureaucracy – shit got done, fast. The downside is it's not for everyone."
5/ Hack the flywheel

Wish started as a free wishlisting product (get it?), and with that acquired a ton of free demand. They then went to the merchants of the most wishlisted products (in China), and offered this demand to them if they would sell their products on the platform.
"Now with the supply, we raised a bunch of money and threw it at Facebook ads to sell out the supply. The merchants were happy, so we were able to acquire more supply, which helped convert demand at a higher rate, and the flywheel began."
6/ Become the *best* at your growth channel

Wish helped invent what is now one of the most significant products within Facebook ads: Dynamic Product Ads. This gives companies the ability to upload a giant list of product SKUs, which FB pulls from to run ads dynamically.
"You can upload giant lists of products, and FB figures out which ones perform best and who to show them to. We also helped FB invent a feature where you can automatically overlay produce prices over on the product ad image, which we dynamically tested."
7/ Other wild factoids:
* Efficiency: Probably had a record of GMV to headcount ratio, several million GMV per employee for a long time
* The right timing: Wish was possible because of the combination of growth of smartphones + emergence of FB ads + Peter's unique skillset
* Acquisition offers: Both Amazon and FB tried to buy Wish
* Stunts: Wish also sponsored the Mayweather/MacGregor fight, and some of the world's most successful soccer players
https://t.co/VavQ59kUl4
8/ For more, definitely follow @cplimon

More from Lenny Rachitsky

Lenny Rachitsky
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I'm excited to share a new growth framework that @danhockenmaier and I have been developing (with help from the amazing @reforge crew)

I've been finding myself coming back to this framework often when talking to founders about growth.

Thread

1/ As a startup, it's essential that you, and your team, have a clear understanding of how your business is likely to grow. We call this building a Growth Model. With this, you'll know which growth investments to make right away, which to avoid, and which to double-down on.

2/ Our advice is to think about your business like a high-performance race car. The same four components that help a car drive faster also help your business grow:


1. ⚙️ The (Growth) Engine: Self-sustaining growth loops that drive most of your growth (e.g. virality, perf marketing, content, sales)

2. 💥 Turbo boosts: One-off events that accelerate growth temporarily but don’t last (e.g. PR, events, Super Bowl ads)

3. 💧 Lubricants: Optimizations that make the growth engine run more efficiently (e.g. improved conversion, a stronger brand, higher customer retention).

4. ⛽ Fuel: The input that your engine requires to run (e.g. capital, content, users).
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Lenny Rachitsky
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Matt Mochary has been CEO coach to @naval, the founders of OpenAI, Notion, Rippling, Robinhood, Coinbase, Reddit, Plaid, Flexport, Opendoor, partners at Sequoia, YC, Benchmark, and many others.

He also open-sourced his entire curriculum, templates and all. Here's a link 👇


The Mochary Method Curriculum ➔ https://t.co/A8J51IzYhz

My recent conversation with @mattmochary where we talk about fear, anger, innovation, how to lay people off well, and his coaching practice ➔

Also in podcast form ➔

For more from Matt, buy this book
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Lenny Rachitsky
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@lennysan
If you want to get better at writing, do yourself a favor and subscribe to this free email series by @david_perell. I read every issue and take something away each time. Often, something game-changing. And it’s
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Lenny Rachitsky
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@lennysan
How do you prioritize a roadmap?

First, take a step back and remember that a business is just a group of people solving problems for other people in exchange for money. Your job is to (1) figure out the problems, and (2) solve them in the most efficient way possible. Thread 👇

1/ Step 1: Figure out the problems -- get the ground truth:
* Talk to customers
* Talk to employees who talk to customers (CX, sales)
* Observe your customer's behavior, through data and user research
* Use the product yourself
* Look into what caused users to churn

2/ Step 2: Solve problems in the most efficient way possible -- least work for most impact:
* Develop hypotheses around what you believe will solve the problems
* Ideate solutions to these hypotheses (see link)
* Put these ideas into a spreadsheet

3/ Rate each idea from 1-5 across two attributes: (1) Impact: How impactful it'll be in solving the problem, and (2) Effort: How much work it'll take to execute. Guesstimate -- what matters most is relative differences.
* Sort the spreadsheet by ratio of Impact / Effort, discuss

4/ How do you estimate Impact?
Every decision is somewhere along this spectrum:
Gut <--------------------> Complete data
Knowing this, use all of the data at your disposal (quant, qual), plus your team's experience, to inform the estimate. You are smart people, trust yourselves.
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Lenny Rachitsky
Lenny Rachitsky
@lennysan
Earlier today, I gave a talk at the @SubstackInc's writer conference about building a writing habit. Below are the ten concrete strategies I shared that have helped me publish a post every week for 1.5 years 👇

0/ First of all, just sharing advice about this topic gives me serious impostor syndrome because writing is still pretty new to me, and I have much to learn. But these are things that have helped me, and I hope they'll help you.

1/ Strategy 1: Commit publicly

This was maybe 50% of my initial motivation. Having told people I was going to write weekly made me feel bad when even thinking about skipping a week. It gave me just enough nudge to keep


1b/ You don't need to make this super public. Just sending an email to a few friends regularly with your concrete goals about writing (and anything else) works wonders.


1c/ If you *really* want to be motivated, ask people for money. Nothing motivates you more than people paying you for regular
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@DefenseNigeria
Once again the nighmarish scenario of the Nigerian military not only decimating Boko Haram, but going after ISWAP in the Lake Chad basin has triggered the same sort of activities that preceded the March/April 2020 false flag Maskirovska.


In the early months of 2020 the Nigerian Army recorded unexpectedly significant gains against Boko Haram insurgents. Remember this was the period Boko Haram insurgents were surrendering to the Nigerian army by the hundreds. Who remembers the audio tape of Abubakar Shekau

...weeping to Allah/God for intervention. This was the first time Field artillery troops coordinated with the NAF for round the clock air and artillery bombardment. This affected the morale of BHTs who have never experienced this level of firepower and began surrendering en mass

Things got so bad Shekau sent assassination squads to go after BHT commanders surrendering. This did nothing to deter the exodus of frightened fighters. The army was having a hard time processing the hundreds surrendering. A BHT commander surrendered with his wife and children.

What happened next? Boko Haram supposedly attacked a Chadian Army base, a few kilometres from U.S and French military bases for NINE straight hours. Killed 100 Chadian troops and escaped on canoes with caches of weapon. Think about it. For nine hours the vaunted Chadian army
WORLD
SeunOkin Channels tv
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#endsars #endpolicebrutality

Dear Friends,

On a rather deeper look at things, Police brutality is the topmost of the agitation but the anger and fury is deeper, bottled up for many years. An oppression our fathers have endured and the children now say No More, Enough is Enough!

In the context of the current scenario “SARS” has become a metaphor.

“SARS” in our society today represents all the inefficiencies, corruption, structural imbalances, faults and All the shenanigans of the Political class

If this present fury does not inspire an overhaul of the Nigerian system, then we may be headed for another restless round of 60 year of disastrous merry go round. This Nation needs a RESET NOW!!

It’s a good time to negotiate the fixing of this great Nation.

How long do we keep singing; Nigeria has great potentials? Let those potentials start working for good

If we must tell our selves the bitter truth as a people we urgently need to fix these;

* A drastic cut in cost of governance
* Federal Ministers shouldn’t be more than 10

* Remove the lofty attraction in public office
* Reduce the powers of the centre and decentralize reasonably
* Fix our defective constitution
* Reset the civil service
* Create regional economic/developmental competition
* Allow states to explore their resources/endowment
WORLD
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Hedwig Kuijpers
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🔴🔴Syria's Kurds ready to get in bed with their worst

Last week, SDC's rep. Sihanouk Dibo stated that they would announce the signing of a new memorandum of understanding with a Syrian opposition party. Yesterday, Ilham Ahmed said that they are planning to hold a national conference for all Syrian opposition forces this year...

These rapprochements might be applauded by Western powers that advocate for regime change, but are disturbing for people in the region. After all, these are the same forces the Kurds have been fighting off for years, and that have taken large swats from the lands they held.

Areas such as Ras al-Ayn, Afrin, Tal Abyad and Suluk, which were previously under Kurdish control, have been violently taken and occupied by the same ‘Syrian opposition’ the SDC now wants to cooperate with.

Dozens – if not hundreds – of civilians and Kurdish fighters were killed in these clashes, and I can only imagine how the families of the victims of these radical groups will feel about the prospect of cooperation with their killers.
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Phestos Tosin
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@phestostosin94
With historical Data and explanations, I will want to DISAGREE with what you said here ma'am Or at Least Reframe what you said because what you said can be used to refer to a lot of scenarios.

Who are the "Citizens of Nigeria" you claim are not ready because they are...
(/1)


Not demanding good governance?.

If by this you mean the Vast majority of Nigerians that are in the lower class should demand for good governance, then I hope you know this can never be effective.

Why?

It is virtually impossible for the lower class citizens to gather and...

Demand for good governance. What do they know that they want to demand? The few among them that are "enlightened" will have their voices drown out by the many that are not. I hope you know that there will always be the ignorant, evil men (hired assassin, political thugs) and also

Good men, the proportion of good men to the ignorants and evil men in this social class is low. Therefore l, gathering to something meaningful will be low.

How will they even gather? Through elections? I also hope you know that the wicked political leaders will not just fold...

Their arms and not defend their rulership from being overthrown. They will surely sow misinformation, spread lies aimed at misleading the masses. This particular social class, that are also numerous will be easy to swallow such lies and cajoled. Buhari was sold to us as a...
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\u092e\u093e\u0927\u0935
माधव...
@ob_serv_er
German farmers are in revolt, but lack global ‘liberal’ lobby support, unlike India: Here are 3 reasons why?

https://t.co/JuFiBHYYYK via @OpIndia_com

German govt brought in a new “insect protection law.” It 'll curb d use of certain pesticides to save insect populations from collapsing. But many German farmers insist that these laws 'll destroy their livelihood. Or as they put it more succintly,“don’t kill farms to save bugs.”

To make their statement, German farmers even brought their tractors to the historic Brandenburg Gate in Berlin. Sound even more familiar?

Nobody tried to seize symbols of German state power and plant alternative flags. Also, nobody used swords against police personnel nor tried to chase them into a ditch. Such losers I tell you, those Germans. They don’t understand how “peaceful protest” is really done.

But I cannot help wonder. As Rihanna would say, why aren’t people talking about this? What happened to humanitarian liberal media all around the world and their supposed reverence for farmers? Don’t the “annadatas” of Germany deserve some love?
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Gather round, Gentle Readers. It is time I tell the story of the worst decision I ever made in an office. Some of you have heard this. Some have not. Whatever you do in your office today, this week, the rest of this year, you can console yourself by recalling this tale.

A long time ago, I was a talent agent. I worked for a woman named Susan Smith, who had her own small boutique agency. She was known for three things:

1. She had fantastic taste in clients. If there is someone you admire, odds are good that at some point, she was their agent,

2. She could negotiate a deal like few who have ever trod the earth. Casting would give her all the money they had budgeted for that part, plus a little more, plus promising to get her dog Barnaby groomed. She was magnificent to watch.

3. She was insane.

I'm sure you're thinking, "Quinn, it's the entertainment industry, they are all insane." Yes, many are. So consider this; if you told someone you worked for Susan, people who worked for insane people would look and you and whisper, "I hear she's insane."
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An interesting set of games that I've been vaguely interested in since I was a kid, after seeing one at a friend's house and never being able to find it again, was the BATTLES IN A DISTANT DESERT/BATTLES ON DISTANT PLANETS series.


These are turn-based wargames for windows 3.x, sharing the same engine.
Battles in a Distant Desert is from 1992, and is based on the first Iraq war (Desert Storm)


and Battles on Distant Planets is from 1991, and takes place in SPACE!
I'm pretty sure this is the one I played as a kid.


They've got 3 options to play with:
* Player vs. Player
* Player vs. Computer
* Computer vs. Computer

So it's a 0-2 player game!


They also did a DOS strategy game called "STARDATE 2140.2: GALACTIC CONQUEST" in 1990, but it seems to be lost.
All the games share an experimental AI system based on neural networks.
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So I was talking to @gewt about Job: A Comedy of Justice and I came up with a theory that I think explains why Heinlein's late-period work is so kinda-terrible and why I still enjoy it so much


So Heinlein had always been very interesting in the short parts of his novels, like the little snippets inside chapters. He had a very fun writing style, and wrote some fun dialogue with fun characters, right?>
It probably comes from how much of his early stuff was short fiction

And I think what happened with a lot of his longer works is that he'd just start writing fun bits and hope it would end up going somewhere or having a bigger plot by the end. like eventually he'd figure out where this was going, then go back and rewrite it into a cohesive whole

and I'm sure he had editors that'd help this process. No editor would let you publish something as rambly and changing-gears-every-other-chapter as The Number Of The Beast, for example... unless you were God-King Of Science Fiction 1980s Robert Heinlein.

so basically I think what happened is that by the 80s (when he was in his seventies!!) he lost the drive to go back and rewrite and he was too Untouchable for editors to make him.
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This is my son, Sam. He’s 5. And today he learned how shitty and harmful #ToxicMasculinity is. My rage meter is spiking right now so excuse me if this is a little raw but there are some things I want to say about BS #gender norms (a thread)


Sam is my middle child & he’s a terror. A “boy’s boy” as so many (not me) would say. He’s rough and tumble, he’s loud, he’s always dirty, loves trucks, plays sports and knee drops me from the couch. But he also loves a lot of “girl” things.

Sam has a collection of purses because he likes to carry things around. And he also loves to have his nails painted bright colors because he thinks they “look beautiful.” And he’s right – they are beautiful…


So he proudly wore his red nail polish to kindergarten this morning because Sam has absolutely no concept of nail polish only being for girls or reason to think anyone would possibly have a problem with beautiful nails.


But his classmates did have a problem. A big one. Sam was ridiculed for being a boy with nail polish. They called him names and told him to take it off. This lasted the entire day.
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Paul M Domenick\U0001f43a
Paul M Domenick🐺...
@PaulMDomenick
10 Signs of Social Intelligence 🧠

1-Smile
2-Good posture
3-Strong eye contact
4-Fluid hand gestures
5-Let’s others talk more
6-Listens & relates
7-Comfortable Touching people
8-Walk with a swagger
9-Speaks at slower pace
10-Keeps calm under criticism

[ QUICK THREAD ]


1-Smile

How do you feel when you see someone that looks angry?

It’s a downer

No one will want to interact with you if you look pissed all of the time, it’s just negative energy

Plus, smiling is a sign of confidence and boosts others moods


2-Good posture

Don’t walk Into any social setting looking like the hunchback

It’s weak and makes you look low energy

Plus, you’re displaying low status with weak posture

Stand up straight with your chin up & chest out like a god

Walk like you’re proud of yourself


3- Strong eye contact

Ever shake someone’s hand & their eyes are either looking down or darting?

It’s weak & you probably won’t trust them

Or in conversation?

Eye contact while talking means you’re listening and paying *Attention*

Strong eye contact displays confidence


4-Fluid hand gestures

Use your hands to talk & express your points

Don’t stand there like a robot

Using the hands can make what you’re talking about exciting

It can also be used to emphasize

Exciting = positive emotion

Remember, making people FEEL is what’s important
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