Mac Martine

2x exited founder | DemandBird: Content pipelines that run across platforms for agencies & founders

Co-running Wildfront for bootstrapped SaaS builders

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

New here? Welcome!

Let me introduce myself:

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@Shpigford

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

BREAKING: AD AGENCIES ARE DEAD

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

AI makes us faster. It doesn't make us interesting.

When I put a basic prompt into AI and ask for a post, it writes something that is technically correct, but without character or personality, and is completely forgettable.

The model hasn't bootstrapped a business, or had to decide when to pivot, had customer conversations, or had to figure out how to pay the bills or where to invest back into a company.

But when I feed it a story, with beliefs, and properly guide it, AI becomes actually helpful and valuable. The problem is, many people have already come to expect AI to give back exactly what we imagine in our heads, but without willingness to give it proper direction and information.

Those accounts posting AI garbage content are skipping the hard part. Their going for a quick win, and it's not going to work, at least not for long.

They want the model to have opinions so they don't have to. It won't. You still have to know what you believe and why, and be willing to articulate that.

It takes experimentation, and time, but once you have a system, it's transformative. So much friction is removed.

AI is a great writing assistant to partner willing to train it just as you would an assistant. It's a terrible ghost writer.

What kind of content do you want to put out there?

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@levelsio @AndreyAzimov Totally agree with this. Also the stress caused by trying to beat the clock makes it hard to make good decisions.

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@Shpigford RIP EVERYTHING AND EVERYBODY

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

I wish I had thought of this earlier...

Having Claude generate plans/specs in HTML instead of Markdown keeps me much more sane.

And yes, we have a boatload of new free tools coming soon to help you with your content production for one or more platforms.

Even one to send you content ideas and publishing reminders once a week.

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@valsopi Have you been doing much Reddit?

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@valsopi You're getting there! Keep going!

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

Posting to multiple platforms doesn't mean posting the same thing to multiple platforms.

LinkedIn likes stories and more depth. X rewards conciseness. Threads has its own feel. Instagram captions are meant to support an image. And Bluesky doesn't have a definitive style yet, but posts are short and punchy. What works on LinkedIn won't work there.

The aspect ratios for assets are all different too.

If you're copy-pasting the same post everywhere (understandable, as adapting for each platform is a ton of work), it's often not even worth the time.

Here's a workflow that takes about 30 seconds:

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@AlexBoyd08 @coreyhainesco ⚡️

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

I'm one prompt, and 25 seconds in, guys.

We're done.

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

Having been building social media platforms since 2018, I've seen the pattern in what most people do early on that helps them stay consistent, and grow.

They define their content pillars. It keeps them on track with what to talk about, and it removes the blank screen issue, as they already know their categories to alternative between.

Here's the balance I often see:

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@noahkagan I'm so tired of fearing these platforms can destroy, or harm our business in a heartbeat at their discretion. Yet, it's so hard to build a business with zero valuable dependencies.

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@saasalecom Yep, that's exactly what we're solving for

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

Most social tools make you choose: bring your own content, or let AI write it for you.

One leaves you staring at a blank page, and expects you to make all the assets exactly as each platform demands. The other writes generic content that has nothing to do with you.

DemandBird believes humans with a smart, pro-active AI assistant beats humans or AI alone.

A good assistant doesn't replace you. They remove friction. They nudges you when you're stuck. They help you tell your story without telling a generic or hallucinated one.

We're early, and every conversation right now shapes where this goes. If this resonates, hit me up, I want to talk to you. Not about what we're building, but about where you could use some help.

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@victor_bigfield Do you have legit api access?

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

Well that's unfortunate.

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

@levelsio FWIW, we use @tryramp for this. It auto matches receipts from email.

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

Naw, promise, I'm not scared at all.

[Mac Martine @saasmakermac]

Remember what social media was only used by humans?