TLDR Founders · STRATEGIES & TACTICS

THE LIGHTHOUSE PLAYBOOK

a16z.substack.com6 min read

Summary from the TLDR Founders newsletter

In environments of abundance, the strongest signal isn't what you broadcast - it's what others say about you. This playbook flips standard growth advice: instead of building your brand, find people already on your team who are respected in networks you care about and invest in building their brands. Not influencer marketing - the opposite. Linear tells the world something about you because of how it positions craft. Stripe didn't say "payment processing" - they said "increasing the GDP of the internet. AI has lowered the cost of building products toward zero, but it hasn't done anything to change the cost of attracting people to you.