@MJ DeMarco just read your ITM newsletter and I want to push back slightly. Not on the framework, it's solid... but I think it's more nuanced than influence, training, and marketing. Hear me out.
Quick Recap
I'm 21, finishing my last semester at a state college, working remotely at a YC-backed B2B AI accounting startup. Did a lot of freelancing, learned sales, learned the whole dev cycle, landed a few clients myself, built a personal brand, hustled, etc. By all appearances I've been doing the right things. Networking. Building skills. Going to tech events. Recently drove to TechTO in Toronto. Great energy, smart people.
But after 4 years I re-read Unscripted and something cracked open. I think I've been playing the wrong game entirely.
"Founder" vs Entrepreneur
LinkedIn and the startup world sold me on "founder" as an identity. The personal brand. The raising funds. The networking. The Twitter thread about your journey.
But founder is a costume. A very broke costume. Entrepreneur is: find a real problem, find the specific people with that problem, earn their trust, get paid, repeat.
MJ, Here's the Nuance!
Your newsletter says the barrier to entry dropped and now you need Influence, Training, and Marketing to win.
You're right that training and data are the moat. Your civil engineering and used car examples are exactly correct. The value is the dark matter of the specific industry baked into the product.
But the Influence piece, the YouTube channel, the newsletter list... that's the B2C horizontal play. Build an audience, sell software to the audience in public. Valid. But it's also a performance game with better ROI math. I've talked people that tried this, it's not as clean as you think.
Here's what I think you missed: the barrier dropping created a second, opposite opportunity.
Every ambitious "builder" is rushing toward the visible, digitally legible markets. The ones on Apollo and Clay. The ones receiving cold emails. The ones reading newsletters about AI software strategy. But nobody is going the other direction.
The "Dark Market"
I used to work as an optometry tech. 1.5 years in a small practice in upstate NY.
I watched the front desk make manual recall calls one by one. I watched empty chairs sit unfilled because no-shows had no backfill system. I watched doctors stay late doing notes.
Last week I searched Apollo and Clay for independent optometry practices in the US. It returned about 1,500 results. There are approximately 20,000 independent optometry practices in the US.
18,500 practices have likely never received a cold email about scheduling software. They don't have a digital footprint large enough to show up in any prospecting tool. Their websites were built by phone book companies. They have fax numbers listed prominently.
Solutionreach, Weave, Demandforce, all healthcare SaaS companies fishing in the same 1,500 visible practices. Competing on features and price in a crowded pond.
Meanwhile 18,500 practices are probably untouched. That's the game.
The New Hard Thing
You're very right that coding is now a public park. Anyone can build.
But here's what didn't get easier when Claude Sonnet 4.6 came out:
Earning trust with people who've been burned by vendors. Showing up physically. Mailing actual letters to people. Embedding yourself deep enough in a vertical workflow to speak its language fluently. Doing the unglamorous Google Maps research that takes an afternoon and can't be automated. Integrating with their data and current software APIs. Adhering to compliance.
The barrier to building dropped to zero. The barrier to trust didn't move.
That's where I'm going.
What I'm Actually Building
I'm building optometry-specific scheduling and recall software. Not a horizontal healthcare tool skinned for optometry, something built from the ground up for how these practices run.
Next week I have a meeting with the doctor I used to work for, she's going to be my design partner.
Then I'm sending FedEx envelopes from my home address to practices I found on Google Maps and Yelp. Personal letter with a photo of me. Specific details about their practice I read on their website... because I actually read it.
The distribution strategy isn't digital. It's fax, physical mail, phone calls, showing up at CE events, getting into Optometry Society events.
Things that feel embarrassing in 2026. Things nobody my age would ever do.
That's the moat. Just the willingness to look uncool.
MJ's ITM Framework, Reframed
I — not Influence. Intimacy. Deep knowledge of a specific community and workflow that can't be faked.
T — Training data is right. The optometry ontology nobody has mapped.
M — not Mass marketing. Manual. The unsexy channel nobody uses because it doesn't scale.
The opportunity is in the places the wave hasn't reached yet.
The cream doesn't always rise. But sometimes it's just sitting in a practice a fax number and a 2004 website waiting for someone to actually show up.
So I'm gonna show up.
Quick Recap
I'm 21, finishing my last semester at a state college, working remotely at a YC-backed B2B AI accounting startup. Did a lot of freelancing, learned sales, learned the whole dev cycle, landed a few clients myself, built a personal brand, hustled, etc. By all appearances I've been doing the right things. Networking. Building skills. Going to tech events. Recently drove to TechTO in Toronto. Great energy, smart people.
But after 4 years I re-read Unscripted and something cracked open. I think I've been playing the wrong game entirely.
"Founder" vs Entrepreneur
LinkedIn and the startup world sold me on "founder" as an identity. The personal brand. The raising funds. The networking. The Twitter thread about your journey.
But founder is a costume. A very broke costume. Entrepreneur is: find a real problem, find the specific people with that problem, earn their trust, get paid, repeat.
MJ, Here's the Nuance!
Your newsletter says the barrier to entry dropped and now you need Influence, Training, and Marketing to win.
You're right that training and data are the moat. Your civil engineering and used car examples are exactly correct. The value is the dark matter of the specific industry baked into the product.
But the Influence piece, the YouTube channel, the newsletter list... that's the B2C horizontal play. Build an audience, sell software to the audience in public. Valid. But it's also a performance game with better ROI math. I've talked people that tried this, it's not as clean as you think.
Here's what I think you missed: the barrier dropping created a second, opposite opportunity.
Every ambitious "builder" is rushing toward the visible, digitally legible markets. The ones on Apollo and Clay. The ones receiving cold emails. The ones reading newsletters about AI software strategy. But nobody is going the other direction.
The "Dark Market"
I used to work as an optometry tech. 1.5 years in a small practice in upstate NY.
I watched the front desk make manual recall calls one by one. I watched empty chairs sit unfilled because no-shows had no backfill system. I watched doctors stay late doing notes.
Last week I searched Apollo and Clay for independent optometry practices in the US. It returned about 1,500 results. There are approximately 20,000 independent optometry practices in the US.
18,500 practices have likely never received a cold email about scheduling software. They don't have a digital footprint large enough to show up in any prospecting tool. Their websites were built by phone book companies. They have fax numbers listed prominently.
Solutionreach, Weave, Demandforce, all healthcare SaaS companies fishing in the same 1,500 visible practices. Competing on features and price in a crowded pond.
Meanwhile 18,500 practices are probably untouched. That's the game.
The New Hard Thing
You're very right that coding is now a public park. Anyone can build.
But here's what didn't get easier when Claude Sonnet 4.6 came out:
Earning trust with people who've been burned by vendors. Showing up physically. Mailing actual letters to people. Embedding yourself deep enough in a vertical workflow to speak its language fluently. Doing the unglamorous Google Maps research that takes an afternoon and can't be automated. Integrating with their data and current software APIs. Adhering to compliance.
The barrier to building dropped to zero. The barrier to trust didn't move.
That's where I'm going.
What I'm Actually Building
I'm building optometry-specific scheduling and recall software. Not a horizontal healthcare tool skinned for optometry, something built from the ground up for how these practices run.
Next week I have a meeting with the doctor I used to work for, she's going to be my design partner.
Then I'm sending FedEx envelopes from my home address to practices I found on Google Maps and Yelp. Personal letter with a photo of me. Specific details about their practice I read on their website... because I actually read it.
The distribution strategy isn't digital. It's fax, physical mail, phone calls, showing up at CE events, getting into Optometry Society events.
Things that feel embarrassing in 2026. Things nobody my age would ever do.
That's the moat. Just the willingness to look uncool.
MJ's ITM Framework, Reframed
I — not Influence. Intimacy. Deep knowledge of a specific community and workflow that can't be faked.
T — Training data is right. The optometry ontology nobody has mapped.
M — not Mass marketing. Manual. The unsexy channel nobody uses because it doesn't scale.
The opportunity is in the places the wave hasn't reached yet.
The cream doesn't always rise. But sometimes it's just sitting in a practice a fax number and a 2004 website waiting for someone to actually show up.
So I'm gonna show up.
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