DeveloPassion's Newsletter #160 - KM for beginners Pre-order
Edition 160 of my newsletter, discussing Knowledge Management, Knowledge Work, Zen Productivity, Personal Organization, and more!
Welcome
Another week, another newsletter! I hope that you all had a great one 🤩
Sorry for last week. I've been unable to find time to prepare and publish the newsletter. What a shame. But I'm with you now ❤️
I'm making good progress on my latest project, I'll share everything in the lab section below.
Apart from that, life is sweet. The sun is back, nature is adding beautiful colors again, and I'm feeling great. No better context to continue working towards my goals 🚀
I've finally decided to order an electric bike. I can't wait to receive it and wander all around Belgium ;-)
Alright, let's gooooo 🚀
Knowledge Management for Beginners now available for pre-order

I've focused my time and energy on the Knowledge Management for Beginners course. And I'm happy to announce that the course is now available for preorder. You can learn everything about in on the landing page I have created:

There is also a Gumroad product page with more details:
The course is not ready for prime time yet, but you can already pre-order a copy at the lowest price. If you do, you'll receive the course modules as they're getting produced. I don't want to set a hard deadline for various reasons, but I hope to deliver the whole course by the end of April.
I've worked hard on the sales copy to make it crystal clear and convincing. My goal is to convey the most important ideas about Knowledge Management and Personal Knowledge Management as simply as possible, and to enable as many people as possible to understand the benefits and long-term impact these practices can bring.
I'll regularly share news about my progress 🚀
The lab 🧪
I've focused mostly on the marketing and sales sides for the KM for Beginners course. It's far from trivial, and I realize that it's where I have failed with my previous projects. As I have mentioned a few weeks ago, I did prepare a detailed outline and started working on the content, which means that I have a very clear idea about what I want to deliver. But I am now convinced that the second most important step is to convince others of the value I am going to bring to the table. That's why I have worked on the marketing plan, sales copy and on the landing page. This will help me raise interest and truly validate the idea. This means that I won't spend months working hard only to realize that nobody cares.
Preparing this side of the project is quite involved:
- Identifying the target audience
- Identifying the persona corresponding to each target
- Clearly stating the problems that need a solution and the associated pain points
- Explaining the solution I will deliver
- Listing the features
- Explaining the benefits
- Defining the pricing
- Thinking about potential offers, promotions, upsells, etc
- ...
And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Preparing the marketing plan also involves preparing a detailed communication plan: blog posts, tweets/threads, videos, ads, etc. Those will require some more work, but will ultimately make the difference between a quiet launch and one where people can't wait for me to deliver the content.
On the technical side, there are also quite a lot to set up, but most of that is already done:
- Acquiring the domain name
- Configuring the DNS servers to point to Cloudflare
- Pointing the domain to Carrd
- Creating the landing page, adding images, anchors, links, animations
- Creating the product page on Gumroad, customizing the homepage, adapting existing product bundles
- Adding and configuring analytics using Plausible
- ...
And there's more coming 🥱
Once I'm done with the initial marketing effort, I'll go back to creating the content.
New articles
I have recently published an article about the benefit of setting achievable goals. It's not about aiming lower/dampening your hopes and dreams, but rather about focusing on manageable sub-goals along the way. This has many benefits that I discuss in the article:

Quotes of the week
- "The difference between an employee and an entrepreneur is control over your potential" — Dan Koe
- "An inch of movement will bring you closer to your goals than a mile of intention"
Thinking and learning
I recently stumbled on this article by Lembran Sar, who tracked his daily life for ten years. In it, he shares some of the benefits he got from doing this for such a long time. As you probably know, journaling is one of the practices I consider really important and impactful in my life. While I don't want to spend a ton of time each day tracking everything that happens to me, I do see the value of at least keeping track of important achievements, ideas, discoveries and life events.
I've also enjoyed this article by Barbara Fillip, discussing the close relationship between Knowledge Management and Personal Knowledge Management. As he mentions, there is no Knowledge Management without Personal Knowledge Management, and no Personal Knowledge Management without Knowledge Management:
In the following video, Zsolt Viczián introduces and highlights the value of concept diagrams. Concept diagrams are part of my top 10 ways to explore new topics, make sense of ideas and build solid mental models:
Do you retain a lot of what you read? If not, then you might enjoy these articles:


Are you frustrated by your lack of progress or success? Then check out this inspirational video by Jim Rohn:
About Sébastien
I'm Sébastien Dubois, and I'm on a mission to help knowledge workers escape information overload. After 20+ years in IT and seeing too many brilliant minds drowning in digital chaos, I've decided to help people build systems that actually work. Through the Knowii Community, my courses, products & services and my Website, I share practical and battle-tested systems. You can follow me on X 🐦 and on BlueSky 🦋.
I am an author, founder, and coach. I write books and articles about Knowledge Work, Personal Knowledge Management, Note-taking, Lifelong Learning, Personal Organization, and Zen Productivity. I also craft lovely digital products.
If you want to follow my work, then become a member and join our community.
Ready to get to the next level?
If you're tired of information overwhelm and ready to build a reliable knowledge system:
- 🎯 Join Knowii and get access to my complete knowledge transformation system
- 📚 Take the Course and Master Knowledge Management
- 🚀 Start with a Rock-solid System: the Obsidian Starter Kit
- 🦉 Get Personal Coaching: Work with me 1-on-1
- 🛒 Check out my other products and services. These will give you a rock-solid starting point for your note-taking and Knowledge Management efforts
