Making people care about your startup: three archetypes

This Lenny’s Newsletter guest piece is by executive ghostwriter and narrative strategist Kristen Lowe (ex-Hinge; incoming Director of Founder & Editorial Communications at Scribe). It is not a playbook for viral hooks. It starts with a simpler question:

Why did you start this company?

In one sentence

Founder talking with users

It has never been easier to start a company — or harder to get anyone to care. AI makes idea-to-business faster than hiring one engineer, and floods X and LinkedIn with slop. Founder-led communication is still a low-cost, high-leverage way to earn attention and talent. The top reason founders hire ghostwriters is not hatred of writing. It is “I have no idea what to say.” Most people do not need to be vulnerable or contrarian in every post. They need a credible why.

Vision archetypes and movement energy

Three archetypes, three relationships

Every why is unique, but almost all map to one of three archetypes — and three audience feelings:

Archetype	Motivation	Audience feeling
Problem	Fix pain you were living	I identify with you
Insight	See a mispricing others missed	I trust you
Vision	Picture a world that does not exist yet	I would follow you

Your archetype sets goal, voice, messaging pillars, and success conditions. It does not answer “how often should I post?” Like a workout plan, the best channel and cadence is the one you can keep.

Choosing an archetype as an indie

Problem founder: make customers feel seen

You are this type if: the only way to get the problem solved was to do it yourself.

Goal: loyal customers who feel deeply understood.
Voice: personal, honest, detailed, appropriately urgent.
Core pillar: high-repetition, scene-based vignettes (the Taylor Swift method) — not “existing options failed,” but “I was crying in my car at lunch.” Secondary pillars: product design with personal origin stories; community stories from early users.

Avoid: market-gap CEO talk; oversharing your whole life.
Channels: long podcast interviews you can clip; community-forward social. X and panels rarely give room for the full story.
Signals: comments start sharing their experiences, not just “great post.”

Insight founder: make the audience feel smarter

Three founder archetype paths

You are this type if: you spotted a wrong assumption, broken process, or mispriced problem and moved to correct it.

Goal: followers who trust your read enough to adopt your ideas and believe in the company.
Voice: clear, analytical but accessible, curious, opinionated, generous.
Core pillar: regular, incisive industry thought leadership — credibility comes from being helpful more than being right every time. Extend with predictions and engagement with other thinkers.

Avoid: making people feel stupid; hot takes without reasoning; never admitting uncertainty.
Channels: long-form first (essays, newsletters, podcasts). LinkedIn favors conclusion-first posts and is an AI bloodbath — if you use it, prefer the newsletter feature. Short video distributes thinking; it does not replace it.
Signals: your language and reasoning show up in other people’s arguments.

Vision founder: make people want to join the movement

You are this type if: you see a fundamentally different future and the company is the vehicle to get people there. (Rarest type; many Insight founders inflate themselves into Vision.)

Goal: talent, customers, and investors invested in where you are going.
Voice: expansive, certain, hopeful, plainspoken.
Core pillar: repeat “X does not have to be true” — explain fairly why the status quo made sense, then offer a new belief. Vision needs concrete scenes (“never being late to pick up your kids because…”); milestones prove possibility.

Avoid: contempt for the status quo; making yourself the protagonist; talking scale instead of shape.
Channels: video and audio are almost required — conviction needs tone, cadence, and body language; keynotes, launches, clippable long video.
Signals: people describe your world back to you in their own words and champion the vision for you.

For indie products and small teams

Write your why first, then pick the archetype — do not copy someone else’s vulnerability persona.
Problem → scene stories; Insight → long reasoning; Vision → challenge assumptions + stage presence.
A cadence you can keep beats the perfect platform.
The more slop in the feed, the more honest, specific founder voice is worth.

Full notes in the second brain. Source: Lenny’s Newsletter.