🏠 This is the new Homescreen

In partnership with

GM! It’s Brett again. HOMESCREEN FRIENDS!! Exciting news today.

I'm trying out a brand new format and focus for the newsletter - how to be 100x more productive with 100x less work.

A few years ago I observed that the way we've been talking about productivity has been wrong and damaging. The glorification of Inbox Zero is one of many examples of beliefs that I believe aren't based on outcomes but rather status signaling.

Productivity should be about getting more done in less time so you can do other things in work and life. This is why I started Micro, an AI-powered productivity tool that keeps you organized so you don't have to be, and it's why we're transitioning Homescreen to center around this same topic.

This is the first edition! Would love your feedback.

Big investors are buying this “unlisted” stock

When the founder who sold his last company to Zillow for $120M starts a new venture, people notice. That’s why the same VCs who backed Uber, Venmo, and eBay also invested in Pacaso.

Disrupting the real estate industry once again, Pacaso’s streamlined platform offers co-ownership of premier properties, revamping the $1.3T vacation home market.

And it works. By handing keys to 2,000+ happy homeowners, Pacaso has already made $110M+ in gross profits in their operating history.

Now, after 41% YoY gross profit growth last year alone, they recently reserved the Nasdaq ticker PCSO.

Invest for $2.90/Share

_{Paid advertisement for Pacaso’s Regulation A offering. Read the offering circular at invest.pacaso.com. Reserving a ticker symbol is not a guarantee that the company will go public. Listing on the NASDAQ is subject to approvals.}

🚀 PLAYBOOK - Turn Your LinkedIn Reply Guys into Warm Leads

The majority of founders I know are turning to LinkedIn for sales, and companies like Pylon show how powerful it can be, building meaningful pipeline almost entirely through LinkedIn-focused approaches.

LinkedIn drives 277% higher lead conversion rates than Facebook and Twitter combined. And for B2B specifically, 80% of social media leads come from LinkedIn, making it the clear winner for quality lead generation.

The problem is: most founders either burn time sending manual DMs or risk their accounts with unsafe automation. The real unlock is turning engagement, the people liking, commenting, and replying, into warm conversations.

I’ve been using Valley for months to do exactly this, end to end. But just came across this interesting article about how to stitch it together with HeyReach + Trigify (and Clay for enrichment), here’s the DIY version 👇

1. Capture the right signals
You need a way to listen when someone engages with posts your ICP follows.

• Trigify does this. It tracks signals like “connection accepted,” “post liked,” or “comment left.”

2. Automate safe outreach
Once the signal is captured, you want the system to send a connection note or follow-up without tripping LinkedIn’s alarms.

• HeyReach handles this. It’s built with proxy rotation + daily caps so you don’t burn accounts.

3. Personalize at scale
Generic messages kill acceptance rates. Add a layer that pulls in context about what they wrote or engaged with.

• Clay generates personalized icebreakers (e.g., “Just read your post on async meetings. I think if you turned that framework into a short Loom playbook for your team, you’d probably cut 30–40% of recurring calls. Want me to share how another SaaS team used this to save 12 hrs a week?”).

4. Sync it all together

• Trigify detects the signal (e.g., someone liked your last post).

• HeyReach sends a friendly connection note.

• Clay adds personalization so it feels human.

• If they accept or engage again, the system sends the right next step

The result

Instead of spamming 200 cold prospects, you’re having warm conversations with the 50 who already raised their hand. Safe, scalable, and repeatable.

For the full technical walkthrough (account setup, API keys, trigger creation), check the original blog here → How to connect HeyReach + Trigify for smarter LinkedIn outreach

💥 21 things founders should know about getting acquired

I worked on Google's M&A team when we were doing 40+ acquisitions a year and here’s the no-BS reality for founders:

1. Your team will likely have to pass interviews at the new company, so hire well.

2. Every time your valuation increases, the number of potential acquirers decreases.

3. Deals that come in through the corp dev team have a <1% success rate, so talk to actual product people.

4. Build relationships with product teams years in advance of a potential acquisition.

5. Your largest customers and partners are the best potential acquirers.

6. M&A is a FOMO game, so it's good to play acquirers off each other (when you are legally able to).

7. The deal isn't over until the $$ is in the bank (lots of deals dying very far along these days).

8. Don't let your team know you're running a process until the very end. they'll leak the news or become wildly unproductive when they find out and even more unproductive when the deal falls through.

9. The best time to get acquired is when you don't need to or want to be.

10. When you talk to acquirers, you need to show them how you will supercharge their product/business – this can involve actual design and code.

11. Full acquisition prices you see in the headlines often come with strings attached – usually integration, revenue/user growth, and employee retention milestones.

12. Decide with your cofounder what the conditions would be (e.g., $$) for you to accept an acquisition offer before you have your first conversation. cofounder misalignment here can really really hurt.

13. Running a fundraiser at the same time as an M&A process can help both – buyers can offer more if your fundraising options are good and investors love to see real exit opportunities.

14. There are 3 types of deals: acquihire (just the team), asset (just the tech), and full (entire company, team & assets).

15. Acquihires can range from just getting a normal job (and the ability to say you were "acquired") to also including $10M+ payouts. don't trust folks bragging about getting acquihired because it's usually the former.

16. Your liquidation preferences will largely determine your financial outcome. your investors get their money back before you get your payout from an acquisition, so if you've raised a lot (on bad terms) and you don't have traction, you're probably not going to make much at all.

17. Some acquirers will hold back equity you've already vested as part of the deal. some will accelerate unvested equity AND throw in retention bonuses.

18. Falling into depression after an acquisition is not uncommon. take care of your mental health and make friends who have gone through it.

19. Make sure you're clean legally and financially. investing in good bookkeeping early on can save you tons of time and prevent your deal to get derailed.

20. Acquisitions have complex personal tax consequences. hire someone good for that.

21. The best acquired founders at Google only stayed an average of 2.5 years before leaving to start their next thing. life isn't over after you sell!!

🛠️ THE DROP

⚙️ Zivy helps you tracks conversations across all your Slack channels & brings important stuff to one dashboard.

😳 Why Most SDRs Will Be AI SDRs In 2026+ 
AI SDRs don’t just work faster, they actually know the product. At SaaStr and across portfolio companies, bots now answer 87% of technical questions vs. 15% for humans.

‼️ Why AI Labs Are Starting to Look Like Sports Teams
Compute is abundant, but talent rivalinge. Star researchers now sign deals rivaling pro athletes, short-term, high-stakes, and always poachable.

❓ Are we ready for AI sales reps? (Sequoia)
RB2B swapped its sales-assist team for a $99 AI avatar. In 3 weeks it handled 1,700 chats, 300+ demo requests, and 98 SOC2 docs.

👀 Why ChatGPT will be the next big growth channel (and how to capitalize on it) | Brian Balfour

🧠 The Shape of the Essay Field (Paul Graham)

🎯 THE 80 / 20

Simple tricks to get a ton of value with minimal effort for work and life.

Email Template Shortcuts
If you send any version of a repeat email (scheduling, intros, investor updates), create a “snippet” in Superhuman/FlyMSG or use Gmail canned responses. Deploy with two keystrokes.

Monthly “Nuke/Pause” Ritual
Every end of the month, audit every app, subscription, or tool you used. Didn’t use it? Hit “pause/cancel,” downgrade, or remove the account.

Clipboard Manager
Use Raycast’s clipboard history to instantly paste your last 20 copied messages, links, code snippets, or intros.

Camcorder Method
Whenever you perform a recurring task, onboarding an employee, reviewing a contract, giving product design feedback, screen record yourself doing it as if you’re training your future replacement.

Voice-to-Text Everywhere
Instead of typing, just speak. Tools like Superwhisper turns every text box on Mac or iOS into fast, accurate voice-to-text for emails, notes, Slack, and everything.

😂 FROM THE FEED

Homescreen is a collaboration between Micro and Launch House Ventures

Micro is a CRM that doesn’t feel like homework and an email client that knows what matters. Simply put, it’s an all-in-one productivity tool that organizes itself so you don’t have to.

LHV is a community-driven, early-stage venture fund backing ambitious founders at the earliest stages.

REACH 40K+ FOUNDERS, INVESTORS & OPERATORS

If you’re building tools that help founders, investors and other professionals who want to be 100x more productive with 100x less work, and you’re interested in advertising with us, send an email over to [email protected] with the subject “Homescreen Ads”