How Survivorship Bias Distorts Our Perception of Success

When we browse through Indie Hackers or any similar platform, we find ourselves immersed in a sea of success stories: individuals making $50k in monthly recurring revenue, or even selling their ventures for millions to larger companies. These stories are inspiring and captivating, drawing us in.

It’s no surprise that success stories attract attention and have a wide readership. After all, who doesn’t love a tale of triumph? However, what goes unnoticed are the failures, especially the grand ones. Failure often carries a strong emotional burden, making it difficult for individuals to openly discuss.

When someone does open up about their failures, it’s often framed within the context of a “soap opera sequence” – a narrative where a moderate failure serves as the starting point for a remarkable success story. This storytelling approach is a popular marketing strategy. Have you ever wondered why you receive “huge failure stories” or tales of childhood drama in your inbox? It’s because these stories help establish a connection with the reader, evoking sympathy and empathy for the individual who experienced such setbacks.

However, in the realm of reality, away from the carefully crafted success stories, failure is a topic we tend to avoid as much as we embrace success. We take both success and failure personally.

There are those who succeed in one area and believe they can replicate that success in every endeavor. They go as far as claiming they can teach others how to achieve the same results. Twitter is a prime example, where anyone with over 5k followers feels compelled to create a book or a course on gaining Twitter followers.

Similarly, when a startup founder becomes an advisor to other startups or an author writes a book on how to write great books after achieving success in their own work, we quickly notice the pattern of assuming expertise in a particular domain and offering guidance.

But what if their success was merely due to blind luck? Hard work alone doesn’t always guarantee positive outcomes. Maybe they were early adopters in a specific niche, or perhaps they struck a chord with their audience. It’s also possible that they stumbled upon the right formula for attracting SEO visitors.

However, future success is never guaranteed.

Take my own blog, for instance. I receive a significant amount of traffic from Google, but I can’t confidently say that if I were to start from scratch today, I would achieve the same level of success. While I may perceive myself as an expert in the SEO game due to the one million pageviews from Google last month, the truth is I lack real insights into what made it work. I can only speculate.

I enjoy offering advice to people interested in starting a blog or an online course. Yet, it’s important to recognize that what worked for me may not necessarily work for someone else.