u/Admirable-Staff-7367

context: CSE engineer, started thinking about PM about 8 months ago. spent a couple of months reading everything I could find, hit the same wall every aspiring PM hits: serious content sits behind paywalls (Lenny $150/yr, Reforge $2,000+) and what's free is ad-stuffed listicles ranking the same ten books on every site.

so I ended up writing my own prep stack as I went. 14 days ago I shipped it as a free site for anyone in a similar spot. wanted to share what's in it that's specifically interview-prep relevant, since this question comes up a lot here.

for the behavioral / product-sense round

• 30 essential PM books with original reviews, not back-cover summaries. meta-commentary on what each book actually teaches, who it's for, what gets commonly misread. Inspired, Hooked, Lean Startup, The Mom Test, Continuous Discovery Habits, etc. — the ones that show up in every recommendation thread.
• the reviews are honest about which books are worth deep reading vs which you can skim — useful when you have 2 weeks before an interview, not 2 years.

for case study / product-thinking rounds

• 65 long-form case studies (7 paragraphs each, not bullet listicles). real product decisions documented: Apple iPhone's keyboard call, Slack's pivot from gaming, Razorpay's payment gateway shift, Zerodha bootstrapping, BYJU'S downfall, Discord pivoting from gaming chat. when interviewers ask "tell me about a product decision you admire," you have real material instead of generic.
• includes a strong Indian set (Cred, Razorpay, Zerodha, BYJU'S, Paytm, Meesho, Swiggy, Nykaa) — important if you're interviewing at Indian companies or want to discuss markets beyond SV.

for general PM craft

• 18 curated YouTube playlists across design, data, product analytics, marketing — for when you'd rather watch than read.

what's not on it

• mock interview questions (this isn't a leetcode-for-PM site)
• formulaic "answer this framework" templates (PM interviews reward judgment, not formulas)
• paid courses or affiliate funnels

honest disclosures

• the prose is AI-assisted (Claude). I curate, structure, and edit. credited to "northstar editorial," not a fake personal byline.
• the only monetization is Amazon affiliate links on book pages.
• it's free. no signup wall, no email gate.

pmnorthstar.in

happy to share what helped me most for specific rounds (case study, behavioral, product sense) if anyone here is mid-prep.

solo Indian engineer here (CSE background). spent the last ~14 days building northstar, a free curated product management library. wanted to share since this community might find it useful.

what's on it

• 65 long-form case studies on real companies, both global (Apple, Spotify, Slack, Netflix, Figma, Stripe, Discord, Vercel, Loom) and Indian (Cred, Razorpay, Zerodha, BYJU'S, Paytm, Meesho, Swiggy, Slice, Nykaa, Cult.fit + 6 more). each one is a 7-paragraph deep dive on a specific decision, the pivot, the moat, the failure, the bet. not bullet listicles.
• 30 PM book reviews (Inspired, Hooked, Lean Startup, Hard Thing About Hard Things, etc.). reviews are deliberately not summaries. they're meta-commentary on what each book gets right, who it's actually for, what gets commonly misread, and whether the assumptions hold for PMs working in India. most PM books assume an SF context that doesn't always translate.
• 18 hand-picked YouTube playlists across design, data, marketing, branding, startups, finance.

no paywall, no signup wall, no display ads. Amazon affiliate links on book pages are the only monetization.

stack

Next.js 14 + Supabase + Tailwind + Claude Code. Claude wrote most of the actual code. I drove product decisions, structure, and editing. about to wire a self-hosted CMS so I can publish from a phone if my laptop dies.

why I'm posting here

this community has a lot of Indian engineers and builders. some of you are PMs, some are PM-curious, some are just interested in how Indian product companies actually got built. would love feedback from people in and around this space.

specifically: are the Indian case studies actually capturing the dynamics correctly? if you've worked at any of these companies and something reads wrong, please tell me. I'll fix it.

pmnorthstar.in

happy to share specifics on the stack, the editorial process, or the CMS I'm building.

what it is

A curated free product management resource — 65 long-form case studies, 30 essential PM book reviews with takeaways, 18 hand-picked YouTube playlists. All in one place. No paywall, no signup wall.

who it's for

PMs, founders, operators, and anyone trying to learn product management without dropping $150/year on Lenny's Newsletter or $2,000+ on Reforge.

the problem

Serious PM content lives behind paywalls. What's free is usually ad-stuffed listicles ranking the same ten books on every site, or YouTube videos that turn out to be 20-minute ads. There's no single curated place where someone new to product can land and actually learn for free, without trading their money upfront.

how it stands out

• 65 long-form case studies, not bullet listicles. 7-paragraph deep dives on Apple, Spotify, Cred, Razorpay, Zerodha, BYJU'S, Slack, Discord, Loom, Vercel. Each one documents a specific decision — the pivot, the moat, the failure, the bet — not a Wikipedia summary.
• 30 book reviews that are actually reviews. For each PM book (Inspired, Hooked, Lean Startup, Hard Thing, etc.) we wrote what the book gets right, who it's for, what gets commonly misread, and whether the assumptions hold for non-SV companies. Closer to a friend's honest take than a back-cover blurb.
• Strong Indian / global cross-context. Most PM content assumes the SF playbook. We wrote Indian case studies (Cred, Zerodha, Razorpay, Paytm, BYJU'S, Swiggy, Meesho, Slice, Nykaa + more) and reviewed every western PM book with a "what translates and what doesn't" lens.
• Honest about AI assistance. The prose is AI-assisted, the curation and editing is human. Credited to the brand, not a fake personal byline. We'd rather be upfront than do the trust-theater every other content site is doing in 2026.

stack

Next.js 14 + Supabase + Tailwind + Amazon Associates. Shipped solo in ~14 days. ~106 indexed pages, 96 on Vercel Speed Insights, full JSON-LD schemas, breadcrumbs, FAQs, OG images per page.

the honest part

Nailed engagement -> 41% bounce rate, 3 pages per visit, both well above industry average. But stuck at ~40 visitors a day. Site is built. still needs some work to build an audience.

what I'd love help with

1. For a content site without a paywall, what's the most underrated organic acquisition channel you've actually tried? (Planning Hacker News + subreddits + newsletter outreach this week.)
2. Should I focus the next 2 weeks on more content (20-30 more case studies) or distribution (Twitter/LinkedIn/Reddit + outreach)?
3. Anyone here grown a free curated resource site past 10k visitors/month without paid acquisition? What was the unlock?

Happy to share specifics on the build, the stack, or the editorial process if useful.

pmnorthstar.in

first time posting on reddit, be gentle.

CSE background but I've never actually shipped a real product solo before — work doesn't put me in front of Next.js / Supabase / SEO stuff day to day. So for the last ~2 weeks I used Claude Code to skip the learning curve and ship something end-to-end.

what I built: northstar — a free product management library. 65 long-form case studies, 30 book reviews with takeaways, 18 YouTube playlists. No paywall, no signup wall.

Claude wrote almost all the code (Opus 4 for architectural stuff, Sonnet for the quick stuff). I wrote all the content myself and acted as the product owner / annoying nitpicker.

the stack:

• Next.js 14 (App Router) on Vercel
• Supabase Postgres + Prisma for auth and saved items
• Tailwind for styling
• Substack embed for the newsletter
• Amazon Associates for affiliate links

what the workflow actually looked like:

• Describe what I wanted in plain english. Claude scaffolded the component. I iterated.
• Screenshots were the real unlock. "here's the home page, the cards feel cluttered, fit 5 per row" → it'd handle the CSS + grid + responsive collapse without me opening a single Tailwind doc.
• Worst moments were architectural drift. Once it removed all Wikipedia author photos and replaced them with initials circles because I said "make them consistent." I wanted consistency in the other direction. Easy fix once spotted but I could've missed it.

3 things that mattered (probably more than the code):

1. Real content from day one. Couldn't outsource that.
2. Catching scope creep. Claude kept wanting to build personal libraries, save dashboards, profile pages. I kept saying "no, ship what we have."
3. Infra hygiene — secrets rotation, sitemap correctness, OG images per page, breadcrumbs, JSON-LD schemas, custom 404, middleware. CSE training helped here, but only because I knew enough to ask "is this actually secure?"

pmnorthstar.in — happy to share specifics on any part of the build.

first time posting on reddit, be gentle.

CSE background but I've never actually shipped a real product solo before — work doesn't put me in front of Next.js / Supabase / SEO stuff day to day. So for the last ~2 weeks I used Claude Code to skip the learning curve and ship something end-to-end.

what I built: northstar — a free product management library. 65 long-form case studies, 30 book reviews with takeaways, 18 YouTube playlists. No paywall, no signup wall.

Claude wrote almost all the code (Opus 4 for architectural stuff, Sonnet for the quick stuff). I wrote all the content myself and acted as the product owner / annoying nitpicker.

the stack:

• Next.js 14 (App Router) on Vercel
• Supabase Postgres + Prisma for auth and saved items
• Tailwind for styling
• Substack embed for the newsletter
• Amazon Associates for affiliate links

what the workflow actually looked like:

• Describe what I wanted in plain english. Claude scaffolded the component. I iterated.
• Screenshots were the real unlock. "here's the home page, the cards feel cluttered, fit 5 per row" → it'd handle the CSS + grid + responsive collapse without me opening a single Tailwind doc.
• Worst moments were architectural drift. Once it removed all Wikipedia author photos and replaced them with initials circles because I said "make them consistent." I wanted consistency in the other direction. Easy fix once spotted but I could've missed it.

3 things that mattered (probably more than the code):

1. Real content from day one. Couldn't outsource that.
2. Catching scope creep. Claude kept wanting to build personal libraries, save dashboards, profile pages. I kept saying "no, ship what we have."
3. Infra hygiene — secrets rotation, sitemap correctness, OG images per page, breadcrumbs, JSON-LD schemas, custom 404, middleware. CSE training helped here, but only because I knew enough to ask "is this actually secure?"

pmnorthstar.in — happy to share specifics on any part of the build.