Nikola Balić

AI obsessed Developer Marketer who ships code, content, communities and experiments

🚀 Why not now?

For the past two years at Daytona, I've led a dev-first GTM, expanding the brand's presence across every README, conference corridor, and Slack thread. I've learned that the strongest developer brands don't pitch; they permeate. They saturate every interaction with substance and ship solutions—docs, code snippets, replies—at a greater velocity than their deployments.

I believe in shipping fast and learning by doing. At Daytona, I ran 50+ GTM experiments, took on the tech giants in their own backyard, and built a community of developers who actually care about what we're building. Now I'm ready to bring that same energy to tackle new challenges and drive growth for innovative technical products.

20K+
GitHub stars (0→20K in 2 years)
3x
Product Hunt launches (#1, 2x #2)
51
Domain rating (from 0)
8K+
Developer community built
5
Launch Weeks

💼 My recent rides

Head of Growth at Daytona
2023-2025
  • Led entire PLG and GTM strategy for developer tools startup competing with GitHub Codespaces, Gitpod, and Coder
  • Initiated complete positioning pivot from "cloud development environments" to "AI runtimes" based on experiments I ran and market research
  • Built multi-channel content engine: 200+ technical pieces, developer-first documentation, video tutorials
  • Launched OSS bounty program that turned users into contributors (and advocates)
  • Used analytics extensively to track our open source product usage and optimize our new AI sandbox SaaS
  • Grew social presence: 5.3K LinkedIn, 4K X, 700 YouTube subscribers (all organic)

🛠️ Recent GitHub Activity

While leading growth, I stayed technical. Check out my recent projects at github.com/nibzard:

  • Built awesome-agentic-patterns: curated catalogue of agentic AI patterns
  • Created agentprobe: tool to test how well AI agents interact with CLI tools
  • Built claude-threads: lightweight web viewer for Claude Code conversations
  • Created Daytona MCP Interpreter: Model Context Protocol server for Python code execution in ephemeral Daytona sandboxes
  • Created GitHub stargazers analysis platform that transforms repository stars into actionable business intelligence
  • Built LLMDB: time-aware, schema-rewritable, WASM-powered memory store for autonomous agents
  • Created AI enablement stack: community-driven mapping of AI development tools
Growth Lead at Codeanywhere
2022-2023
  • Reactivated dormant user base for developer IDE preparing for acquisition
  • Sent 30M+ emails with 25%+ open rate on 1M deliveries—proving you can do developer email marketing without being annoying
  • Implemented data-driven growth experiments focusing on user reactivation and retention
  • Helped position company for next investment round through improved metrics
CEO & Founder at Pulent now Disequi
2018-Present
  • Single person boutique advisory specializing in developer tools GTM and innovation strategy
  • Helped technical startups translate deep tech into market traction
  • Focused on PLG strategies for B2B SaaS companies targeting developers
Visiting Lecturer at University of Split
2023-Present
  • Teaching NoSQL databases and complex network analysis to data science students
  • Bridging academic concepts with real-world developer needs
  • PhD research on AI and memory systems (because why not?)

Context: Before diving into developer tools, I spent 15 years in tech transfer and innovation ecosystems—helping universities commercialize research, building startup incubators, managing €34M in EU innovation projects, and leading teams of up to 30 people. This taught me how to translate complex tech into market impact, a skill I now apply to developer marketing.

💎 What I bring to the table

"The best developer marketing is indistinguishable from great documentation. It solves real problems, ships fast, and doesn't waste anyone's time with vanity metrics or corporate speak."

  • Bias for action: Ship first, optimize later. Perfect is the enemy of shipped.
  • Developer credibility: I code, I ship, I understand the tools developers actually need because I'm usually the first to file an issue when something breaks
  • GTM execution: Launched products against Goliaths and won through community + content + relentless iteration
  • Multi-product mindset: At Daytona, managed messaging for opensource, enterprise and SaaS products simultaneously
  • Long-term > Short-term: Built sustainable growth through community and authentic relationships, not quick marketing wins
Let's ship something developers will actually love. 🚀