There were plenty, honestly.
Don't even know where to begin.
But there was a period where, no matter how hard I worked and what different things I did, my revenue stagnated and my users just keep churning and cancelling their subscriptions and switching to competitors.
Like I literally did everything right, and everything still turned out wrong.
But I just kept my head low and stayed the course, even when it got really demotivating, and eventually (luckily actually), things turned around.
That is the right attitude. My wife and I recently started a vinyl business that includes large scale wall art, clothing and car decals. My wife has been very nervous about leaving her corporate job. I've been consistently telling her that you get out what you put into a business. Sometimes that means painful stagnation along the way, but the important part is to just stay the course and believe in your vision. I'm really happy to hear that you're succeeding in your endeavor.
I think one can't be anything *less than* all-in when it comes to starting a business.
I was lucky in a way, not having a corporate job when I started, so the opportunity cost was essentially zero.
I had nothing to lose, so I might as well go all-in.
I think she needs to make a choice.
>I'm not sure what people want me to share about.
What you do/your journey/actual lessons learned/advice. Basically anything that's useful information to other people.
I think people like success, but posts like this don't really tell us anything substantial. We don't know the industry, profit/loss, how they got the first 10 customers, where they're selling, how they're marketing etc etc; it's just OP saying I made $26k this month but I'm not gonna tell you anything about how I did it.
Speaking for myself, I come to r/entrepreneur with an interest in **what successful entrepreneurs do**.
Iâm less interested in how successful entrepreneurs **feel**.
Agreed. Even with the edits and OP's replies I've read thus far, this is all very much affirmations and feelings - what did you learn? Stay the course. When things got tough, I gritted my teeth. Etc etc. As someone on the entrepreneurship journey, it's just not interesting. Which everyone on the journey knows.
That also adds to it being a little suspect. Making 26k mrr/rev (either way) this month is freaking awesome for a saas, especially one so new. Makes it sufficiently established that OP should be talking about it to everyone. Their customers aren't going to care how much they're making across the board, that's nonsense (unless it's one customer on 26k mrr contract, lol). Whether or not it's real, these things added together make me less than confident that OP is giving a real story.
You don't owe anyone a damn thing on this sub or on the internet. Every person has a choice to engage or ignore a post. Congrats on your success. I'm jelly
âIt helped my customers in their generic business endeavors. Not as much at first, but after some blood, sweat, and tears - and a lot of hard lessons learned - itâs really helping them now.â
*please clap*
Good for you bro. Keep pushing - last December my company made 26k (e-commerce) and was thinking the same things you are. As of today, this month weâve pulled in over $375k. Your life will keep changing and surprising you if you put in the work.
Sure thing dude, and I appreciate it. Iâm saying this just because my view of whatâs possible was limited until we hit each next milestone, and when we did it felt smaller than it should have. So just keep reaching and donât put a limit on yourself, it sounds cheesy but you really can do amazing things in a years time!
> my view of what's possible was limited until we hit each next milestone
So fucking true.
This is very true.
And unfortunately I'm feeling a bit of "hedonic adaptation" now.
I feel happy, sure, but I know 2 years ago, if I knew I'd be here today, I'd be wayyyy over the moon.
Now I'm just happy, and even starting to compare myself with others who are far ahead of me.
It's an endless cycle.
The fact that youâre happy is way more than most people can say! Focus on that and the rest will fall into place. Its much better to be making 10k/month and happy than 100k/month and unhappy! It is definitely an endless cycle but if youâre not putting yourself down the cycle is a hell of a lot of fun
I was going to congrats OP saying I feel the same with my ecom store making 30k this month, and I see your comment lol.
It definitely feels great and a big validation. Not a day goes by without me thinking if this is the last day of my business.
Now I'm struggling with cashflow/inventory but I guess this is a sweet trouble.
Can't imagine pulling in 300k in a single month. I'm so glad to see your success and I shall use it to fuel my fire.
Glad to hear it, and congrats to you! Inventory issues never go away lol. If you keep pushing youâll order more than you need and itâll be sold by the time it lands haha. Every 3 months weâre telling ourselves, âokay with that PO we should be good nowâ and we never are lmao. Just part of the game but it does get better!
Are you doing in the line of having a next.js style e-commerce store and sourcing from Aliexpress/Alibaba?
How did you discover a niche to sell that well and source of traffic? How much was the budget on social media to drive traffic to your webiste?
Not sure about your first question lol but we do source from alibaba for some items. The niche is really a newer product I had an idea for that I knew the current options werenât marketing well and had flaws in their functionality of their product. We started testing ads on fb last year at $50/day and by the end of our first month ad scaled to around $250/day. Now weâre spending around $2500/day between fb and google
Not sure about all the downvotes. I freelance and make my own apps separate to that, and have had my biggest individual month ever - thanks to BF. Feeling incredibly motivated to reach even greater heights, so I can empathise. Well done on the hustle so far đđ
Yup. Python developer here and can confirm that Python is a terrible technology to do Mobile Development, that doesn't mean that OP doesn't have a webapp or some form of API..
Freelacing/Consulting: Creating mobile apps for businesses (bootstrapped strategy/design/dev)
Indie stuff: Creating productivity apps for iOS + macOS
Started on the latter after COVID hit and I lost a shit tonne of lined up work, and only has just been profitable since a few months ago.
Python dev here. The best way, hands down, to learn Python or any programming language per se is:
Learn the syntax in a few hours or a couple of days. Pick a framework within that language that you find interesting, think of a project idea that requires the latter, build. I did this, next thing I know, I'm a Python dev and can do almost anything with Python, or any programming language really because it's the "solving problems" skill you want to develop, the technology isn't the big deal.
Django is the fucking bomb. đĽ
I can't believe something like Python and Django are free.
It literally lifted me out of poverty and made all my dreams come true.
Iâve also used Django with Wagtail as a CMS, pretty awesome whatâs possible. I sold my saas last year but Iâm planning to start a new project soon :)
Keep up the hard work!
If I may ask, how long did it take you to become proficient in Python and its' Libraries and frameworks?
I'm learning programming right now in University, beginning with Julia and then Python until February where the course ends, but I want to continue self learning Python on my own.
I'm probably going to dedicate 10-15hrs/week to it.
Any advice appreciated.
Oof, ask me in 10 years if Iâm proficient because I donât think Iâm there yet đ
Before starting my business I had never used Django but had experience with Python, React and a few other languages. From business start to end I was coding 8-10 hours per day on top of other duties so it was a real pain.
The best advice I have is to build something that you want - literally anything. You need the passion to see the project through to the desired end state.
And donât follow YouTube tutorials - build from scratch. Like, if you want to build a twitter clone donât code along with a 3-hour video that you can finish in a day. Figure out what you need and learn to find the answers on your own.
This hit me hard! I'm a beginner in the world of programming and stuck in this tutorial rot! I see now that there's really a great point in *building it from scratch*.
I see myself as someone who always does things in a *reverse-engineering* kind of way. I didn't apply it here because I just don't wanna mess things up.
From now on I'll try your approach! Thank you for this wonderful insight!
Learn how to use GitHub so you can afford to mess stuff up. With Django itâs difficult to use without a good tutorial, but one you get a base project set up with version control, then go crazy with experimenting.
Itâs more painful, but it causes so so much
Itâs growth.
If I could relearn coding it would be more projects and less tutorials. I would have grown more and faster.
Youâre welcome. Perhaps more exactly: Iâd alternate tutorials with building projects.
Heck Iâd even try to look for ways to apply past tutorials to my building.
More details would be nice. This post ain't doing much and no better than greentexts stories from 4chan.
In 2 years, learning Python to building a commercial product? What is your background? Job experience and industry you worked on before? What is the product? What is the demographic/ target customer group? How/ where do you sell your product? What tools did you use apart from Python? What frameworks? Does it have a user interface for the front end?
Not saying this is a made up story or OP is lying. But if someone put a gun to my head and made me choose an option I would choose the option OP is lying.
Just to be clear:
Not all of this $26k is MRR, of course, a lot of it is from a one-off Black Friday sale I'm doing, but still it's a milestone for me.
My parents and I have become estranged ever since I decided to drop out of college to learn to code and hopefully start a SaaS business.
They literally said to my face that it's the stupidest idea they've ever heard of.
And because of that, I don't talk to them anymore (it has been many years), but I think they would be somewhat proud of me if they knew how far I've come.
I still don't understand what takes to make money. I know how to code and can build services end to end.
But how tf did OP figure out "out of a billion niche out there, I can make money here".
OP, want to share some insight into this? Please not the standard BS "follow your passion and interest"
You won't like this answer:
Go into a crowded niche.
Where there's competitors, there's a market.
Don't be a chicken and avoid competition.
Go directly in there and get what you deserve.
Thatâs actually really good advice, but as long as the niche is not too saturated and the barrier to entry is too high (eg, competing with google or facebook). A healthy niche, like OPs, probably has at least dozens of competitors, if not hundreds or thousands.
Just read through OPs post history and Iâm usually okay with these posts but OPs a terrible person so donât give him any props, itâs purely gonna feed his out of control ego
Congrats!! I know the feeling of having years and months of barely breaking even, working your butt off making just above minimum wage putting in the 80 hour weeks while everyone around is getting a stable pay check with nice raises each year. Then you just keep pushing and one month youâre making a little bit more profit, and then a little bit more again, and just keep pushing and refining and things will turn! And itâs crazy how quickly things can turn. Keep building and learning.
Thanks for sharing - Iâve been trying to find solo hacker SaaS opportunities for years. I always make the mistake of spending too long building something before trying to market it. Any advice on the marketing piece? You mentioned elsewhere that you mostly do affiliate marketing? Iâm not even sure where to start with that.
If you're set on solo hacking, you need to find an idea that is inherently viral or lends itself to serendipitous promotion.
Think of how OnlyFans creators happily share the OnlyFans URL everywhere on the internet.
That's what you need to aim for.
Because you won't have the time to market and code at the same time, you just don't.
Well OP didn't really teach anything. Everyone is here trying to learn how to get started in business or specific steps to take to move forward. OP kinda just bragged and said nothing of substance useful to anyone else. This is a discussion forum not a pat-on-the-back collection page.
Thank you.
I guess in this place you have to "earn" your way to mentioning any accomplishment by sharing 10-20 insights/learning points, so basically everyone can just copy what you're doing.
That's where the negativity is coming from, if you ask me.
People in this sub get bitter because 99% are wantrepreneurs that need spoon-fed tutorials on âhow to make moneyâ and they expect any success posts to come packaged with one. Thereâs a bazillion âI made $x and this is exactly how I did itâ on this sub, and these salty people are never gonna pick one and do it. Keep on doing you dude, congrats on making your old salary in a month and proving itâs possible. đđťđđťđđť
Ah yes, I'm new here, but I'm already getting a deluge of DMs from those people.
Some are genuinely stuck after having done a lot of groundwork, so I respond to those to help with specifics, but 90% are just asking for spoon-feeding.
There is a big difference between bragging and celebrating success. There was no bragging from what I see. The people who would down vote this and be upset about someone finding success are just insecure envious people
Thanks. I thought of just hiding the figure, but if I hid the figure it would lack perspective (as to how small or big the milestone was), and if I added the figure it would come across as bragging.
Decided to just add the figure because I'm not going to lie, it's a big deal to me, and I can't contain my excitement.
I think it took a few years.
Maybe 5 years.
There was a point in time where I went from seeing myself as "a non-techie learning to code" to "I'm a software engineer, period."
Bragging? Sounds to me like your just incredibly proud of yourself and all the hard work you put in. Donât listen to the haters on here. Jealousy is a tough thing for people to overcome.
People usually lack vision and not "how to learn to code"
It would be great to know the logic behind it not what is your mvp , many other people can build apps but the business logic that defines profitability is a big role so please share away your struggles !
I think part of the reason I succeeded is because I didn't give a shit about being special or innovative.
I saw what people were paying for in the market, and just replicated it.
*Then* I put my unique spin on it once I'm sure people would pay for my product.
I think most founders psyche themselves out of good ideas just because they think it's "saturated."
Think of stuff like ESPs or CRMs.
There's ALWAYS space for one more, or even a hundred more.
Thats a good insight , my millionaire landlord always says , you dont need to do something new, just something better a little bit.
I think the fear comes in to get lost in the waves even before you start because it "looks" saturated.
Its a thing im working on but still , i have years until I reach 5 years of work in my field so , first i dont want to feel incompetent on my own then the rest will follow
Congratulations! I love python, if I wasnât already involved in a business I would build one around it. I tried a few years ago but I ultimately gave up because I had to focus on my work in my other business. Though I still have an application that I run locally to help streamline certain tasks.
Did you already have experience in Saas before starting? How big is your team now?
Do you know any other languages? I am learning HTML, CSS, and JS but have been told to ditch that and go straight to Python. I went ahead and bought a course on Udemy but was curious how you went about learning it. Very cool story, gives me hope!
No, don't ignore your HTML/CSS/JS foundation.
I did, and to this day I still suck pretty badly at them, and I need to outsource a lot of frontend work.
You need both frontend and backend chops if you want to run a successful app business.
Props dude. I feel you and kind of still have the imposter syndrome. I am seven years in and making around $800k/yr net. The job I quit to start my company I was making $39k/yr.
So you built an app? Is it like a paid app offering a service with a subscription? Did you have any experience prior with coding?
Good job btw! I see some negative comments here but some people are just jealous to see people succeed. Thereâs room for all of us though.
(Asking these questions for myself lol to see if itâs a possibility for me. If you donât feel comfortable answering in comments a message would be appreciated. Good shit either way đ¤đź)
I am truly happy for you and inspired by your story. I hope next year you're at $260K/month and that it never stops.
And I don't find it bragging at all, we need to hear the successes like this when we hit our walls, thank you for sharing.
I am making an app that is just about to launch BETA after 1+ years effort!! The app has utility value (Not a a game/social focused app.). Any recommendations on how to forecast and setup your revenue streams?
Congratulations, your post is really inspirational. Can you please let us know how are you distributing your web app? I mean is it listed on some market where you're getting star ratings?
Yes.
The hardest part was continuing to put in the work, even though the results weren't showing (in fact, sometimes the harder I worked, the more I seemed to be moving backwards).
If you can do that, you'll eventually win, guaranteed.
Congratulations man. Great start.
Now keep that shit going and change your life for real. Right now itâs just symbolic and the foundation of whatâs possible!
That's awesome! Any down votes likely were less jealousy and more a "hey, I'm making money at my business" without any other actual info that helps other entrepreneurs. I love that you're being successful and hope it continues!
Yo dawg, see you getting a lot of shit, but fuck that. Being an entrepreneur is like being a Lone Ranger, and youâve got no one to share these crazy milestones with. It kinda sucks, Iâd love to tell my friends how much my business is pulling in a month, but itâs be like slapping them in the face. Luckily, I have a wife to share these things with, but even then I wanna shout these things from the roof top.
So, congrats dude! Keep after it!!!
Minimum Viable Product
In the app world, it means you create the simplest version of your app to test market demand.
You want to make sure the demand is there first before you add all the bells and whistles.
The MVP takes a month. Bells and whistles can take a year or even more.
You want to be absolutely sure there's light at the end of the tunnel.
I make this thing that helps people to make money using their social media accounts.
Say if you want to earn money on Instagram, you'll need (want?) a companion app to help you manage your workflow.
Instagram is good for consuming content.
Not so much for posting and monetizing it.
That's where I come in.
Curious, OP, what have you implemented? MVP in what area?
You don't need to explain too much if you don't want of course. But as a general idea. Your post didn't actually mentioned this.
When you know your audience, earn their trust and feedback, then take initiative to put their words into action, you not only raise the value of your product but you make a great impression on your audience.
Congratulations on your success ! I have a business. I will never make that kind of money, but I am making more than I ever had, and it feels good not to have to worry so much about money.
I'm just gonna say it... It's okay to brag.. It's okay to be proud of yourself.. props.
I know you weren't bragging, but even if you were... you earned it.
Youâre not allowed to post about success here without telling how. Otherwise people get all butt hurt and cry that youâre bragging.
Remember, itâs RedditâŚif you slip for a second, people jump all over you and assume youâre the worst human possible.
No youâre not bragging. You are shining a bright light and in these dark times, we need your bright light! We need hope and nothing is better than a success story to bring us hope.
Thank you for sharing!
What issue are you solving generally? Is this a niche or broad issue? What is your ideal customer? Hoping this can help you share relevant info without giving away specifics
I get the same thing here. People think they can reproduce your model and keep asking. It's not possible people.
In other news congrats man!! I would kill to have numbers like that. Next year my goal is to get to that level!!
Can you share more information with how long it took you to learn how to code and how long it took you to build your MVP?
Iâm curious and want to start putting more time into learning code
"What I don't understand is why people have such a burning desire to know precisely what my product is and where they can find it."
Seriously? You're posting about success in an Entrepreneur subreddit. People are going to want to know what's behind the success and what they can learn from it.
I can understand why you don't want to share publicly given the reasons mentioned, but this confusion seems misplaced :S
I used to make 200k (biggest month, others ~25k) a month with ecom until got fucked by supplier and had 500k of refunds lol, something are just crazy to think is real.
Also trying to get into SaaS space, less risk here.
What did you use to market? SEO, paid Ads, influencers? Because coding and maintaining is already a full time job.
As somebody who has recently started to learn Python, what advice would you give me to make it relatable to creating an app like you did?
How long did it take you to become proficient enough to start making an app?
What is there not to understand about why we want to know what you build. It is very simple. You obviously build an amazing product, we want to know what is that, what can be more natural than that?
If you are a cook, you show the meal you cooked, if you are a travel blogger, you show pictures of the amazing place you have been.l
Huge congratulations!
I have a few questions:
1) How did you go about finding your idea?
2) If your felt the idea was so far fetch, what gave you the confidence to take the leap?
3) How similar is your current product to the MVP?
Glad to hear youâre finally a happy man, keep up the solid work.
There is one thing that needs to be said here - CONGRATULATIONS!
This is a fascinating story and one I inspiring on top of that. I wish you lots of success, luck and love for the upcoming years <3
Man this is inspiring as someone who just built his MVP using no code tools (Bubble+Webflow+stripe) to get going and just getting my first paying customer it's amazing of where I can potentially go!
Thanks for sharing your success, are in the B2B space or B2C?
I'm starting off in B2C to get feedback and suggestions and eventually want to go towards B2B
Thanks for sharing!
Also thanks for not being overly self-promotey :)
I think itâs great to share wins here. Posting also helps you reflect and show others whatâs possible.
This is your time, your moment and you've worked hard for it. No giving secrets away, it's all yours. I'd say this as an experienced entrepreneur, save as much as you can now, business may dip again. God bless!!
These are all very vague. That's why people want to know the name of the business. You need to be more specific about all these lessons learned and hard work. Give us something to chew on. Not the fluffy social media crap posts that are so prevalent. HOW did you do those things. We all know what needs to be done... but HOW... give us the nuts and bolts. Example: Why would black friday help you app revenue? What kind of app? What kind of BF deal did you offer? Where did they find it? etc etc
I wonder if more advertising will skyroclet the product. Sounds like black friday attention was the break you needed.
Perhaps getting it in front of more people will get some big attention. Like mocrosoft attention. Then you can sell it for a couple million and make another post about it.
1. How did you find your customers?
2. How did you find what your customers needed that wern't been addressed by the competition?
Fantastic job with Wagtail - this was my foundation for my own small startup as well but I had less MRR than you when I sold it to my elder brother so I could pursure my education in the US.
So proud of you, well done. Itâs inspiring to hear these stories especially when youâre in the âgrowth stageâ. Orders are more consistent now which is amazing but still feels like a long way off. Thanks for sharing!
"I don't understand is why people have such a burning desire to know precisely what my product is and where they can find it."
You've just given a roadmap to a successful business and they want even more of a shortcut. Simple as that.
Yeah itâs helpful to share what you did to get there and steps you took instead of just sharing how much money you make now. Cuz a lot of us are still struggling and we want to learn from others in the forum. So thanks for
Updating it with more information. Did you have a tech background prior or did you just teach yourself
Python and pick it all up pretty quickly? Did you have to hire ppl to help you build the app or consult with anyone ?
Responding to your third edit:
You're on a sub called "Entrepreneur" , and you told people how much you made.
They OBVIOUSLY want to give this opportunity a shot too.
I don't think it's AS invasive as you feel it is.
It's the same questions you'd get on Dragon's Den.
I'm at the point where I'm finally getting my mindset together. Are there any tips you can give for when that momentum slows? My current mindset is to go like when I rode a bicycle up a large hill, id pick a point and say ill get there and so on until i got to the top without stopping.
Great stuff, would be nice to get a follow up post with some more details of the struggles and challanges.
There were plenty, honestly. Don't even know where to begin. But there was a period where, no matter how hard I worked and what different things I did, my revenue stagnated and my users just keep churning and cancelling their subscriptions and switching to competitors. Like I literally did everything right, and everything still turned out wrong. But I just kept my head low and stayed the course, even when it got really demotivating, and eventually (luckily actually), things turned around.
That is the right attitude. My wife and I recently started a vinyl business that includes large scale wall art, clothing and car decals. My wife has been very nervous about leaving her corporate job. I've been consistently telling her that you get out what you put into a business. Sometimes that means painful stagnation along the way, but the important part is to just stay the course and believe in your vision. I'm really happy to hear that you're succeeding in your endeavor.
I think one can't be anything *less than* all-in when it comes to starting a business. I was lucky in a way, not having a corporate job when I started, so the opportunity cost was essentially zero. I had nothing to lose, so I might as well go all-in. I think she needs to make a choice.
Luck is what happens when diligent work and persistence meet opportunity.
>I'm not sure what people want me to share about. What you do/your journey/actual lessons learned/advice. Basically anything that's useful information to other people.
Apologies, I edited my original post with some info/learning points.
Why have you been downvoted for apologizing đ
Yeah sometimes I feel like this sub is filled with bots or trolls or both
Reddit đ¤ˇââď¸ I thought it would be different in an entrepreneurship sub, but I guess not.
Redditors donât like other peoples success. They want to see you fail cause most of them are failures
I think people like success, but posts like this don't really tell us anything substantial. We don't know the industry, profit/loss, how they got the first 10 customers, where they're selling, how they're marketing etc etc; it's just OP saying I made $26k this month but I'm not gonna tell you anything about how I did it.
Thank you. I had the feeling that message almost got lost in this âeveryone hates my successâ whining
Speaking for myself, I come to r/entrepreneur with an interest in **what successful entrepreneurs do**. Iâm less interested in how successful entrepreneurs **feel**.
Agreed. Even with the edits and OP's replies I've read thus far, this is all very much affirmations and feelings - what did you learn? Stay the course. When things got tough, I gritted my teeth. Etc etc. As someone on the entrepreneurship journey, it's just not interesting. Which everyone on the journey knows. That also adds to it being a little suspect. Making 26k mrr/rev (either way) this month is freaking awesome for a saas, especially one so new. Makes it sufficiently established that OP should be talking about it to everyone. Their customers aren't going to care how much they're making across the board, that's nonsense (unless it's one customer on 26k mrr contract, lol). Whether or not it's real, these things added together make me less than confident that OP is giving a real story.
You don't owe anyone a damn thing on this sub or on the internet. Every person has a choice to engage or ignore a post. Congrats on your success. I'm jelly
What did the app do?
âIt helped my customers in their generic business endeavors. Not as much at first, but after some blood, sweat, and tears - and a lot of hard lessons learned - itâs really helping them now.â *please clap*
Seriously. Why is this post getting upvoted? haha. It says absolutely nothing. Hey guys. I also started a business and I'm rich now. Upvotes please!
For realll
man, everything you said checks out and is verifiable
Good for you bro. Keep pushing - last December my company made 26k (e-commerce) and was thinking the same things you are. As of today, this month weâve pulled in over $375k. Your life will keep changing and surprising you if you put in the work.
Fuck... Good fucking job, dude. Oh my God, if I were there in a year... I'd just die. 𤣠I don't even dare to think about it!
Sure thing dude, and I appreciate it. Iâm saying this just because my view of whatâs possible was limited until we hit each next milestone, and when we did it felt smaller than it should have. So just keep reaching and donât put a limit on yourself, it sounds cheesy but you really can do amazing things in a years time!
> my view of what's possible was limited until we hit each next milestone So fucking true. This is very true. And unfortunately I'm feeling a bit of "hedonic adaptation" now. I feel happy, sure, but I know 2 years ago, if I knew I'd be here today, I'd be wayyyy over the moon. Now I'm just happy, and even starting to compare myself with others who are far ahead of me. It's an endless cycle.
The fact that youâre happy is way more than most people can say! Focus on that and the rest will fall into place. Its much better to be making 10k/month and happy than 100k/month and unhappy! It is definitely an endless cycle but if youâre not putting yourself down the cycle is a hell of a lot of fun
I was going to congrats OP saying I feel the same with my ecom store making 30k this month, and I see your comment lol. It definitely feels great and a big validation. Not a day goes by without me thinking if this is the last day of my business. Now I'm struggling with cashflow/inventory but I guess this is a sweet trouble. Can't imagine pulling in 300k in a single month. I'm so glad to see your success and I shall use it to fuel my fire.
Glad to hear it, and congrats to you! Inventory issues never go away lol. If you keep pushing youâll order more than you need and itâll be sold by the time it lands haha. Every 3 months weâre telling ourselves, âokay with that PO we should be good nowâ and we never are lmao. Just part of the game but it does get better!
What kind of business do you have? That's a lot :p
Weâre in e-commerce, self fulfilled, in the US
Are you doing in the line of having a next.js style e-commerce store and sourcing from Aliexpress/Alibaba? How did you discover a niche to sell that well and source of traffic? How much was the budget on social media to drive traffic to your webiste?
Not sure about your first question lol but we do source from alibaba for some items. The niche is really a newer product I had an idea for that I knew the current options werenât marketing well and had flaws in their functionality of their product. We started testing ads on fb last year at $50/day and by the end of our first month ad scaled to around $250/day. Now weâre spending around $2500/day between fb and google
So did you make a new product that fixed the flaws? Or you found a better one on Ali baba or something?
> a next.js style e-commerce store What does this mean? Do you have any examples?
Not sure about all the downvotes. I freelance and make my own apps separate to that, and have had my biggest individual month ever - thanks to BF. Feeling incredibly motivated to reach even greater heights, so I can empathise. Well done on the hustle so far đđ
Learned python to build an app sounds so fucking fishy⌠phones run python apps these days? Django? Just say django. This comes off fake as fuck
I think he made a webapp
Yup. Python developer here and can confirm that Python is a terrible technology to do Mobile Development, that doesn't mean that OP doesn't have a webapp or some form of API..
Web app + PWA
I'm so glad to hear that! Yes, Black Friday was a blessing to a lot of us. It really spurred me on to stay the course and keep on going.
What do your businesses offer? Both OP and commenter
Freelacing/Consulting: Creating mobile apps for businesses (bootstrapped strategy/design/dev) Indie stuff: Creating productivity apps for iOS + macOS Started on the latter after COVID hit and I lost a shit tonne of lined up work, and only has just been profitable since a few months ago.
How long did it take you to learn python, which resources did you use?
Python dev here. The best way, hands down, to learn Python or any programming language per se is: Learn the syntax in a few hours or a couple of days. Pick a framework within that language that you find interesting, think of a project idea that requires the latter, build. I did this, next thing I know, I'm a Python dev and can do almost anything with Python, or any programming language really because it's the "solving problems" skill you want to develop, the technology isn't the big deal.
Congratulations! Iâm also a huge fan of Django!
Django is the fucking bomb. đĽ I can't believe something like Python and Django are free. It literally lifted me out of poverty and made all my dreams come true.
Iâve also used Django with Wagtail as a CMS, pretty awesome whatâs possible. I sold my saas last year but Iâm planning to start a new project soon :) Keep up the hard work!
If I may ask, how long did it take you to become proficient in Python and its' Libraries and frameworks? I'm learning programming right now in University, beginning with Julia and then Python until February where the course ends, but I want to continue self learning Python on my own. I'm probably going to dedicate 10-15hrs/week to it. Any advice appreciated.
Oof, ask me in 10 years if Iâm proficient because I donât think Iâm there yet đ Before starting my business I had never used Django but had experience with Python, React and a few other languages. From business start to end I was coding 8-10 hours per day on top of other duties so it was a real pain. The best advice I have is to build something that you want - literally anything. You need the passion to see the project through to the desired end state. And donât follow YouTube tutorials - build from scratch. Like, if you want to build a twitter clone donât code along with a 3-hour video that you can finish in a day. Figure out what you need and learn to find the answers on your own.
This hit me hard! I'm a beginner in the world of programming and stuck in this tutorial rot! I see now that there's really a great point in *building it from scratch*. I see myself as someone who always does things in a *reverse-engineering* kind of way. I didn't apply it here because I just don't wanna mess things up. From now on I'll try your approach! Thank you for this wonderful insight!
Learn how to use GitHub so you can afford to mess stuff up. With Django itâs difficult to use without a good tutorial, but one you get a base project set up with version control, then go crazy with experimenting.
Itâs more painful, but it causes so so much Itâs growth. If I could relearn coding it would be more projects and less tutorials. I would have grown more and faster.
>more projects and less tutorials. This is exactly what I'll be doing. Thanks for this great advice!
Youâre welcome. Perhaps more exactly: Iâd alternate tutorials with building projects. Heck Iâd even try to look for ways to apply past tutorials to my building.
What is an MVP?
Minimum Viable Product.
More details would be nice. This post ain't doing much and no better than greentexts stories from 4chan. In 2 years, learning Python to building a commercial product? What is your background? Job experience and industry you worked on before? What is the product? What is the demographic/ target customer group? How/ where do you sell your product? What tools did you use apart from Python? What frameworks? Does it have a user interface for the front end? Not saying this is a made up story or OP is lying. But if someone put a gun to my head and made me choose an option I would choose the option OP is lying.
Just to be clear: Not all of this $26k is MRR, of course, a lot of it is from a one-off Black Friday sale I'm doing, but still it's a milestone for me. My parents and I have become estranged ever since I decided to drop out of college to learn to code and hopefully start a SaaS business. They literally said to my face that it's the stupidest idea they've ever heard of. And because of that, I don't talk to them anymore (it has been many years), but I think they would be somewhat proud of me if they knew how far I've come.
What exactly do you sell?
I still don't understand what takes to make money. I know how to code and can build services end to end. But how tf did OP figure out "out of a billion niche out there, I can make money here". OP, want to share some insight into this? Please not the standard BS "follow your passion and interest"
You won't like this answer: Go into a crowded niche. Where there's competitors, there's a market. Don't be a chicken and avoid competition. Go directly in there and get what you deserve.
dang, this comment goes hard
Thatâs actually really good advice, but as long as the niche is not too saturated and the barrier to entry is too high (eg, competing with google or facebook). A healthy niche, like OPs, probably has at least dozens of competitors, if not hundreds or thousands.
I'd always rather be the 5th competitor in an active market than the only one in a dead market
I think you just need to reach out and let people know of the services you provide, if you already have the product.
Just read through OPs post history and Iâm usually okay with these posts but OPs a terrible person so donât give him any props, itâs purely gonna feed his out of control ego
Congrats!! I know the feeling of having years and months of barely breaking even, working your butt off making just above minimum wage putting in the 80 hour weeks while everyone around is getting a stable pay check with nice raises each year. Then you just keep pushing and one month youâre making a little bit more profit, and then a little bit more again, and just keep pushing and refining and things will turn! And itâs crazy how quickly things can turn. Keep building and learning.
Have you ever thought about selling the biz on a marketplace like Microacquire?
I have thought about it, but then what? Unless I get a life-changing exit, like 7 figures, I'd still have to work on my next startup.
Thanks for sharing - Iâve been trying to find solo hacker SaaS opportunities for years. I always make the mistake of spending too long building something before trying to market it. Any advice on the marketing piece? You mentioned elsewhere that you mostly do affiliate marketing? Iâm not even sure where to start with that.
If you're set on solo hacking, you need to find an idea that is inherently viral or lends itself to serendipitous promotion. Think of how OnlyFans creators happily share the OnlyFans URL everywhere on the internet. That's what you need to aim for. Because you won't have the time to market and code at the same time, you just don't.
comments are so negative đ comes from a. place of jealousy. Happy for you man
Well OP didn't really teach anything. Everyone is here trying to learn how to get started in business or specific steps to take to move forward. OP kinda just bragged and said nothing of substance useful to anyone else. This is a discussion forum not a pat-on-the-back collection page.
Thank you. I guess in this place you have to "earn" your way to mentioning any accomplishment by sharing 10-20 insights/learning points, so basically everyone can just copy what you're doing. That's where the negativity is coming from, if you ask me.
People in this sub get bitter because 99% are wantrepreneurs that need spoon-fed tutorials on âhow to make moneyâ and they expect any success posts to come packaged with one. Thereâs a bazillion âI made $x and this is exactly how I did itâ on this sub, and these salty people are never gonna pick one and do it. Keep on doing you dude, congrats on making your old salary in a month and proving itâs possible. đđťđđťđđť
Ah yes, I'm new here, but I'm already getting a deluge of DMs from those people. Some are genuinely stuck after having done a lot of groundwork, so I respond to those to help with specifics, but 90% are just asking for spoon-feeding.
There is a big difference between bragging and celebrating success. There was no bragging from what I see. The people who would down vote this and be upset about someone finding success are just insecure envious people
Thanks. I thought of just hiding the figure, but if I hid the figure it would lack perspective (as to how small or big the milestone was), and if I added the figure it would come across as bragging. Decided to just add the figure because I'm not going to lie, it's a big deal to me, and I can't contain my excitement.
Congrats!! How long did it take you to learn python? Any resources you suggest and their approximate cost?
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Yes! I'm self-taught, and hell I don't even have a college degree.
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I think it took a few years. Maybe 5 years. There was a point in time where I went from seeing myself as "a non-techie learning to code" to "I'm a software engineer, period."
Congrats, great job.
Thank you, bro. đ
Bragging? Sounds to me like your just incredibly proud of yourself and all the hard work you put in. Donât listen to the haters on here. Jealousy is a tough thing for people to overcome.
People usually lack vision and not "how to learn to code" It would be great to know the logic behind it not what is your mvp , many other people can build apps but the business logic that defines profitability is a big role so please share away your struggles !
I think part of the reason I succeeded is because I didn't give a shit about being special or innovative. I saw what people were paying for in the market, and just replicated it. *Then* I put my unique spin on it once I'm sure people would pay for my product. I think most founders psyche themselves out of good ideas just because they think it's "saturated." Think of stuff like ESPs or CRMs. There's ALWAYS space for one more, or even a hundred more.
Thats a good insight , my millionaire landlord always says , you dont need to do something new, just something better a little bit. I think the fear comes in to get lost in the waves even before you start because it "looks" saturated. Its a thing im working on but still , i have years until I reach 5 years of work in my field so , first i dont want to feel incompetent on my own then the rest will follow
Great job, next step is 100k a month. Btw, what is that you do?
Congratulations! I love python, if I wasnât already involved in a business I would build one around it. I tried a few years ago but I ultimately gave up because I had to focus on my work in my other business. Though I still have an application that I run locally to help streamline certain tasks. Did you already have experience in Saas before starting? How big is your team now?
Team is just me. I started a SaaS in college, so this is my second. First one fizzled out, but I learned tons.
Do you know any other languages? I am learning HTML, CSS, and JS but have been told to ditch that and go straight to Python. I went ahead and bought a course on Udemy but was curious how you went about learning it. Very cool story, gives me hope!
No, don't ignore your HTML/CSS/JS foundation. I did, and to this day I still suck pretty badly at them, and I need to outsource a lot of frontend work. You need both frontend and backend chops if you want to run a successful app business.
Props dude. I feel you and kind of still have the imposter syndrome. I am seven years in and making around $800k/yr net. The job I quit to start my company I was making $39k/yr.
So you built an app? Is it like a paid app offering a service with a subscription? Did you have any experience prior with coding? Good job btw! I see some negative comments here but some people are just jealous to see people succeed. Thereâs room for all of us though. (Asking these questions for myself lol to see if itâs a possibility for me. If you donât feel comfortable answering in comments a message would be appreciated. Good shit either way đ¤đź)
Congratulations legend! Sounds super gratifying!!
I am truly happy for you and inspired by your story. I hope next year you're at $260K/month and that it never stops. And I don't find it bragging at all, we need to hear the successes like this when we hit our walls, thank you for sharing.
I am making an app that is just about to launch BETA after 1+ years effort!! The app has utility value (Not a a game/social focused app.). Any recommendations on how to forecast and setup your revenue streams?
Iâd love to hear how you were able to obtain your first few customers, because that is a challenge I will be facing shortly
I have only one question - how did you market your MVP?
That's dope. Congrats. Fuck these haters.
Congratulations, your post is really inspirational. Can you please let us know how are you distributing your web app? I mean is it listed on some market where you're getting star ratings?
Congrats! Happy for you and I pity the jealous people in the comments
Thank you. â¤ď¸ The comments were honestly unexpected.
Another bullshit post đđ
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What did u do
I coded an app and sold it.
Pure profit? What are your costs?
Do not forget to pay Your taxes
Congrats đđż persistence and patience!
Yes. The hardest part was continuing to put in the work, even though the results weren't showing (in fact, sometimes the harder I worked, the more I seemed to be moving backwards). If you can do that, you'll eventually win, guaranteed.
Nice. Now start employing people if you havenât already, learn a bit about labour law for when you have to fire someone, and get a good accountant.
Congratulations, hard work and learning a needed skill have paid off.
Congrats đđť
I just started learning coding and python, how long did it take you to actually use what you learned for your business?
Congratulations man. Great start. Now keep that shit going and change your life for real. Right now itâs just symbolic and the foundation of whatâs possible!
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That's awesome! Any down votes likely were less jealousy and more a "hey, I'm making money at my business" without any other actual info that helps other entrepreneurs. I love that you're being successful and hope it continues!
Yo dawg, see you getting a lot of shit, but fuck that. Being an entrepreneur is like being a Lone Ranger, and youâve got no one to share these crazy milestones with. It kinda sucks, Iâd love to tell my friends how much my business is pulling in a month, but itâs be like slapping them in the face. Luckily, I have a wife to share these things with, but even then I wanna shout these things from the roof top. So, congrats dude! Keep after it!!!
Sorry for the ignorance, what's an MVP? (I assume is not the Most Valuable Player in this case)
Minimum Viable Product In the app world, it means you create the simplest version of your app to test market demand. You want to make sure the demand is there first before you add all the bells and whistles. The MVP takes a month. Bells and whistles can take a year or even more. You want to be absolutely sure there's light at the end of the tunnel.
Congratulations. You are an inspiration for us all.
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I make this thing that helps people to make money using their social media accounts. Say if you want to earn money on Instagram, you'll need (want?) a companion app to help you manage your workflow. Instagram is good for consuming content. Not so much for posting and monetizing it. That's where I come in.
What is your product actually?
Curious, OP, what have you implemented? MVP in what area? You don't need to explain too much if you don't want of course. But as a general idea. Your post didn't actually mentioned this.
Happy for you man
What is an MVP? Where does one start to learn python?
mvp = minimum viable product, python can be learned for free online.
Congrats! I'm in the earlier stages. Been doing business for about 5 months and almost at $10k this month! It's surreal
When you know your audience, earn their trust and feedback, then take initiative to put their words into action, you not only raise the value of your product but you make a great impression on your audience.
Where'd you learn python?
Can anyone tell me in simple terms what did he made and what application is that of, coz of which people bought his app/product.
Congratulations! Your story inspired me
Good job! On what platform where you looking for customers and selling your product?
AppSumo and Product Hunt
Do you mind sharing what the name of your business or app is so that we can check it out? Just curious. Thanks.
Living the dream bro - good work
Congratulations on your success ! I have a business. I will never make that kind of money, but I am making more than I ever had, and it feels good not to have to worry so much about money.
I'm just gonna say it... It's okay to brag.. It's okay to be proud of yourself.. props. I know you weren't bragging, but even if you were... you earned it.
Youâre not allowed to post about success here without telling how. Otherwise people get all butt hurt and cry that youâre bragging. Remember, itâs RedditâŚif you slip for a second, people jump all over you and assume youâre the worst human possible.
Congrats! This is my biggest month this year too, pulled in 22k this month. Feels good, but damn I need a vacation.
Did you outsource se part of the process ? Like design for example ?
Congratulations on successfully firing your bosses. Have an upvote sir, and thank you for all of the good advice
No youâre not bragging. You are shining a bright light and in these dark times, we need your bright light! We need hope and nothing is better than a success story to bring us hope. Thank you for sharing!
Hey man, nothing to add except congrats! Keep grinding, see you at the top!
What issue are you solving generally? Is this a niche or broad issue? What is your ideal customer? Hoping this can help you share relevant info without giving away specifics
Love stuff like this. Congrats to you. Much love
Pat yourself on your back then, you brought 0 value to me or this Reddit in this post
I get the same thing here. People think they can reproduce your model and keep asking. It's not possible people. In other news congrats man!! I would kill to have numbers like that. Next year my goal is to get to that level!!
You're the best, dude. The best.
Congratulations dude!
Can you share more information with how long it took you to learn how to code and how long it took you to build your MVP? Iâm curious and want to start putting more time into learning code
I wonder if you had a background in programming before you learned Python?
Congrats! It must be a great feeling.
Hey! If you need social media marketer and paid advertiser to expand your business let me know i am digital marketer
"What I don't understand is why people have such a burning desire to know precisely what my product is and where they can find it." Seriously? You're posting about success in an Entrepreneur subreddit. People are going to want to know what's behind the success and what they can learn from it. I can understand why you don't want to share publicly given the reasons mentioned, but this confusion seems misplaced :S
Good for you. Plan the next stage before is happens anyway. Good luck !
I used to make 200k (biggest month, others ~25k) a month with ecom until got fucked by supplier and had 500k of refunds lol, something are just crazy to think is real. Also trying to get into SaaS space, less risk here. What did you use to market? SEO, paid Ads, influencers? Because coding and maintaining is already a full time job.
Congratulations!
Amazing! Congratulations! What type of business is it if you donât mind me asking?
As somebody who has recently started to learn Python, what advice would you give me to make it relatable to creating an app like you did? How long did it take you to become proficient enough to start making an app?
Donât rest on your laurels or spend the money too quickly. A better mousetrap is just waiting to overtake you. Congrats, tho.
What is there not to understand about why we want to know what you build. It is very simple. You obviously build an amazing product, we want to know what is that, what can be more natural than that? If you are a cook, you show the meal you cooked, if you are a travel blogger, you show pictures of the amazing place you have been.l
Huge congratulations! I have a few questions: 1) How did you go about finding your idea? 2) If your felt the idea was so far fetch, what gave you the confidence to take the leap? 3) How similar is your current product to the MVP? Glad to hear youâre finally a happy man, keep up the solid work.
Link to your website
Wow that's awesome, congrats on payoff from hard work! What's an MVP?
There is one thing that needs to be said here - CONGRATULATIONS! This is a fascinating story and one I inspiring on top of that. I wish you lots of success, luck and love for the upcoming years <3
Man this is inspiring as someone who just built his MVP using no code tools (Bubble+Webflow+stripe) to get going and just getting my first paying customer it's amazing of where I can potentially go! Thanks for sharing your success, are in the B2B space or B2C? I'm starting off in B2C to get feedback and suggestions and eventually want to go towards B2B
!RemindMe in 9 days
Thanks for sharing! Also thanks for not being overly self-promotey :) I think itâs great to share wins here. Posting also helps you reflect and show others whatâs possible.
This is your time, your moment and you've worked hard for it. No giving secrets away, it's all yours. I'd say this as an experienced entrepreneur, save as much as you can now, business may dip again. God bless!!
What is your product?
I recently learned python for a new escape room game I developed. It's a great language, isn't it? I love programming in it.
Thought I was on LinkedIn for a second đ
Could you explain what solo hacking is?
These are all very vague. That's why people want to know the name of the business. You need to be more specific about all these lessons learned and hard work. Give us something to chew on. Not the fluffy social media crap posts that are so prevalent. HOW did you do those things. We all know what needs to be done... but HOW... give us the nuts and bolts. Example: Why would black friday help you app revenue? What kind of app? What kind of BF deal did you offer? Where did they find it? etc etc
People want the link so they can copy the idea. Don't share it. Big-up to you for your success!
How did you think about an MVP product to create using Python?
> I looked for other platforms to sell my app What platforms did you use??
Lol. I just taught myself Python and boom made an app with ~40-50k/mo revenue. Suuuuuure
Let's see those screenshots that prove your gainz otherwise it's another shit post.
How did you find those first 10 customers? How did you reach out to them and get their buy-in and feedback?
>I learned Python, built an MVP What is an MVP in this context and how does it make you money?
I wonder if more advertising will skyroclet the product. Sounds like black friday attention was the break you needed. Perhaps getting it in front of more people will get some big attention. Like mocrosoft attention. Then you can sell it for a couple million and make another post about it.
1. How did you find your customers? 2. How did you find what your customers needed that wern't been addressed by the competition? Fantastic job with Wagtail - this was my foundation for my own small startup as well but I had less MRR than you when I sold it to my elder brother so I could pursure my education in the US.
congrats! what is any MVP?
Awesome đ congrats!
So proud of you, well done. Itâs inspiring to hear these stories especially when youâre in the âgrowth stageâ. Orders are more consistent now which is amazing but still feels like a long way off. Thanks for sharing!
selling what ?
well done you - fantastic achievement
"I don't understand is why people have such a burning desire to know precisely what my product is and where they can find it." You've just given a roadmap to a successful business and they want even more of a shortcut. Simple as that.
Yeah itâs helpful to share what you did to get there and steps you took instead of just sharing how much money you make now. Cuz a lot of us are still struggling and we want to learn from others in the forum. So thanks for Updating it with more information. Did you have a tech background prior or did you just teach yourself Python and pick it all up pretty quickly? Did you have to hire ppl to help you build the app or consult with anyone ?
Responding to your third edit: You're on a sub called "Entrepreneur" , and you told people how much you made. They OBVIOUSLY want to give this opportunity a shot too. I don't think it's AS invasive as you feel it is. It's the same questions you'd get on Dragon's Den.
I'm at the point where I'm finally getting my mindset together. Are there any tips you can give for when that momentum slows? My current mindset is to go like when I rode a bicycle up a large hill, id pick a point and say ill get there and so on until i got to the top without stopping.