my co-founder in my current startup has one. he is an australian and was making 150k/year out of college, but hated it. moved to eastern europe, made a staff management system and makes 1k/month now (like 6-8 months into it), but that is enough to live and travel all around europe and the U.S with a few hours a month of work.
Ask HN: Small product, single founder success stories?
151–156 of 156 posts
Re: Ask HN: Small product, single founder success stories?
#152A bit late to the party, but... I'm the single founder behind Jitbit Software (website: http://www.jitbit.com/) tho, I'm in the process of bringing in a co-founder, since it's really getting out of control, I can't live like that any more.
I do both web-based apps (bestselling one is "Jitbit Helpdesk") and traditional apps for Windows (bestselling is Macro Recorder), just look at the web-site.
I started almost 6 years ago and WORKED REALLY FREAKING HARD, no secret here. I literally had no sleep for weeks. After 3 years I quit my job and went full time. Last year (2010) was $210k in profits. Also, 2010 was the first year I brought in more remote devs and support people since it was getting really hard...
We have kids so no continuous travelling for us (every kid needs a home, with his own room, his own bed + teddybear)... But we can choose to live in any place we want (we chose London).
Re: Ask HN: Small product, single founder success stories?
#153I'm a single founder (Haystack Software). I wrote/write Arq (online backup to S3). I consider it a success because it pays my bills. A huge side benefit is it gets me into conversations with folks who tell me their business pain. I'm working on products to solve those pains as well. I was (and still am) hugely inspired by DHH's presentation at Startup School 08 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CDXJ6bMkMY
Having those conversations with the folks with the business pains is golden.
I want to switch my current development job, among other things, because I don't get to interact with the customers having the business problems, and I want to solve them (not to mention it's where the money is, but I honestly like solving business problems too).
Being empowered to solve them should be gratifying too.
Thanks for sharing.
Re: Ask HN: Small product, single founder success stories?
#154I'm the solo founder of an MMO guild hosting company (5 years and counting as of this past May), which was doing quite well years ago ($90k+/year), but is now much less busy. The site: http://www.dkpsystem.com . Honestly, I blame the fact that I've had almost the opposite mentality as the 37 Signals guys, where I've added most of the features my customers ask for, thus making the system more complicated than it shoul…
How have your cold calls been going? I'm curious about targeting some niche industries but feel I'd be wasting my time with cold calls.
Cold calling has been surprisingly fruitful. I'm getting about a 70% success rate for setting up an in-person meeting. Granted, all have been in the Milwaukee area, so setting up a meeting is more "personal" than the next logical step, which will be trying to set up remote meetings with a screen-cap demo. That might be much more difficult. For now, when I start calling places about 50-100 miles away, I'll give them the option to do a tele-meeting, otherwise, I'll gladly drive down there.
Re: Ask HN: Small product, single founder success stories?
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
How have your cold calls been going? I'm curious about targeting some niche industries but feel I'd be wasting my time with cold calls.
Cold calling has been surprisingly fruitful. I'm getting about a 70% success rate for setting up an in-person meeting. Granted, all have been in the Milwaukee area, so setting up a meeting is more "personal" than the next logical step, which will be trying to set up remote meetings with a screen-cap demo. That might be much more difficult. For now, when I start calling places about 50-100 miles away, I'll give them t…
Followup (since I thought I had already posted this and it's too late to edit):
Feel free to toss me an email at gumm@sigma-star.com or something. I'm curious how it goes with your project and the cold-calling.
Re: Ask HN: Small product, single founder success stories?
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am curious to know how well you are doing with your Android sales as I am looking to release an Android app soon. Is Android as hard to monetize as people say? Did you dual launch your apps on iPhone and Android? Are your apps paid or ad supported or both? How are you marketing your apps? Thanks in advance
I've never had any trouble monetizing Android, but I've never known anything else. I only do Android, not iPhone. Although I did just get a mac.. My apps are paid, ranging from 2.99 to 4.99. Some hits, some misses. I don't do any marketing whatsoever.
Thanks Mizza this helps