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Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

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Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#221

Post by floydax »

adpoe wrote: post #214
floydax wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you share the store URL? Please check my profile. I wonder, how do you deal with customs issues? I've had issues in the past while shipping outside EU and customers always expected me to solve the issues for them

Yes, here's my URL, feel free to share =) http://modshop.guitars/ For customer issues, you just need to be responsive and as helpful as you can be. I've also had issues shipping outside the US, but Shopify (the platform that I use) lets you disable shipping outside of certain countries. I've had some issues shipping to Canada, (never had an EU customer), so I only ship within the USA now. And changing that was only a…

Thanks for sharing, looks awesome :)

Do you use Shopify for any specific reason? Or it simply satisfies your needs?

Last question (I promise!): Do you place the orders manually or do you have any sort of automated system integrated with your supplier?

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#222

Post by 0898 »

bemmu wrote: post #17

I've been running https://www.candyjapan.com for about five years. It has (just barely) made enough to support my life in Japan. I'm currently writing a "year in review", will probably post it next week.

I bought your book on Leanpub. Great read, as I recall.

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#223

Post by client4 »

chrishacken wrote: post #109

I'm not sure if this qualifies as an "online business", but I started an ISP in November '15. It's also not entirely "one-person". I am the sole founder, but I do hire part-time help on occasion if I'm swamped. It started off as a WISP and has finally grown to the point where we are beginning to deploy fiber. The site is https://nepafiber.com I still work full-time as a systems engineer, but the business started brin…

Hey! I run a new ISP in Montana. We're actually about to head to China to source more affordable fiber and OSP materials. If you want to chat we have a slack channel called #ispschool that has a bunch of ISP owners in it. http://slack.tsi.io

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#224

Post by kerryfalk »

jdc0589 wrote: post #209

This barely counts, but I started a small premium handmade custom leather goods brand about 6 months ago: http://vulcancrafting.com . cash/card wallets, notebook/journal wallets, belts, etc... I didn't want to spend all my time after work sitting at a computer. I'm not in the positive yet; there's an equipment investment cost, I intentionally don't keep a huge order backlog, and I don't charge as much as I could for…

A friend of mine has been doing this for many years. I have bought a lot from him, and he's not cheap. I know he could make a lot more if he worked on his marketing a little bit, but I'm not sure he wants to.

https://www.instagram.com/madeinzaidasbasement/

Anyway, I love that there are more people doing this kind of stuff. Good luck!

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#225

Post by DanHulton »

acoyfellow wrote: post #191

I've been running https://OptKit.com for about 3 years. Launched it to almost immediate ramen profitability, but haven't focused full time on it yet. Bills get paid through consulting. On schedule to re-launch within 1-2 months with a stricter focus, better defined use-cases, and stronger differentiation from competition.

I had to close a fake chat interface and a bottom overlay (with a semi-insulting "no I don't want my website to be amazing" style message) before I could see enough of your site to make sense of it and begin to read it. Then a full-page popover obscured literally the entire site.

Not to sound too mean, but you lost me. I can't honestly be bothered to read sites that employ these tricks, and you flooded me with them. I had to fight my way past them just to read your core value proposition. And on reading further, it looks like all those popups... are your core value proposition?

Your tech may be wonderful, but I feel like you don't understand its influence on people's browsing behaviour - these tricks drive people away, not towards.

(Also, you have a spelling error in your hero section: "Call-To-Action's" does not require the apostrophe, as it is not possessive.)

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#226

Post by adpoe »

tmaly wrote: post #217
adpoe wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used Shopify's drop shipping guide to get started--it really is very helpful. They're invested in making you profitable (it's in their best interest as well, since they make $$ from you), and consequently their guides are very good. https://www.shopify.com/guides/dropshipping Fair warning though: you'll still have a ton of problems and spend time dealing with customers. For example, the first time I got a $100+ sal…

When you use AliExpress for drop shipping, are you making money as an affiliate or is it something different?

No, basically there are software add-ons to Shopify that let you import an AliExpress seller's product into your store.

Your customer never sees the original seller's listing, and therefore you can charge any price you want.

So, as long as you charge a price that is higher than the raw cost + S&H, you can then collect money from your sale, and use that to purchase the item from the AliExpress vendor (this is automated). Part of the automation process fills in your customer's mailing address, and the vendor fulfills their order directly. (So you don't have to hold any inventory, you're just the go-between.)

Your AliExpress vendors will know what's going on, but they expect and anticipate that people do this. It's how they make money.

Essentially, the service you provide is marketing, design, and salesmanship. They provide the product.

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#227

Post by 0898 »

jessegrosjean wrote: post #149

I've been doing Hog Bay Software mostly as (just me) since 2004. Tried expanding with 3 others around 2010-2013, but I'm a developer, not manager. Also the whole app marking seemed to be having troubles. Back to just me again last few years. Main focus and income right now is: - https://www.taskpaper.com The business is building Mac productivity apps for individual users... i.e. not focused on selling to businesses.…

I do my best writing in WriteRoom – thanks for making it.

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#229

Post by jawn- »

dr_win wrote: post #197

Selling macOS apps at https://www.binaryage.com . TotalFinder.app sales is what allowed me to work on my own projects full time. This is what I personally define as a success. I own 100% of my time and stuff I create. Since introduction of macOS system integrity protection sales have been poor. But luckily I made enough in previous years so I have pretty long runway to build something new. If you are interested how i…

totalspaces2 is terrific! thank you for that.

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses?

#230

Post by mohoyt »

I've been running Bowtiful Ties (http://www.bowtifulties.com) as a side project for the last 4 or so years.

Everything is vertically integrated and hand made by myself, from the bow ties, to the packaging, to the website and all processes. Bootstrapped from the start, it's pretty low volume, but nicely profitable.

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