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Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

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Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#41

Post by cullenking »

patio11 wrote: post #39
JangoSteve wrote: post #13

I guess I'm a successful bootstrapper by your definition. Revenues vary, but tens of multiples of your definition at this point (am I the only one that still feels weird about divulging this info in public?). I'm a single-founder. The startup is http://www.ratemystudentrental.com , which licenses private-label subscriptions to universities. I also have a consultancy that builds web-based software, and that consultanc…

am I the only one that still feels weird about divulging this info in public? For me its kind of like boiling a frog. I get all kinds of queasy about telling people what my salary was (I was raised such that one just did not do that), but back when I was making all of $24.95 in sales a month well pfft no harm in saying that... and then all you have to do is "not stop". Amusing cultural note: Japan is almost totally o…

My father raised me the opposite. He was always open about salaries but let me know other people weren't always comfortable talking about it. It resulted in me being pretty open about it personally, but I can understand where the awkward thing comes from.

Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#42

Post by dstik »

The blog: The Art of Non-Conformity by Chris Guillebeau (http://chrisguillebeau.com/3x5/), writes a lot about bootstrapping and how he started out, he now has a self sustaining blog and affords to travel all over the world and blog about it. It's a great blog, lots of inspiration, and I think it'll definitely meet your criteria.

Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#43

Post by ahoyhere »

jamroom wrote: post #24

Maybe it is just me, but I've never seen the reason for being "transparent" about internal business processes. While I am certain that the HN crowd here finds it interesting, our customers have never once asked us (in 8+ years) to divulge our monthly sales figures. We are 100% focused on our customers, and really don't worry what other entrepreneurs might think of our company. Does anyone here have any stats that sho…

If your customers are fellow entrepreneurs, it's one way to lure them in.

If your ideology involves the encouragement of more small biz, it's a way to further your mission.

And if you do like both of those things, but don't think your customers need to know, then blog about it elsewhere. Most won't bother to search for it :)

Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#45

Post by yankeeracer73 »

modoc wrote: post #17

Two out of three ain't bad? While I'd like to blog about the internals and experience, we sell mostly in the B2B large corporation space, and our small size is our largest pain point during the sales cycle. I think an open blog about our internal business growth would make things worse for us, not better.

Interesting - we're in the same space but I don't think I know a single paying client of ours that actually reads our blog. Most of our readership comes from Hacker News and friends - it's a little like living in two worlds.

Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#46

Post by mahmud »

chops wrote: post #9

I'm a single-founder, bootstrapped, successful (by your definition - my monthly revenue has ranged from $2.5k to $13k since launch) startup founder. I don't, however, have a public blog about how I run or started the business. It's not that I'm trying to hide it, I just don't have a blog. My site is http://www.dkpsystem.com (Hosting for MMO guilds). Woo self-promo. A while back (over a year), I had a reasonably open…

You managed to earn a living from something I both don't understand and despise :-)

Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#47

Post by mahmud »

modoc wrote: post #17

Two out of three ain't bad? While I'd like to blog about the internals and experience, we sell mostly in the B2B large corporation space, and our small size is our largest pain point during the sales cycle. I think an open blog about our internal business growth would make things worse for us, not better.

Another B2B guy. Shoot me an email, will ya? I am alone here :-/

Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#48

Post by decipher »

amix wrote: post #28
boundlessdreamz wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems from the homepage that Todoist.com is free. How do you make money? Ads? Can you share more numbers?

Freemium, but I don't promote it that much. When people pay they expect support, new features and new iterations - something that I don't have time to provide as Todoist isn't my active startup. For numbers: Todoist has 100.000+ users and only a few % paying customers - enough to cover costs and make it profitable.

Todoist is by far my favourite task manager, and has helped me complete countless projects over the last couple of years.

great stuff amix.

Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#49

Post by icey »

sdrinf wrote: post #5
icey wrote: post #3

There are quite a few successful bootstrappers on The Business of Software forum: http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?biz

Would you mind linking a few examples, by pointing to their revenue confession posts?

I don't have any of the comments bookmarked, but I'm sure you could find them with a tiny amount of Googling.

Re: Ask HN: successful, transparent bootstrappers?

#50

Post by skmurphy »

sdrinf wrote: post #31
jamroom wrote: post #24

Maybe it is just me, but I've never seen the reason for being "transparent" about internal business processes. While I am certain that the HN crowd here finds it interesting, our customers have never once asked us (in 8+ years) to divulge our monthly sales figures. We are 100% focused on our customers, and really don't worry what other entrepreneurs might think of our company. Does anyone here have any stats that sho…

It doesn't, but you miss an important point: essentially, the "product business community" -those, who are in for the long run- is a small one. The real ROI does not come from having more customers, but rather from business contacts, who can (and will) provide important info, and valuable insight, for you, at the right time, which will have real impact on your bottom line. There are, of course, many others way to do…

given your desire to join the "product business community" it would seem you should put some information in your profile so others can understand who you are and where you are coming from.
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