Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

toomas.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 158 posts

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#101

Post by rhizome »

ihaveajob wrote: post #4
noxToken wrote: post #3

I've always wondered what the advice would look like if you compiled a list of what not to do from failed companies. TFA is a list of the successful ones who got it right, so we know what they did to make it. Yet I'm sure many people follow this advice and still fail. You can find wildly varying statistics, but somewhere between 50% and 90% of startups will fail within 2 years. What did those companies do (or failed…

Virtually all of them ran out of money because they didn't have enough customers to cover their expenses. It seems silly but if you put it in basic terms, this usually maps to something very concrete in your domain.

if you put it in basic terms, this usually maps to something very concrete in your domain.

For those of us who didn't go to college, can you translate "maps to something very concrete in your domain" into concrete terms? It's pretty abstract.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#102

Post by yathern »

rhizome wrote: post #101
ihaveajob wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Virtually all of them ran out of money because they didn't have enough customers to cover their expenses. It seems silly but if you put it in basic terms, this usually maps to something very concrete in your domain.

if you put it in basic terms, this usually maps to something very concrete in your domain. For those of us who didn't go to college, can you translate "maps to something very concrete in your domain" into concrete terms? It's pretty abstract.

It means that in the area in which a (failed) business tried to operate, the failure can be more specific than "couldn't cover expenses". For example, a shoe company that makes very cheap shoes. Costs 5 dollars to make, sells them for 10 dollars. They have basic operating expenses of 50 dollars a day. They need to sell 10 shoes a day to stay in business by the skin of their teeth. If they don't, they 'failed to attract enough customers to cover expenses'. But they could have a more specific view:

1) We didn't have any advertising since we were operating on a shoestring (hehe) budget - losing customers

2) Our low prices actually made us seem like a low quality entry in the market, and hurt our sales.

3) We could have invested more into our production line to reduce recurrent costs.

Or any number of things. But it ultimately comes down to "we didn't have enough money"

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#103

Post by jansho »

komali2 wrote: post #96
jansho wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading about success might create a feedback loop to yourself so that you feel more motivated and possibly more guided to get to success. Kinda like hanging out with games enthusiasts, and you gradually become one yourself?

I have definitely read in one of those exact type of books that surrounding yourself with successful people helps you become successful. Same for surrounding yourself with the rich. Something about feedback loops, and greater access to opportunities through networking.

On the other hand you could start experiencing imposter's syndrome. In any case, it's not easy to get that golden ticket for such circles, let alone maintain your rep once there!

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#104

Post by komali2 »

jansho wrote: post #103
komali2 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have definitely read in one of those exact type of books that surrounding yourself with successful people helps you become successful. Same for surrounding yourself with the rich. Something about feedback loops, and greater access to opportunities through networking.

On the other hand you could start experiencing imposter's syndrome. In any case, it's not easy to get that golden ticket for such circles, let alone maintain your rep once there!

>Imposter's syndrome

To be fair, there's about sixteen million articles on how to eliminate this.

>it's not easy to get that golden ticket for such circles

Not sure I agree. I want to remember the book I read this in but I can't, but in this case the dude just rented in an super expensive apartment complex. I guess he was able to do that because he had a job, sure, but the point was he rented higher than he was comfortable doing, yet it paid off in the end.

Most of the ways I'm thinking of involve money (get VIP badges at conferences, clubs, whatever), but a simple and free way is to go to shitloads of meetups and other "people gathering" events, being gregarious and meeting everyone you can. No reason you couldn't bump into a high falutin CEO at a motorcycle ride day or on the Frisbee golf course or something.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#105

Post by strongai »

zapperdapper wrote: post #48
matthewking wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you do with the other 9 months of the year? side projects? travel? Id be interested to hear how your lifestyle is with all the free time. I've considered this approach myself too but more 6 months on, 6 months off. Scala in particular seems to pay extremely well (£600-£650 /day) so easy to make the money to live a comfortable lifestyle in 3 or 6 months per year. I think other dev contracts are usually around…

Hi Matthew, my rate is £400 a day, I'm a tech writer. Most contract developers I know are on a lot more than that. Double mostly. They do Java/Scala/Perl. That is probably just the niche I have been in though. My very first contract wasn't particularly high £260 a day, but you get known and you can charge more once you've got people who will vouch for you. With regards the 9 months. I write code (Python), read (a lot…

Hey zapperdapper

I'm so glad you posted. I'm a 57-year-old tech writer (UK-based) who followed a similar pattern to you for 10 years.

Then I got sick of static daily rates and now work as a permie (2 days in Birmingham, 3 days from home) for a US based tech company.

My first contract rate in 2004 was £350 a day, and now I'd probably struggle to make that again. Maybe £400, but above that, I'd need some special USPs. And from where I live, it's £50 a day to get to London, not to mention the extra 4 hour journey times!

Great to know you've found a perfect formula!

PS: Topping was also on my agenda until I reached 50.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#106

Post by ThomPete »

cmahler7 wrote: post #81
open_bear wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Survivorship bias: because for every Steve Jobs and Bill Gates there are millions of folks, whose business ended without any success (something like 80% of businesses close during the first year).

That's my point, 80% of entrepreneurs can't make it one year, so what are the odds of Steve Jobs starting multiple multi-billion dollar companies over multiple decades, with tens of thousands of decisions, through pure luck? You're saying that skill and knowledge play no part in success. A mentally handicapped person would have as good a chance at success as Steve Jobs by your logic, because it's all luck.

You are missing the point and having a wrong understanding of what talent means.

There are many extremely talented people doing exactly the same not succeeding. You have the same in everything from music to movies and art.

The primary defining factor are things which has nothing to do with the talent but with timing and luck. So the primary insight is to play the game to have a chance to win.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#107

Post by ThomPete »

komali2 wrote: post #94
Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>what are the odds of Steve Jobs starting multiple multi-billion dollar companies over multiple decades High. The first success is luck and the rest are a consequence of this initial lucky break (namely via generous access to capital).

>generous access to capital Increases total number of opportunity chances. I don't like the lottery metaphor, because the math doesn't work out (you can't buy out the total # of lottery numbers to guarantee a win and still profit), but basically, the more money you got, the more tickets you can buy, the higher your chance of winning. Mark Cuban said something along the lines of "You only have to be right once." Get y…

I wasn't making a lottery metaphor. I was making a if you start a company you have better chances than playing the lottery but you are still playing that game.

There are literally thousands of talented people executing like there is no tomorrow and failing.

Access to capital, access to distribution, luck, timing. Thats what you primarily have the other factors are less relevant because most people playing the entrepreneur game have those.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#108

Post by ThomPete »

awb wrote: post #69
ThomPete wrote: post #57

In other words. Reading about success to become successful is like reading the autobiography of lotterywinners. There are no secrets to success other than luck, timing and actually shipping your product (or play the lottery). Contrary to the lottery though much fewer people ship and there are much more winning lottery coupons. There is nothing to learn about how to build a successful product. If you want to read anyt…

Not true at all. There are methods and practices that can help with the skill of starting and running a business. I've done it before successfully and the advice in the article is helpful. Luck helps too, but you need to set yourself up to be able to take advantage of the luck you get.

There are no methods to make you successful. If you believe that you are fooling yourself. There are plenty of methods and practices to run a company but that has nothing to do with whether it successful. You can be very unsuccessful and still following all the right methods and practices.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#109

Post by ThomPete »

mendeza wrote: post #66
ThomPete wrote: post #57

In other words. Reading about success to become successful is like reading the autobiography of lotterywinners. There are no secrets to success other than luck, timing and actually shipping your product (or play the lottery). Contrary to the lottery though much fewer people ship and there are much more winning lottery coupons. There is nothing to learn about how to build a successful product. If you want to read anyt…

I don't think this is lottery winning. We all get paid a lot of money for our skills, they just work and observe that some of their skills can be amplified in value(in the viewpoint of contractors that turn to startups). There has been a lot of indiehackers that have started as contractors and built startups. I think the biggest value I learned is, "Understand you market" and "find problems that people have" and its…

No one is claiming it's purely lottery winning simply that even among the very talented people there are many failures so the only thing that really stand out is the luck and the timing aspects. Talent is mostly a hygiene factor.

Re: Things I’ve Learned from Reading IndieHackers

#110

Post by jansho »

komali2 wrote: post #104
jansho wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand you could start experiencing imposter's syndrome. In any case, it's not easy to get that golden ticket for such circles, let alone maintain your rep once there!

>Imposter's syndrome To be fair, there's about sixteen million articles on how to eliminate this. >it's not easy to get that golden ticket for such circles Not sure I agree. I want to remember the book I read this in but I can't, but in this case the dude just rented in an super expensive apartment complex. I guess he was able to do that because he had a job, sure, but the point was he rented higher than he was comfo…

Well, I'm not sure if I'll ever have the wit and guts to hustle my way to that circle, dunno if I even want to in the first place. But there's truth in "it's who you know, not what you know" so ya, feedback-looped, thanks ;)
Post reply on HN