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How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

campfirelabs.co

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Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#81

Post by systematical »

wyldfire wrote: post #33

Stupid question, how could you possibly automate lead generation? For that matter, how do you do it manually? Search for potential customers and read up about their business?

You can, I replied to the main thread about my two side businesses without going into specifics. Both my businesses were lead generation. I won't give the industries a way, but here's the jist.

I had a system I built for a clients lead generation business. I asked if I could re-purpose the software and in exchange I'd provide the enhancements free as well as discounted development. He agreed. It was a basic system where a lead would come in for a geographical area, that area would have a vendor assigned, and an email would be dispatched. If you do the SEO and marketing right, the leads become pretty passive.

I improved the system in two ways:

1. My client generated monthly invoices. This was a problem since he had to chase people down for money. I setup a credit system where you purchased credits (leads) in advanced. I gave a 20% discount for purchasing 100 credits at a time. I also gave new customers their first 10 credits free. No obligation, no contract, not joking.

2. Email sucks. I integrated twilio and did direct call dispatching with numbers I controlled. I spammed the internet with these numbers. If a customer ever dropped off, I'd just find someone else. Rarely did I need to do that since the leads were so good.

This required a lot of work up front, but in areas where my marketing was dialed in already it just always generated income. This is the kind of stuff fluff articles like this never tell you, the actual specifics.

You could now take this basic model and apply to any industry that requires leads. Bonus if the industry is underserved, not huge, and filled with techno-peasants.

Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#82

Post by sbov »

Skunkleton wrote: post #29
zanny wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is such a modern problem too. No matter what anyone feels about it having to farm crops to eat was definitely meaningful work a hundred years ago. Even if you were being exploited in a factory suicide was common but mostly from abuse and injury rather than the vacuousness of the job. Its wholly contemporary to invent bullshit jobs and imagine complexity to keep people at desks en masse, leaving them with such a…

Truth. My job is "important", but at the same time I don't think anyone's life would be measurably worse if I didn't do it (besides mine lol). IMO it is kind of a problem with software in general. It is getting me down honestly; I could use some advice.

Part of why I like working at smaller companies that focus on serving small-medium sized businesses. At this level you are actually building a piece of software for users rather the C-suite.

Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#83

Post by csa »

zaphirplane wrote: post #74
csa wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I vouched for the dead comments. The story might need to have a missing date on it (4 years old?), but the two comments that the author of the post made don’t seem to violate the terms or spirit of HN rules. If someone can show me how the rules were broken in his comments, I will gladly unvouch.

Maybe because it’s advertising, wrapped in an old article.

Sure. The post could probably be legitimately downvoted. The comments from the author, however, just don’t seem problematic.

Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#84

Post by illumin8 »

derekp7 wrote: post #43

If you don't mind me asking, I'd like some help laying out what my next steps should be on one of my side projects. I had an idea for a side project, ran it by a hand full of friends and associates, expecting to have a bunch of holes poked into it (they have done that to me many times in the past). This time they all think I have something. Problem is I work full time, as a Linux systems engineer (30 years of Unix ex…

Honestly, as someone who has started a 5-6 figure monthly "side-hustle" in an area where there are many other players, and which requires learning new frontend skills, while I'm a crusty UNIX/Linux head, 30 years experience like you, I would say: just do it!

Here is the thing I learned in 2018, in which I also generated >$700K of side income working 10-12 hours a week (mornings, evenings, and weekends): If you know how to learn new tech skills at a reasonable rate, you can learn anything you need to do in a few hours. Obviously this doesn't apply to sophisticated things, but how many of the things you need to do in tech are really that hard? For example, my client needed to update a static website with data stored in Airtable - I spent 2 hours finding some python code that was open source on GitHub that scrapes Airtable every few minutes and puts the data in a JSON file that his static website can now read. 2 hours of effort and I have a client that I billed almost $1000 and he's completely happy with the outcome. His static website is now dynamically updated from Airtable. Not only that, I learned a new skill and I can repeat this for other clients without the effort of learning. Multiply this over several hundred days over several years and you have an amazingly strong side hustle.

Just do it, you can figure out the details as you go...

Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#86

Post by lowercased »

lifeformed wrote: post #41
usaphp wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He wanted to believe everything he did was perfect and he got his wealth purely from skill He did, his skill was to get on it at a right time in a right place. His skill was to keep working on it and believing in himself. Saying it was due to luck is just pure disrespect.

It's both - if he didn't have his skills, he wouldn't succeed either. But for him to deny that luck played any role is naive. We should work our hardest so we're ready to shine when the opportunity comes, but we need to remain humble because not everyone gets the same opportunities.

he had the skill to be born a man of a certain to certain parents in, i'm assuming here, was a western country in the last 60 years or so. a less skilled person would have been born a farm worker 3000 years ago.

Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#87

Post by zorga »

Skunkleton wrote: post #21
blakesterz wrote: post #6

> As a millennial there are few things that rank as desirable as finding a recurring source of income that doesn’t take much work That made me laugh! As someone much older I can honestly say that there are few things that rank as desirable as finding a recurring source of income that doesn’t take much work for me too.

As a millennial myself, I would like the need for income taken off the table so that I can find a recurring source of meaningful work.

> As a millennial myself, I would like the need for income taken off the table

In other words, I'd like someone else to pay for taking care of me, my shelter, my food.

> so that I can find a recurring source of meaningful work.

So that I can follow my desires rather than being forced to pay my own way.

As a gen-x'er I just have say, you are not entitled to other people's labor, certainly not so you can avoid labor you don't like. The world just doesn't work that way, taking care of your own needs is necessary work, whether you you find it meaningful or not.

Virtually everyone would prefer not "needing income", that's just another way of saying "be rich". Meaningful work is a luxury.

Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#88

Post by illumin8 »

nowarninglabel wrote: post #54

"the first thing I did was hire a team in the Philipinnes to ensure I never had to stay up until 1am building lists" Is it possible for anyone to share how they found people to hire/outsource building sales lists to?

He says right in the article: odesk.

Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#89

Post by chucksmash »

csa wrote: post #27
gonehome wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Replying for mike2477 who wrote the article and responded to this post, but his comments are dead. Mike - it looks like you got shadow banned, but it’s not clear why? Maybe dang can help.

I vouched for the dead comments. The story might need to have a missing date on it (4 years old?), but the two comments that the author of the post made don’t seem to violate the terms or spirit of HN rules. If someone can show me how the rules were broken in his comments, I will gladly unvouch.

Maybe shadowbanned because he's the Mike of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13339723 fame?

Re: How I Built a $5K a Month Side Project

#90

Post by zorga »

zanny wrote: post #28
Skunkleton wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a millennial myself, I would like the need for income taken off the table so that I can find a recurring source of meaningful work.

This is such a modern problem too. No matter what anyone feels about it having to farm crops to eat was definitely meaningful work a hundred years ago. Even if you were being exploited in a factory suicide was common but mostly from abuse and injury rather than the vacuousness of the job. Its wholly contemporary to invent bullshit jobs and imagine complexity to keep people at desks en masse, leaving them with such a…

> Its wholly contemporary to invent bullshit jobs and imagine complexity to keep people at desks en masse

I don't believe that's remotely true. That bullshit jobs exist is certainly true, but it's due to inefficiencies in communication and incentives at larger companies. Bullshit jobs eat into profit, companies don't do it on purpose, it's just harder and harder to weed those people out the bigger you get; the more people you have the easier it is for non-productive people to hide and not have it known.

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