Founders share the challenges of running a tech business • Hacker News Board

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#11

Post by jermaustin1 » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 6:39 PM UTC

blizkreeg wrote: post #9

taylorhou wrote: post #3

enjoy how there's perspective given from the responders with their current MRR as well. as a founder of a bootstrapped tech-enabled service startup with $135k+ MRR is cash flow. Accounts Receivable is a PITA and it still hasn't been solved (even with the likes of bill.com, harvest, stripe, paypal, qbo, etc...) - i'd almost pay for a company to outsource our AR to completely to represent us on initial AR, 30-90 day AR…

at that size, would it be better to just hire an in-house accounting/book-keeping person?

I was going to recommend the same thing, but I also know there are plenty of AR companies out there. YC even funded one called YayPay. I know my accountant will chase down invoices for me if I asked him (for a fee of course), thankfully QuickBooks Online handles this reporting, and has a one click solution to resend Invoices. I don't do $135k/mo, and only send a handful or two of invoices each month, so I cannot comment on how well it scales.

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#12

Post by hhs » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 7:10 PM UTC

With respect to each company, what do the numbers in the parentheses mean? Is that profit, revenue or something else per month?

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#13

Post by randlet » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 7:24 PM UTC

hhs wrote: post #12

With respect to each company, what do the numbers in the parentheses mean? Is that profit, revenue or something else per month?

This is almost always (and frustratingly!) Monthly Recurring Revenue.

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#14

Post by hhs » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 7:29 PM UTC

randlet wrote: post #13

hhs wrote: post #12

With respect to each company, what do the numbers in the parentheses mean? Is that profit, revenue or something else per month?

This is almost always (and frustratingly!) Monthly Recurring Revenue.

Good to know, thank you!

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#15

Post by nif2ee » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 7:43 PM UTC

Never trust anything that comes from indiehackers, this is a community of professional indie astroturfers and manipulators of everything from renaming the same product and launching it every couple months on ProductHunt and buying upvotes, to baiting HNers with "How I made $X by doing Y". It's a pump and dump scheme on sub-million dollar levels.

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#16

Post by gumby » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 7:50 PM UTC

nif2ee wrote: post #15

Never trust anything that comes from indiehackers, this is a community of professional indie astroturfers and manipulators of everything from renaming the same product and launching it every couple months on ProductHunt and buying upvotes, to baiting HNers with "How I made $X by doing Y". It's a pump and dump scheme on sub-million dollar levels.

Not sure why a coffee company is a “tech startup”.

(Though TBF Amazon didn’t feel like a tech company in the 1990s)

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#17

Post by Wordball » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 8:10 PM UTC

nif2ee wrote: post #15

Never trust anything that comes from indiehackers, this is a community of professional indie astroturfers and manipulators of everything from renaming the same product and launching it every couple months on ProductHunt and buying upvotes, to baiting HNers with "How I made $X by doing Y". It's a pump and dump scheme on sub-million dollar levels.

hmmm, odd that you're getting downvoted...

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#18

Post by Wordball » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 8:15 PM UTC

gumby wrote: post #16

nif2ee wrote: post #15

Never trust anything that comes from indiehackers, this is a community of professional indie astroturfers and manipulators of everything from renaming the same product and launching it every couple months on ProductHunt and buying upvotes, to baiting HNers with "How I made $X by doing Y". It's a pump and dump scheme on sub-million dollar levels.

Not sure why a coffee company is a “tech startup”. (Though TBF Amazon didn’t feel like a tech company in the 1990s)

It has a live chat and five different tracking solutions implemented. What about this doesn't look like a tech business?

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#19

Post by sosodev » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 8:21 PM UTC

nif2ee wrote: post #15

Never trust anything that comes from indiehackers, this is a community of professional indie astroturfers and manipulators of everything from renaming the same product and launching it every couple months on ProductHunt and buying upvotes, to baiting HNers with "How I made $X by doing Y". It's a pump and dump scheme on sub-million dollar levels.

I’m not sure you can lump all of IH together into one big undesirable thing. All platforms have bad apples but there’s plenty of good information if you look closely.

Re: Founders share the challenges of running a tech business

#20

Post by aldoushuxley001 » Fri, Feb 14, 2020, 8:24 PM UTC

nif2ee wrote: post #15

Never trust anything that comes from indiehackers, this is a community of professional indie astroturfers and manipulators of everything from renaming the same product and launching it every couple months on ProductHunt and buying upvotes, to baiting HNers with "How I made $X by doing Y". It's a pump and dump scheme on sub-million dollar levels.

How can it be a pump and dump if they’re not public companies and generally rely on subscriptions?

Indiehackers is a great community that produces a lot of useful content for other bootstrappers. Sorry that you think it’s all a fraud, but I suspect you’re throwing out the baby with the bath water.