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6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

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Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#141

Post by mft_ »

s3cur3 wrote: post #125
jnfr wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guess it's a good thing I'm not calculating totals by hand within the app! :)

I _wish_ I could have this good an attitude about people being assholes over tiny mistakes I make in public. One rude comment like the GP’s can easily ruin my mood for hours. People forget that the person on the other side of the keyboard is a human. :(

Totally agree. Having read a lot of similar threads on HN, relentless positivity and humbleness (maybe with a sprinkling of humour) seems to be the solution.

Reminds me a little of being very young, at school, and learning to deal with other kids taking shots to look for a weakness - effectively early mild bullying. Then, again, the rule was stay positive and don’t show them you’re upset, or else they’ve found their weakness... and it will get worse.

Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#142

Post by DoreenMichele »

z3t4 wrote: post #140
DoreenMichele wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is absolutely true and it's been enormously helpful to me to actively seek out such information and have a more balanced perspective. An important difference seems to be that women very frequently get a lot of weird and problematic attention before they are big and it often outweighs the positives. If you get enough positive attention and money out of it, putting up with some icky stuff can be worth it. But wome…

You have to grow thick skin. People will try to bring you down mentally. Doesn't even matter if you are famous, the world is full of people that will try to put themselves above you so that they can feel better about themselves. Its just that the more ppl you talk to the more of those you will interact with. Get moderators that will moderate public forums ( control your communication channels). Dont share stuff about…

My skin is pretty thick. "Don't share stuff about your private life." is probably the more pertinent bit of advice.

I think it's not obvious to women that men share less of such info "in public" because they often share such info with women, even women they barely know. I am often appalled at the degree to which total strangers overshare with me and just immediately trust me with info I really shouldn't be getting.

It took me an overly long time to conclude this is actually a behavior that's extremely problematic to be on the receiving end of. It helps keep women trapped in a private role (which people expect them to play for free) and helps keep them out of a public role (ie a role you would pay them money for).

In essence, people want me to be a shoulder to cry on and it actively prevents me from being taken seriously. They want me to play a wife or mom role and they expect to get that from me completely for free. I'm supposed to care out of the goodness of my heart.

It doesn't open doors for me to be trustworthy in that fashion. It closes them. It's an expectation of slave labor and it's nothing short of abusive treatment, especially when you consider I was also treated this way while literally homeless and going hungry.

That assumption that moms care for "free" is really an assumption that her husband makes good money and is providing for her.

If you aren't paying my bills or otherwise taking care of me in some kind of meaningful fashion, expecting me to "care" about you while you don't give a damn about my welfare and won't help me establish an adequate income is just shitty behavior.

And it's rampant. It's pretty much everywhere and from almost everyone. It's appalling.

Anyway, I've gotten better about figuring out how and where to draw that line (between public and private) and it's made life suck less. Onward and upward and all that.

Edit: It's late. I'm tired. I really meant to also make the point that women being deterred by ugliness on the internet is often a genuine safety concern and not them simply being thin skinned.

This is a real problem for women you that don't typically see for men.

Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#143

Post by hef19898 »

ComputerGuru wrote: post #132
hef19898 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damn, I might be guilty as charged! Not long ago, I officially launched greenleaves.io, a logistics startup. The main issue I have with the about us thing is, that for now it is just me. So I use a lot of we and such (the co founder will join as soon as there is enough money to sustain a second person, we both have family, so...). Would you to have quick look at https://greenleaves.io/about/ ? Because the last two we…

Those stock photos. cringe

I am working on a budget, so... But yeah, on the list to be replaced with something non-stock!

Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#144

Post by hef19898 »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #30
hef19898 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damn, I might be guilty as charged! Not long ago, I officially launched greenleaves.io, a logistics startup. The main issue I have with the about us thing is, that for now it is just me. So I use a lot of we and such (the co founder will join as soon as there is enough money to sustain a second person, we both have family, so...). Would you to have quick look at https://greenleaves.io/about/ ? Because the last two we…

Try reading this: https://johnnycupcakes.com/pages/about Then sit down and "tell your story" in writing as if you were telling it over beers at a pub to a few new-ish friends who don't all equally well know your backstory. Get someone to read through it before publishing it. Good feedback is very helpful. Also, grammar check, spell check, etc. You want to be somewhat entertaining, but more importantly you want to cap…

Thanks for pointing me there! This whole about us thing took me longer to write than the content for the rest of the page, I hate selling myself. Seems I have my work cut out for me over the next couple of days!

Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#146

Post by [deleted] »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #25
blakesterz wrote: post #2

This was super interesting! The design really helped as well. I liked this one: "Lesson learned: People care about the narrative behind your product, so don't be afraid to tell your story!" As someone who finds new things on HN all the time, I always check the "about" page, especially if it's something that isn't free. I'm surprised at how often the "About Us" isn't actually "About Anyone", there's no names, it's all…

I'm surprised at how often the "About Us" isn't actually "About Anyone", there's no names, it's all just "Us" and "We". That's something I often get instructed to use when doing freelance writing. It is considered "professional" and "corporate speak." The other thing is that women and minorities sometimes intentionally hide or downplay their personal details. One guy with a very "foreign" sounding name legally change…

[deleted]

Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#147

Post by zerr »

ronyfadel wrote: post #108
zerr wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Generally speaking, don't most users prefer one-shot payments, even if it is a relatively large amount, rather than monthly subscriptions? So it doesn't require followup mental maintenance... You just pay once and forget.

They probably do prefer that, and also probably want free updates forever. But as a maker, recurring (read: predictable, continuous) revenue makes a software business easier to sustain and gives incentive to grow.

I was thinking the same way, but once a client explained that at least for them it is the same - they periodically roll out the major version update which is paid, and users pay upfront a lump sum the amount they had to pay anyway if it was a monthly subscription during that period.

Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#148

Post by allenu »

hef19898 wrote: post #28
DoreenMichele wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm surprised at how often the "About Us" isn't actually "About Anyone", there's no names, it's all just "Us" and "We". That's something I often get instructed to use when doing freelance writing. It is considered "professional" and "corporate speak." The other thing is that women and minorities sometimes intentionally hide or downplay their personal details. One guy with a very "foreign" sounding name legally change…

Damn, I might be guilty as charged! Not long ago, I officially launched greenleaves.io, a logistics startup. The main issue I have with the about us thing is, that for now it is just me. So I use a lot of we and such (the co founder will join as soon as there is enough money to sustain a second person, we both have family, so...). Would you to have quick look at https://greenleaves.io/about/ ? Because the last two we…

My feedback is the story itself has no flavor or personality to it. It’s essentially “we’ve worked in this space all our careers and then decided to start a company.”

What I would suggest is to add your personalities and some interesting details to it. Something like “Fred started out as an intern at a lightbulb factory and soon realized he loved making things more efficient.”

Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#149

Post by hef19898 »

allenu wrote: post #148
hef19898 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damn, I might be guilty as charged! Not long ago, I officially launched greenleaves.io, a logistics startup. The main issue I have with the about us thing is, that for now it is just me. So I use a lot of we and such (the co founder will join as soon as there is enough money to sustain a second person, we both have family, so...). Would you to have quick look at https://greenleaves.io/about/ ? Because the last two we…

My feedback is the story itself has no flavor or personality to it. It’s essentially “we’ve worked in this space all our careers and then decided to start a company.” What I would suggest is to add your personalities and some interesting details to it. Something like “Fred started out as an intern at a lightbulb factory and soon realized he loved making things more efficient.”

Thanks! That's really valuable feedback!

Re: 6 months in and $1k MRR: my biggest mistakes so far

#150

Post by glofish »

While I commend the creator on a good looking and well-designed user interface - I will say that it boggles my mind when people give up their login credentials to unknown entities on the internet.

There is this fundamental disconnect between wanting to save yourself some money - but not realizing that you are setting yourself up for immense risks. You can lose far-far more by signing up to a site like this than what it could ever possibly benefit you.

The same applies to the founder as well - it is all fun to reach 1k MRR - but are you prepared to shoulder the responsibility that comes with managing people's login accounts and finance records? It is a massive risk.

Someone that forgets to set the development flag on their production service should not be in charge of accessing bank accounts.

This is no different than giving out legal or medical advice on the internet. Most people don't understand what they are getting into.

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