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Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

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Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#31

Post by exdsq »

hermitcrab wrote: post #25

I've run my own one-man[1] software business selling desktop software for Windows and Mac since 2005. Products with launch date: https://www.perfecttableplan.com (2005) https://www.hyperplan.com (2015) https://www.easydatatransform.com (2019) 2020 wasn't a great year due to the effect of COVID on PerfectTablePlan sales. But I've been profitable every year. [1] With a bit of help from my wife on the accounts and freel…

Really tiny comment, but I noticed on Perfect Table Plan you have an example seating plan for a lodge with peoples names? As a member myself I know there are quite a few people who prefer to remain anonymous, so not sure if they'd like that image to be up (albeit the risk is very very low that they'd be identified from a table planning app!).

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#33

Post by blowfish721 »

ratsimihah wrote: post #11

I'll be starting a Youtube channel shortly about solo bootstrapping a tech business around a mobile app and everything that's involved, from idea validation to implementation, launch and marketing. Let me know if that's everything you're interested in

Definitely!

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#34

Post by quelsolaar »

I license a fully automated UV unwrapping tool at MinistryOfFlat.com . UV mapping is the task of unwrapping a 3D model to a flat surface in order to put textures on it. Ive been at it for about 3 years, and last year I made 7 figures. I do sell directly to 3D artists. You probably know some VFX companies and game companies that have licensed my tool.

I make a good amount from people coming to the web site, but the majority is made licensing the technology to various companies. The online sales are mostly there to spread the word, and gather user feedback.

UV mapping is a very difficult problem mostly because artist have very specific ideas of what constitutes good UV mapping and it doesn't conform to any simple heuristics. Its about a megabyte of C code without any dependencies, and that makes very attractive to licensees.

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#35

Post by bitcoinmoney »

ratsimihah wrote: post #11

I'll be starting a Youtube channel shortly about solo bootstrapping a tech business around a mobile app and everything that's involved, from idea validation to implementation, launch and marketing. Let me know if that's everything you're interested in

Following!

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#36

Post by exdsq »

inglor_cz wrote: post #14
akudha wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What subjects do you write about? Any place we can look at your books?

Mostly popular history. https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/18339067.Marian_Kechli... Everything so far has only been published in Czech, though.

I started writing a popular history book a few years ago and found it really tough once I actually dug into it! Kudos on publishing so many and with such good reviews. Can I ask if you have an academic background in history?

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#37

Post by masa331 »

NicoJuicy wrote: post #27
masa331 wrote: post #15

I run a paid addon for local e-commerce platform(with 25k shops build on it). It all started about 15 month ago when i was still working in a web development company. The platform owners came to us and offered us a partnership. We would develop some new addons for them, run them, and split the profits(80% for us, 20% for them). As i was the one most interested in this i got the first project and developed and support…

Can I contact you? I have an overlap in interest ( I'm building an e-commerce platform and things are getting real :) )

yup, definitely, it's pdonat@seznam.cz

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#38

Post by bitcoinmoney »

nicbou wrote: post #5

I write content to help people settle in Germany. They need certain services, and I get a commission when I refer them to those services. I don't think I could trivially reproduce the results, but I'm happy to get paid for offering free advice. I hope it lasts.

How much do you earn and is the space not saturated already? Are you expanding to new niches ?

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#39

Post by gnicholas »

ratsimihah wrote: post #11

I'll be starting a Youtube channel shortly about solo bootstrapping a tech business around a mobile app and everything that's involved, from idea validation to implementation, launch and marketing. Let me know if that's everything you're interested in

I bet you could find some interesting guests in this thread. I'd be happy to share my experience, for what it's worth — feel free to contact through my profile.

Re: Ask HN: Successful one-person online businesses in 2021?

#40

Post by lightning19 »

fxtentacle wrote: post #20

I feel like the question is wrong. I used to run a profitable one-person online business. And I felt miserable every time I had to get up at night to fix server issues, or when I had to do customer support from my laptop while I was supposed to be on vacation instead. Now that we're a team, I feel so much better about the whole thing, even though profit margins are slightly lower than before.

I work for a large ISP as a software dev and still have to wake up at 11am to fix server issues, I also got called to fix something on Dec 31 while I was on leave. I'd rather be working after hours for myself than for my a-hole boss
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