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

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

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 285 posts

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

#231

Post by makeee »

hurflmurfl wrote: post #196
makeee wrote: post #42

Divjoy [0] is now profitable and my full-time thing. It did $50k in year one and my goal is to break $100k this year. It all started with a Show HN [1], so thank you HN :) It was rough going at first, but I won the $15k YC Startup School grant [2], which let me jump into it full-time and give it my full focus. I managed to hit ramen profitable before having to go back to freelance. The conventional wisdom is that dev…

Hi, wanted to let you know that when I click on "see pricing" on the banner in the top of the page, nothing happens. There's no way to find pricing at all, since there's no link at the bottom of the page either. I'm using Firefox 68.11 for Android.

Thanks for letting me know! If you scroll down below the "Choose your template" section do you see a pricing section with purple background? I'm wondering if the scroll to logic is broken or if that section is just not being displayed. If you wouldn't mind shooting an email to gabe.ragland@divjoy.com I'd love to follow-up about this.

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

#232

Post by makeee »

ryan-allen wrote: post #176
makeee wrote: post #42

Divjoy [0] is now profitable and my full-time thing. It did $50k in year one and my goal is to break $100k this year. It all started with a Show HN [1], so thank you HN :) It was rough going at first, but I won the $15k YC Startup School grant [2], which let me jump into it full-time and give it my full focus. I managed to hit ramen profitable before having to go back to freelance. The conventional wisdom is that dev…

> There are a lot of employed software engineers who have disposable income and who are happy to pay for a dev tool if it means they can actually build and launch an idea in a weekend. This is absolutely true, but companies also, or even devs working in companies will buy out of their own pocket to improve their productivity without having to ask the Accounts department, I know I have!

That's a really good point! I may have a good number of those customers and not be aware of it. I need to do a better job of asking people what they're using Divjoy for.

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

#233

Post by tomcam »

nlh wrote: post #223
tomcam wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eSnipe.com

Oh amazing! I haven’t bought stuff on eBay in a while but I’ve absolutely used your service before. I remember using it A LOT back in the early 2000s - it was my secret eBay super power before others knew about it. Thanks again and so glad it’s been life sustaining for you. Cheers.

Really appreciate your business. I have used it as my guitar buying superpower myself. To the tune of 200 or so :0

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

#234

Post by jonplackett »

makeee wrote: post #77
jonplackett wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would be cool if you could add Plausible Analytics!

I've been meaning to look into that. At the moment I'm using this library as the analytics abstraction: https://getanalytics.io . I'll see if the Plausible team wants to create a plugin or do that myself when I have time.

I’ve been chatting to Marko via email and they seem very approachable!

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

#235

Post by makeee »

jonplackett wrote: post #234
makeee wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been meaning to look into that. At the moment I'm using this library as the analytics abstraction: https://getanalytics.io . I'll see if the Plausible team wants to create a plugin or do that myself when I have time.

I’ve been chatting to Marko via email and they seem very approachable!

Looks like they don't have time, but there's an open issue here: https://github.com/DavidWells/analytics/issues/96. I probably won't have time for awhile.. but on the off-chance you're interested in tackling it, I'd happily hook you up with a free Divjoy account in return ;)

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

#236

Post by lcall »

cloogshicer wrote: post #193
lcall wrote: post #134

It's not me personally doing it, but a relative is an effective teacher of 2D game development (godot, gamemaker, pixel art), with good pacing, helpful to customers &c (and pleasant to be around). Some examples of his work, which supports their family: https://www.youtube.com/user/uheartbeast/about https://www.heartgamedev.com/1-bit-godot-course-youtube?r_do...

Super cool! Thanks for sharing. How does did he initially get customers? How does he keep growing?

Asking him would get a more currently accurate answer, but the parts I do know include that he had the knowledge and so wrote a self-published book (paper and digital) about GameMaker some years back, and he is good at knowing about and being a positive part of his gaming communities, so he has built his name recognition over time, initially while working a full-time job and going to school. And I think toward his customers ("students"), he treats them with respect, and they say good things about him. I think he has a designated # of hours per week he spends on things like those. Plus, his personality and strengths line up well with the kind of work he does: he likes art, and gaming, and talking about them, and helping people, and has a sort of natural sense about people and a speech cadence that work well in instructional videos.

Other things that have helped him stay in business are that he and his wife both wanted and agreed early on to take Dave Ramsey's advice (which somewhat they also got from their parents' example), that it is worth being very frugal to prioritize debt avoidance, having some savings, and paying off a house, over many other kinds of expenses, so when there are ups and downs, they can ride them out.

Edit: They drove that old car for a long time even though the A/C didn't work right and the windows wouldn't all roll down properly etc. Then they saved up for a while, watched for good buys, and replaced it with a reliable used van for cash.

Edits: They also pray and pay tithing, and there are blessings promised in Malachi 3 (Bible) and elsewhere to those who do that (properly?), which I have also experienced, not in identical ways. And they are family, so my wife and I pray for them all, often.

Plus he sets objectives and works regularly on weekdays, and takes breaks on evenings/weekends to enjoy the family. And they read business books and discuss them.

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

#237

Post by pythonbase »

fileeditview wrote: post #208

I run my side project https://namesmith.io for about 5 years now. It is a domain name generator which can also check the domain availability. It is covering the server cost plus a bit extra. About $200 per month. I didn't work on it for about 3 years but I recently decided to give it some love. I still think it has potential.

Earnings come solely from domain registration commissions? If yes, then $200/mo is not bad at all.

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

#238

Post by vmception »

akudha wrote: post #228
jklepatch wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DeFi is really great for entrepreneurs yes: lots of curious users, lots of money in it, lots of VCs, can build on top of other projects without permissions, and no regulations. And with crypto prices going up we are probably going to see the next DeFi bubble. If you want to build a DeFi app, You need to learn DeFi development and I have a course just on that: https://eattheblocks-pro.teachable.com/p/defi-development-…

For a developer who has no idea about blockchain, how hard/easy is it to get into DeFi? Also, do you think this can be a long term career?

DeFi is easy and doesn’t really involve blockchain knowledge, but your use of the code becomes blockchain knowledge.

The programming is all javascript and solidity, which has syntax very similar to js. The blockchain imposes restrictions on how complex your code can be which means you are writing simpler code. More like building with legos (which is very similar to other programming where you have dependency hell, not really prevalent here because the other code-legos don't really change).

Private sector has not gotten around to valuing this skillset and typically interview out of novelty and curiosity but are completely confused and ignorant about what your involvement in “blockchain” actually was, but there are enough VC backed companies that operate in this space if you wish to eventually be employed.

You can also get wealthy enough not to care. Not from crypto prices rising, just from transaction volume and earning your crypto.

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

#239

Post by codazoda »

kureikain wrote: post #184

I'm building a custom email forwarding services for your domain. Only have 2 customers right now though. https://hanami.run/ Every time I bought a new domain and need to setup DNS or verify email, all I want is to receive email from that domains. But setting up postfix or configuring lambda/ses is a pain. So I build this service. All you have to do is point MX records to my servers and you will be able to receive inc…

This is a problem I need solved and if your service works, I'll be happy to pay your individual subscription fee. If it works well and I don't have to think about it anymore I'll pay for this for the next decade without thinking twice.

I just subscribed. You've designed the system in a way that's simple and strait-forward. As soon as I get a couple emails through it, I'll be asking you to take my money.

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

#240

Post by hermitcrab »

HeyLaughingBoy wrote: post #227
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…

I think I remember you from the BoS forum.

Ah yes, the BoS forum. I was one of the moderators.

Some of the BoS regulars can still occasionally be found at: https://discuss.bootstrapped.fm/

Post reply on HN