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I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

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Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#81

Post by foobazgt »

parpfish wrote: post #29
_se wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one wants to talk to an AI for customer support.

i've gone back and forth on this over the last few months. I started out thinking that we've all been conditioned by bad customer support chatbots whose only purpose is to look up facts from the FAQ and then tell you to call the real customer support line to actually handle your problem. the problem was that the chatbots weren't granted hee ability and authority to actually do things . wouldn't it be great if you cou…

There's a third case: dealing with folks who just aren't technically savvy enough to figure some things out on there own, no matter how intuitive, well documented, or fully featured your product is.

I think I'd rather troubleshoot with a well-scripted AI chatbot, than a human being who's forced into the role of an automaton - executing directly from a script. Just, FFS, let me escalate to an actual competently trained human being once I've been through the troubleshooting.

Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#82

Post by micromacrofoot »

> Fighting disgruntled customers over $20 is not a good way to spend time.

Absolutely. The advice I'd give for anyone in these situations is that if someone is stressing you out, tell them no, give them a refund, and move on. Always be nice about it (well explained in the post). You don't have to answer every question either.

It might not be the best way to do customer support, and it may feel like you're failing, but you have to protect yourself. You can spend your whole life attempting to appease overly needy customers, it will never end and they'll never be happy.

It's ok to care more about your project than its customers.

Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#83

Post by BurningFrog »

Waterluvian wrote: post #47
authorfly wrote: post #9

Wow I can really relate. The customer support efforts when you don't feel like it, being ghosted after helping a customer, the random or fraud disputes. It's really tricky at that stage between hiring help and having the time/motivation to maintain those very non-tech parts while trying to continue doing other core parts of the side project / startup. The first sale feels great, as does first showing the prototype. B…

I wonder if there's often a mismatch between what one thinks a business is going to be like, and what a business is actually like. One of the things that keeps me away from doing stuff like this is that I _hate_ every part that isn't the engineering part, and the engineering part is a minority share of what it takes to run a business.

One thing most programmers need to painfully have beaten into them is that the software itself is a minor part of a successful software business.

It's a necessary part, but without marketing/sales/support/etc, very few projects work as a business.

Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#85

Post by blantonl »

I do all the direct customer support for my 2 businesses (radioreference and broadcastify) which typically equates to 20-30 Zendesk tickets a day addressing login/password issues, payment issues, technical support etc.

Boy can I relate to burn out and frustration. It's shocking to me how many times I have to deal with things like customer mental health issues, extremely disrespectful customer behavior, some of the wild ways in which customers will try to get out of payments that they directly authorized, and of course the occasional edge cases that customers can get themselves into which will really have you as a developer questioning your sanity.

But the truly perplexing situations are folks that will click through and pay for a product, such as your most expensive subscription plan, and then instantly have buyers remorse and just go off the deep end demanding refunds, implementing chargebacks, blaming you for being misleading, and dishing out wildly disrespectful behavior. "I didn't know what I was purchasing" is a common support ticket.

... and my business does not do recurring billing or automated subscription renewals. You literally have to renew any subscription you have with us when it comes due.

I actually had a customer file a class action lawsuit against my business because we sent him a reminder that his subscription was about to expire and if he wanted to renew it he could, and he subsequently filed this lawsuit claiming we were violating a Florida consumer protection law which doesn't allow debt collectors to contact people during certain hours. That cost me a cool chunk of change to get dismissed.

A lot of it is enough to give a sane person PTSD and to drive the most patient personality to throw a chair through a window in frustration.

Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#86

Post by commodoreboxer »

gizmo wrote: post #33

Not all B2C is the same. If you make a product for professionals you won't get random chargebacks, incoherent emails, or general rudeness. One great way to filter for professionalism is by simply charging more. Another strategy is making it harder to purchase the product. For example by disabling the checkout process until people have completed the tutorial, or only allowing purchases after the free trial has expired…

> You can optimize for revenue/agony instead.

That's a great way to put it. I'm going to start using that one.

Tangent: I'm a programmer at a small company, which has three programmers total. I make a decent wage, but one that's significantly smaller than I could make at a larger company. I often get questions from people who can't believe that I'm not jumping at these other opportunities, but I make nearly six figures, my team and bosses trust me, I have nearly unlimited flexibility to choose what I work on and shape my software the way I feel is best, and I get to work full remote and basically make my own hours, giving me all the time I want with my family. It would take an incredible raise to give this up just for better pay.

An agony-per-dollar ratio is a perfect way to frame the calculation, and it factors into so many places in life. Many forget that it's not just optimizing for the most revenue possible, but a balance of maximizing revenue and quality of life, and often getting diminishing returns when pushing hard on the former.

Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#87

Post by datavirtue »

zerkten wrote: post #62
Waterluvian wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if there's often a mismatch between what one thinks a business is going to be like, and what a business is actually like. One of the things that keeps me away from doing stuff like this is that I _hate_ every part that isn't the engineering part, and the engineering part is a minority share of what it takes to run a business.

We know the answer to this even before modern tech businesses existed: running a business is a very different experience from what people expect. This is exacerbated with certain experiences that create worldviews which are closer to the opposite of running a business. This is why startup people straight out of school are often unencumbered with ideas that impact their mission. If you go into a large organization, yo…

The paycheck mentality. It depresses economic output and productivity across the board by keeping people unengaged and dependent.

Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#88

Post by authorfly »

kebman wrote: post #64

I think in terms of official correspondence, I don't think it's a good idea to ask criminals why they did a certain thing, ref the reply to the scammer about his access being revoked. Yes, it might feel good to berate him and ask "Why did you do that?" But what if he answers? Would you really entertain valuable business time arguing with a fraudster? In general, I also think it's a bad idea to entertain feature reque…

In payment disputes bank dispute resolution often requires a response of any kind from the customer to consider rejecting the dispute. In addition, the submitted forms/disputes often have nonsensical or no information on why the dispute occurred so you truly have no background. Lastly, disputes can be initiated by people without emails or just different emails so you have no chance to connect it to relevant support cases.

That's why he's curtly asking why the dispute was raised - yes in part to pressure the guy directly on his BS knowing he responds, but also because you need any kind of response to win disputes.

Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#89

Post by blantonl »

thehappyfellow wrote: post #61
shash7 wrote: post #37

Can relate, I've been in a similar boat running a small B2B Saas over the last 2 years. It does get easier over time. I've learnt a few tricks for managing early stage pain points. - You need to develop a polite but curt tone of voice for customer support. - Once your core product is built, its worthwhile spending some time automating the heck out of everything. This will save a TON of time in the near future. - Inve…

Do you have an example of “polite but curt” tone? I’m struggling to see what you mean.

"Check yourself before you wreck yourself"

Re: I've built my first successful side project, and I hate it

#90

Post by authorfly »

pc86 wrote: post #40
btbuildem wrote: post #16

This was a fascinating read, really. The potential customer base being basically suckers waving wads of cash to be taken from them. The wild contrast of how nice the author tries to be to every single person that interacts with the project -- despite majority being the equivalent of single-celled organisms poking the fb markeplace "is it available" button. Reading some of the messages from potential users is so eye-o…

I've done exactly one legit "SaaS startup" type venture around 2012-2015. I still think about the absolutely insane customer service requests we'd get. It was a very niched down Eventbrite competitor, so we did things like PDF ticket generation, QR code generation, attendance tracking, there was a big fundraising component as well so lots of payment infrastructure. We charged a percentage of ticket sales so any one e…

Yup yup yup. Big reason for avoiding free users is avoiding those requests.

This is the kind of thing no startup puts in their year one budget and (alongside supplier cashflow issues) is why those projections don't work for

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