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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

#251

Post by hermitcrab »

BurningFrog wrote: post #83
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.

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.

True. If you want to spend all day programming, be a contract programmer. Don't start a software business - you'll spend a lot of your timing doing admin, documentation, websites, newsletters, accounts, support etc.

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

#252

Post by hermitcrab »

anticorporate wrote: post #38

Some advice: If you're going to monetize a side project, and you do it in a way where you're providing direct support, be sure the customer base it targets are people you actually want to deal with. Whatever the niche, imagine the worst people you've encountered on it, and be sure you want to use your spare time talking to them. Otherwise, the juice is likely not worth the squeeze.

I'm sure there are good and bad people in all walks of life. But, yes, people in some markets are definitely (on average) less pleasant to deal with than others.

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

#253

Post by t-writescode »

QuantumGood wrote: post #71
parpfish wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Customer support isn't paid well, so they often aren't motivated to become very skilled beyond the level of a chatbot before they move on to other things. So the interface to bad docs doesn't matter much. And good docs are very hard to produce. AI magnifies problems when good docs are lacking.

> Customer support isn't paid well

"We choose not to pay customer support well".

I've worked at companies where customer support was both strongly supported, paid well and given the tools to do their jobs well.

They were incredible.

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

#254

Post by hermitcrab »

sklarsa wrote: post #5

I love the ending of this story, which isn't obvious from just looking at the title. The author identified key pain points around customer support, automated them, and went back to enjoying life. This is the kind of thing that gets me excited about the possibilities of technology and AI as a force multiplier, especially when working on side projects, "lifestyle" businesses, or even startups as a single founder.

Sure, write an FAQ and usability test your software. But I'm not convinced that you can automated/AI away your support burden in any meaningful way that isn't going to piss off your customers.

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

#255

Post by latentsea »

Vegenoid wrote: post #126
duxup wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You need to develop a polite but curt tone of voice for customer support. And very focused responses in terms of action items. You might think of 3 things to say, check, but sadly 90% of the people you respond to with a list will behave like they read just one of them. Sadly this also leads to dragging things out for everyone who can handle more than one thing at a time :(

Yep. All the time when I worked in IT: Me: Please try these 3 things and let me know how it goes: (list of 3 things with instructions) Them: I tried (thing #1) and it didn’t work. Me: Thank you, please try these 2 things and let me know how it goes Them: I tried (thing #2) and it didn’t work. Me: Thank you, please try this thing and let me know how it goes Them: (no response) Me: Just checking in to see if this is re…

>Me: Please try these 3 things and let me know how it goes: (list of 3 things with instructions) Them: I tried (thing #1) and it didn’t work.

I noticed I do exactly this when troubling shooting problems with LLMs!

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

#256

Post by hermitcrab »

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…

A collected a few crazy support requests here:

https://successfulsoftware.net/2010/11/21/problem-exists-bet...

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

#257

Post by hermitcrab »

conductr wrote: post #163
authorfly wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Idk. It’s totally ok to just ignore those types of requests. Even a lot of the requests the author was getting. They’re just fishing and there’s Practically zero chance they’ll even ever follow up to see why you never responded. Mega corporations get away with awful support of paying customers, people don’t actually expect you to jump at their command as a startup or even as a toy side project. If you’re able to igno…

I reply to every support request that isn't an obvious scam. It feels rude not to.

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

#258

Post by hermitcrab »

gwbas1c wrote: post #196

A couple of thoughts: As a customer, if I see firm boundaries set, (IE, read XXX before contacting me,) I usually assume that someone is under stress from nonsense like this. Then I try to be on my extra-best behavior. I know a lot of people suggested raising your price. Some alternatives are to: 1: Offer two price points: The $20 / month gets no support, the $100 / month is supported. 2: Consider some of the feature…

>Offer two price points: The $20 / month gets no support, the $100 / month is supported.

Someone is paying you money and you won't help them? They are going to cancel and possibly badmouth you on social media. Also, how are you supposed to improve your product if you don't interact with most of the userbase?

I try to help everyone who uses my software. Even if they are evaluating and haven't paid me a penny. Commercial issues aside, I feel it is the right thing to do.

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

#259

Post by hluska »

creesch wrote: post #226
hluska wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you care for a counterpoint? This comment should be three paragraphs. As written, it’s very hard to read and I get lost. If this was a professional communication and you had asked three questions, I might understand one or might not. Now I have no issues saying “dude, your writing is very hard to follow.” But what if your colleagues are nicer than I am? Or just spitballing. You’ve admitted that you’re the kind…

Okay, different person as the one you responded to. Your entire comment was reasonable up until the last line. What is that even based on? Where did they admit to setting up traps? Is that your take on their comment about trying to ask three questions in one message? Because, even without them creating paragraphs, it is abundantly clear they just mean that as something from experience. Not something they do as someth…

This is a good example. They wrote:

“When confronted (constructively, much later) they usually get evasive and can’t explain.”

Confronted is a big word with a hostile intent. They’re incredibly measured in their language and use precise language. That sounds like a trap to me - it’s:

A.) Asking three questions and only get 1/3 answered.

B.) Waiting for a suitable period of time to elapse.

C.) Confronting them while expecting an explanation.

Letting time go by, “confronting them” and expecting an explanation is a trap. It assumes that they can even remember the conversation! Why not send a follow up email immediately and politely ask again? Heck, that’s a good excuse to use “circle back” in conversation. :)

If you missed that first read, no worries because so did I. I had to read the comment three times and then I kind of shaked my head because they are so measured and precise, and that’s an awfully big statement to make about colleagues.

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