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(I won't be sticking ads on it or anything lame like that - just thought it'd be a nice thing to exist).
Note: as of 8pm GMT, it's empty because I didn't want to harvest links from this thread without goodwill - but submissions are open, so please do get stuck in.
I built my company solo for about 1.25 years, got a cofounder for half a year (who then quit for a company who could pay more), so I'm back to being solo again on my company WeddingLovely. http://WeddingLovely.com was built entirely by myself and there are also five other vendor directories ( http://WeddingPhotoLove.com and others). There's also a wedding blog at http://WeddingLovely.com/blog/ that I maintain and pos…
The wedding industry is all about sucking people dry of their $$$, and if you can do a bunch of useful services for a flat $80, that'd make many folks very happy!
My own solo project / side business is http://www.edit-room.com/ I've done all the design and development, and the business setup to be able to accept credit cards as well. I've learned so much in the past 2 years, and I wouldn't change doing it for anything.
Even if you can just do a little bit every day, just start doing research or sketching out things on paper.
Only way to do it is to get started.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What catapulted (if anything) you to achieving so much success with tiny piano? Especially with getting to 6 million free downloads? - Was it something that people naturally search for? - What types of marketing/advertising did you do? - Do any of the other apps help supplement income?
The first big jump I got was in March 2012, when I added iPad support (universal binary) and also translated the app store description to Chinese (钢琴). It turns out that people will search for their native word for piano! ;-) Then it grew slowly over the next 8 months. I continued to add song packs and improve the app. I did some marketing on FB, https://www.facebook.com/tinypiano including a raffle where I gave away…
http://www.meetingshed.com - bootstrapped, some interest and a few users, not enough to start a business. I keep it running because I use the VPS I set up for it for other stuff.
http://www.meetingshed.com - bootstrapped, some interest and a few users, not enough to start a business. I keep it running because I use the VPS I set up for it for other stuff.
I'm getting warnings on Chrome regarding your SSL cert expiring.
To your question, absolutely there are many bottlenecks and limitations. If you are married and have kids then intensify these 2 factors by a magnitude of 10 maybe, at least in my case, especially if you have a day job that consumes most of your time. Also, you might get stuck some simple stuff that would drain your energy and offset the timelines. Some of the mundane tasks would make you go crazy (imagine coming up with 26 different email templates for the emails that go out...that's mundane). A few ideas where I wasn't 100% sure and felt a cofounder would be someone who would have came in handy on those instances.
On top of all these hurdles, after you launch, you have to do product support along with marketing and getting the word out about your product. Mailchimp campaigns, analyzing Analytic points, testing to make sure things are not broken and a whole lot would keep you on your toes. I feel I can only for that far along but I'm determined to make it to the pole.
I believe the reward is after we sort through all of these hurdles...I can proudly say that "this is me, this is what I've built, all by myself" (Seth Godin's quote except the "all by myself" part).
I built a company that develops iOS apps. My most successful app so far is http://www.tinypiano.com/ with 6 million (free) downloads (launched Feb 2012). The app is monetizing via ads and in-app purchases. I do this full time. My goal was to make an app that achieves 10 million downloads. It looks like it should hit that mark sometime this year. Another goal was to make enough money to buy a house. Assuming all goes…