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

I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

indiehackers.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 225 posts

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#191

Post by phkahler »

nzach wrote: post #19

I just want to share my recent personal experience. Recently I've finally decided to try creating something new that people would find useful hoping that some day I would be able to turn a profit from that. So I vibe coded a pretty bare-bones (but fully functional) version of my idea and started to talk about it in several platforms, including IndieHackers. And the main "advice" I've got after talking with a few peop…

IMHO you should not be marketing a product to software developers. That market is completely saturated and most of the tools are free.

Today's super-simple big market idea: We got my elderly mother a flip phone and it's too hard to use. I'm going to describe what would be ideal for her now, and by all means DON'T think up additional features to "make it better". She needs a phone that when opened/activated it give a list of people (contacts) which she can scroll through and pick one to call. It should call directly, not change screen or show some other shit. Just call the highlighted name and call. Maybe it could switch to a "calling" screen with just the one name until the call is over. That's it. No other functionality so she can "get lost" or confused.

Maybe this is an android app? I'm not sure if you can override the main UI to the extent this wants to be. I'll gladly get her a cheap Android phone and pay $5 for an app that turns it into this usable device for elderly people. Yes, five dollars. No adds, no user monetization, no enshitification.

Can anyone deliver this? I think there's a large market for it and it should be a one weekend job.

BTW, however you load/add contacts should be a sort of hard to find function maybe for someone else to do. Not something you can accidently "get into".

There are a million things like this just waiting for someone to create. But talking to developers for ideas is a dead end.

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#192

Post by bschwindHN »

kookamamie wrote: post #117

> 37 different products I guess we have different understandings of what a product is.

Yeah I feel kinda petty saying it, but given how easy it is to crap out a web app, I hardly consider most to be "products". That word in my mind is at least reserved for something that at least has some tangible aspect to it.

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#193

Post by 9rx »

nzach wrote: post #19

I just want to share my recent personal experience. Recently I've finally decided to try creating something new that people would find useful hoping that some day I would be able to turn a profit from that. So I vibe coded a pretty bare-bones (but fully functional) version of my idea and started to talk about it in several platforms, including IndieHackers. And the main "advice" I've got after talking with a few peop…

> But why would you give this generic advice without even looking at the thing?

1. Comments are the internet aren't written for you, they are written for the author of the comment.

2. The assertion is sound, even if not particularly useful. Your logs exclaim that you don't have market fit, just as said. What more can be said? If finding market fit was a well defined formula, everyone would do it. This is the magic that, for better or worse, you have to figure out on your own.

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#194

Post by skeeter2020 »

eddythompson80 wrote: post #152
comprev wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shovel-as-a-Service* [*] Also known as "tool hire" and has been around since the dawn of mankind

I package shovel-industry futures into financial instruments and sell them to speculators.

I strip out the sharp-bladed, fiberglass handled ones and sell them individually, then combine the leftovers with other shitty shovels and sell them as sets of top quality, grade-A dirt moving implements.

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#195

Post by skeeter2020 »

actionfromafar wrote: post #176
antupis wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But if you listen to Levels' interviews, especially before his Twitter stardom, you will see that he always promotes the find your audience and build to them approach.

But there's no guarantee your audience will buy what you can sell.

your audience is supposed to guide what you're selling. The fundamental belief is getting the audience is harder than building something they want. This part is probably true, while the rest of the ecosystem is garbage and scams

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#196

Post by skeeter2020 »

phkahler wrote: post #191
nzach wrote: post #19

I just want to share my recent personal experience. Recently I've finally decided to try creating something new that people would find useful hoping that some day I would be able to turn a profit from that. So I vibe coded a pretty bare-bones (but fully functional) version of my idea and started to talk about it in several platforms, including IndieHackers. And the main "advice" I've got after talking with a few peop…

IMHO you should not be marketing a product to software developers. That market is completely saturated and most of the tools are free. Today's super-simple big market idea: We got my elderly mother a flip phone and it's too hard to use. I'm going to describe what would be ideal for her now, and by all means DON'T think up additional features to "make it better". She needs a phone that when opened/activated it give a…

>> I think there's a large market for it and it should be a one weekend job.

You're essentially asking for a heavily customized phone OS, this is not like adding a bootstrap theme - and you're willing to pay FIVE DOLLARS?

>> But talking to developers for ideas is a dead end.

Maybe for product ideas but perhaps you should find one to critique your "weekend project" idea

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#197

Post by phkahler »

skeeter2020 wrote: post #196
phkahler wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMHO you should not be marketing a product to software developers. That market is completely saturated and most of the tools are free. Today's super-simple big market idea: We got my elderly mother a flip phone and it's too hard to use. I'm going to describe what would be ideal for her now, and by all means DON'T think up additional features to "make it better". She needs a phone that when opened/activated it give a…

>> I think there's a large market for it and it should be a one weekend job. You're essentially asking for a heavily customized phone OS, this is not like adding a bootstrap theme - and you're willing to pay FIVE DOLLARS? >> But talking to developers for ideas is a dead end. Maybe for product ideas but perhaps you should find one to critique your "weekend project" idea

>> You're essentially asking for a heavily customized phone OS

No. I'm asking for a "dialer only" phone OS. It can take the form of an always-on-top dialer app over a standard OS. That's it.

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#198

Post by jacob_rezi »

andreygrehov wrote: post #121
narrator wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well Pieter Levels has a negative customer acquisition cost because he gets most of his business off of X and he gets so many impressions that he gets paid to post there. That's a pretty incredible marketing hack if you ask me. I invest in startups and the ones who do really well hack marketing. They have tech in their stack that is specifically devoted to automating and scaling their marketing.

> They have tech in their stack that is specifically devoted to automating and scaling their marketing. Interesting, what are some examples?

https://www.rezi.ai/enterprise

We've built a white-labeled version of our resume software to tackle specific keywords, communities, and now general organisations

This would be an exact example

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#199

Post by danjl »

Karrot_Kream wrote: post #113
danjl wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You learn where your customers hang out, and then you hang out there and authentically become part of the social group. You spend weeks/months/years learning what they like, their workflows, and their problems. Or, better, you've already spent years working with your customers so you have some experience in these matters. Then you spend more time setting up face-to-face discussions, at conferences, online, or whereve…

Has this ever worked for you? If so, could you walk us through your journey? In my experience if you spend a really long time trying to identify a problem to solve, you end up burning too much time on a problem that may not work. The Indiehackers approach is like the opposite of that where you shotgun low-effort attempts at ideas until you find one that sticks. I think most folks trying to build a business want somet…

This approach has worked for me, and many others. Read the Lean Startup for the general approach, and The Mom Test to learn how to talk to prospective customers. The main point is that you need to talk to customers and work with them throughout the process.

Re: I've launched 37 products in 5 years and not doing that again

#200

Post by ryandrake »

libraryatnight wrote: post #60
karel-3d wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He doesn't even own it anymore and, according to the recent reviews of the service (by marketers), it basically stopped working since he sold it (and when I google there are many more like it that works better, this seems to be using 2024 LLMs). So I am not selling it at all. I just really hate the idea.

I hate it too, but I hate it even more knowing it broke after he sold it. Not even bringing any integrity to the evil. lol

Weird to expect integrity from someone who developed a forum spam-bot.
Post reply on HN