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Finding a market like that sounds really difficult to do. How does someone discover a market like this without a ton of luck?

jasongrishkoff 5y ago
As someone who pulled this off, it was less about discovery and more about being part of it already. The problems are much easier to understand and address when they're actually problems you're facing yourself.
- icer2312 5y ago
  Mine isn't anywhere near paying the bill yet, but it's at 60+ customers for $20/year. It's exactly as you described. I had a pain point which was trivial for most, but not for me. No existing solutions solved it properly so I decided to make it myself. While searching for a solution, I found that a lot of other people had the same problem. It was bad enough for them that they took time out of their day to write their complaints online. In solving my own problem, I was creating something that other people might've pay for. And they did! I quickly learned that marketing was the most important part of the process.
going_to_800 5y ago
I fit very well in the article description. It's not only about finding the right niche and riding the wave, is also about execution, otherwise competitors will eat you. There's luck involved of course, but after 10 failed tries you'll get an eye for it. Just an example: there are sub-markets that don't have specialized products, they all use products built for everyone instead that specific niche, like instead of a CRM for everyone niche it down as CRM for mechanics (i'm sure there are many of them, but you get the idea).
ren_engineer 5y ago
by being directly involved in other areas and seeing the problems that non-developers wouldn't know how to fix the problem with most software engineers is they only know tech. Most of these "niche" businesses are created at the intersection of tech and marketing/design/business
kjksf 5y ago
You say it's luck. I say the universe is sending you lots of signals. Most people ignore those signals. The "lucky" ones are simply perceptive. To give you a concrete example. There was this app Screenhero that was acquired by Slack in 2017. There was a HN thread about it and it erupted with people saying "oh no, I'm using this and it'll go away. how awful!". The thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15552042 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15552042 333 points, 147 comments Just from that thread you could tell: * there's an app with obvious business model (monthly pay per user), immune to piracy (everything is mediated by their servers; no account, the app doesn't work) * the functionality was deemed valuable enough by Slack to acquire a startup that barely got off the ground * people love this app The Universe sent a clear signal. Hacker News is supposed to be a breeding ground for hackers that are interested in building software businesses. How many of the people that read the Slack HN acquisition thread fired up Visual Studio or XCode and started building a copy of Screenhero? Zero. Everyone ignored the signal. It's even worse than that. I actually made that point in 2017, in that same HN thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15555488 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15555488 I spelled out the obvious opportunity for the tens of thousands of people who must have read that post. It was even the top voted comment. Everyone ignore the signal. BTW: "clone Screenhero" opportunity is mostly gone. Not completely but there are at least 2 startups cloning it. I'm pretty sure it took at least 2 years before they started copying Screenhero (one of the startups is actually by a guy from the original team, I think). So for at least 2 years there was a clear opportunity to build a multi-million dollar business by a very small team.
- peterthehacker 5y ago
  But your example, Screenhero clones like Pop (https://pop.com/ https://pop.com/), are in a large, competitive market. That doesn’t fit the qualifications of a small, underserved niche like the article describes.

jasongrishkoff 5y ago

As someone who pulled this off, it was less about discovery and more about being part of it already. The problems are much easier to understand and address when they're actually problems you're facing yourself.

icer2312 5y ago
Mine isn't anywhere near paying the bill yet, but it's at 60+ customers for $20/year. It's exactly as you described. I had a pain point which was trivial for most, but not for me. No existing solutions solved it properly so I decided to make it myself. While searching for a solution, I found that a lot of other people had the same problem. It was bad enough for them that they took time out of their day to write their complaints online. In solving my own problem, I was creating something that other people might've pay for. And they did! I quickly learned that marketing was the most important part of the process.

going_to_800 5y ago

I fit very well in the article description. It's not only about finding the right niche and riding the wave, is also about execution, otherwise competitors will eat you. There's luck involved of course, but after 10 failed tries you'll get an eye for it. Just an example: there are sub-markets that don't have specialized products, they all use products built for everyone instead that specific niche, like instead of a CRM for everyone niche it down as CRM for mechanics (i'm sure there are many of them, but you get the idea).

ren_engineer 5y ago

by being directly involved in other areas and seeing the problems that non-developers wouldn't know how to fix the problem with most software engineers is they only know tech. Most of these "niche" businesses are created at the intersection of tech and marketing/design/business

kjksf 5y ago

You say it's luck. I say the universe is sending you lots of signals. Most people ignore those signals. The "lucky" ones are simply perceptive. To give you a concrete example. There was this app Screenhero that was acquired by Slack in 2017. There was a HN thread about it and it erupted with people saying "oh no, I'm using this and it'll go away. how awful!". The thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15552042 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15552042 333 points, 147 comments Just from that thread you could tell: * there's an app with obvious business model (monthly pay per user), immune to piracy (everything is mediated by their servers; no account, the app doesn't work) * the functionality was deemed valuable enough by Slack to acquire a startup that barely got off the ground * people love this app The Universe sent a clear signal. Hacker News is supposed to be a breeding ground for hackers that are interested in building software businesses. How many of the people that read the Slack HN acquisition thread fired up Visual Studio or XCode and started building a copy of Screenhero? Zero. Everyone ignored the signal. It's even worse than that. I actually made that point in 2017, in that same HN thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15555488 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15555488 I spelled out the obvious opportunity for the tens of thousands of people who must have read that post. It was even the top voted comment. Everyone ignore the signal. BTW: "clone Screenhero" opportunity is mostly gone. Not completely but there are at least 2 startups cloning it. I'm pretty sure it took at least 2 years before they started copying Screenhero (one of the startups is actually by a guy from the original team, I think). So for at least 2 years there was a clear opportunity to build a multi-million dollar business by a very small team.

peterthehacker 5y ago
But your example, Screenhero clones like Pop (https://pop.com/ https://pop.com/), are in a large, competitive market. That doesn’t fit the qualifications of a small, underserved niche like the article describes.