5 ms·

You are only angry because you too want to escape and are externalising the frustration of not finding a similar path. At least thats what i learned about mysel

You are only angry because you too want to escape and are externalising the frustration of not finding a similar path. At least thats what i learned about myself when i had a similar reaction seeing such success stories. Then it struck me - this is it. This is the way for indie success. Build stuff that makes sense to a niche market. To me the product is irrelevant. But the fact that the author escaped is absolute bliss. Also arent most products just useless things relying on other ecosystems?

Capricorn2481 3y ago
I don't think the OP doesn't realize that, it just doesn't make it any less frustrating.
- gumballindie 3y ago
  But why let it frustrate people when one can start taking notes? Literarily when i started looking into these types of successful independent makers in all industries i discovered there are _loads_ of them and each make a little thing here and there. It’s fascinating, and i cant stop reading about them. And the more i read the more i realise that hey… it’s actually doable! But one need to stop overcomplicating things.
  - Capricorn2481 3y ago
    Because there are no notes to take on this. It's survivorship bias of a product that exists in 1000 other forms. It's not visibly doing anything better that other screen cap tools or chatGPT wrappers aren't doing. The main note is that you may not know what people want, and I've been around long enough to know people that advertise themselves as knowing what people want are usually full of shit.
    - ignoramous 3y ago
      > It's survivorship bias... tbf to TFA, it is exactly about how one could be one of those survivors if one did those totally not simple things. It is a crash course survival guide for a build-in-public solopreneur, if you will.
ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
While it's true that niches work, the actual money maker is to create your own niche by forking an existing one. While 45k / month is impressive, the ones who are making 6 figures and above per month, are doing it in niches which aren't "built in public".
- satvikpendem 3y ago
  Yep, I know people in the "boring" industries, making software or running the marketing for plumbers, electricians, med spas, etc. They're at 6 or more figures a month doing that, and they're in industries most software engineers won't dare look.
  - ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
    Custom mobile apps for different companies in the industry is sooo under utilized that you can easily reach 10 million a year with 70-80% margins by just doing that.
    - kossTKR 3y ago
      Can you elaborate on this? You mean being good at creating basic IOS/Android apps and then selling them white label slightly modified to various companies?
  - gumballindie 3y ago
    This is the kind of stuff i want to know more about. I wish it was promoted more on HN. Those people are what I like to call hackers and painters. Nothing hacky about getting VC money or winning the lottery. Building a small thing that works in the 6 figures is.
    - satvikpendem 3y ago
      IndieHackers has more on this, they have a forum but their podcasts especially are the real value [0]. But most people on there are tech people, not marketers, so you'll still get a skewed version of reality. I've found great insight through following actual marketers though, such as Jordan Platten on YouTube who builds a social media marketing agency from scratch via cold calls [1]. Now this is, in my opinion, what programmers should be doing, not learning the latest new Javascript framework to make their MVP just right. On Reddit, there is similarly /r/sweatystartup [2] which also has a website with more podcasts and articles [3]. But the gist is that it's more about boring industries like lawn care, plumbing etc than shiny tech businesses. One of the best things you can do is to take a look at [2] and call 100 local businesses in a niche you pick (lawn care, etc), ask them about their problems then either start a competing service or start creating software for that niche. Nick Huber, the guy who started the subreddit and site, did both and has a ~$25 million business now. The above is basically what I'm doing, I'm looking into making software for the boring industry of social media marketing. [0] https://podcasts.google.com/search/Indie%20Hackers https://podcasts.google.com/search/Indie%20Hackers [1] https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdO5xp5occOzfVGNbR_WZMi3TGuZ-fSnhh https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdO5xp5occOzfVGNbR_WZ... [2] https://old.reddit.com/r/sweatystartup/comments/dmgy0f/useful_resources_from_the_blog_and_podcast/ https://old.reddit.com/r/sweatystartup/comments/dmgy0f/usefu... [3] https://sweatystartup.com/ https://sweatystartup.com/

Capricorn2481 3y ago

I don't think the OP doesn't realize that, it just doesn't make it any less frustrating.

gumballindie 3y ago
But why let it frustrate people when one can start taking notes? Literarily when i started looking into these types of successful independent makers in all industries i discovered there are _loads_ of them and each make a little thing here and there. It’s fascinating, and i cant stop reading about them. And the more i read the more i realise that hey… it’s actually doable! But one need to stop overcomplicating things.
- Capricorn2481 3y ago
  Because there are no notes to take on this. It's survivorship bias of a product that exists in 1000 other forms. It's not visibly doing anything better that other screen cap tools or chatGPT wrappers aren't doing. The main note is that you may not know what people want, and I've been around long enough to know people that advertise themselves as knowing what people want are usually full of shit.
  - ignoramous 3y ago
    > It's survivorship bias... tbf to TFA, it is exactly about how one could be one of those survivors if one did those totally not simple things. It is a crash course survival guide for a build-in-public solopreneur, if you will.

ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago

While it's true that niches work, the actual money maker is to create your own niche by forking an existing one. While 45k / month is impressive, the ones who are making 6 figures and above per month, are doing it in niches which aren't "built in public".

satvikpendem 3y ago
Yep, I know people in the "boring" industries, making software or running the marketing for plumbers, electricians, med spas, etc. They're at 6 or more figures a month doing that, and they're in industries most software engineers won't dare look.
- ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
  Custom mobile apps for different companies in the industry is sooo under utilized that you can easily reach 10 million a year with 70-80% margins by just doing that.
  - kossTKR 3y ago
    Can you elaborate on this? You mean being good at creating basic IOS/Android apps and then selling them white label slightly modified to various companies?
- gumballindie 3y ago
  This is the kind of stuff i want to know more about. I wish it was promoted more on HN. Those people are what I like to call hackers and painters. Nothing hacky about getting VC money or winning the lottery. Building a small thing that works in the 6 figures is.
  - satvikpendem 3y ago
    IndieHackers has more on this, they have a forum but their podcasts especially are the real value [0]. But most people on there are tech people, not marketers, so you'll still get a skewed version of reality. I've found great insight through following actual marketers though, such as Jordan Platten on YouTube who builds a social media marketing agency from scratch via cold calls [1]. Now this is, in my opinion, what programmers should be doing, not learning the latest new Javascript framework to make their MVP just right. On Reddit, there is similarly /r/sweatystartup [2] which also has a website with more podcasts and articles [3]. But the gist is that it's more about boring industries like lawn care, plumbing etc than shiny tech businesses. One of the best things you can do is to take a look at [2] and call 100 local businesses in a niche you pick (lawn care, etc), ask them about their problems then either start a competing service or start creating software for that niche. Nick Huber, the guy who started the subreddit and site, did both and has a ~$25 million business now. The above is basically what I'm doing, I'm looking into making software for the boring industry of social media marketing. [0] https://podcasts.google.com/search/Indie%20Hackers https://podcasts.google.com/search/Indie%20Hackers [1] https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdO5xp5occOzfVGNbR_WZMi3TGuZ-fSnhh https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdO5xp5occOzfVGNbR_WZ... [2] https://old.reddit.com/r/sweatystartup/comments/dmgy0f/useful_resources_from_the_blog_and_podcast/ https://old.reddit.com/r/sweatystartup/comments/dmgy0f/usefu... [3] https://sweatystartup.com/ https://sweatystartup.com/