My thoughts after making my first $100k

[eliquid]

PS - Most incubators such as ycombinator won't even let you in/consider you without a co-founder (unless very rare circumstances).

Very true.

A startup I helped grow and had equity in was invested in by a celebrity Shark Tank investor Barbara Corcoran, and later entered into YCombinator ( YCW15 for those interested ).

 

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[SmoothFranko]

I
Because I always believed in myself and that's really all it takes. I never once gave up. Ever. I just kept going through every failure knowing that I would eventually make it.

So what do you do when no one else believes in you and your not even sure you do yourself?

 

[SteveO]

So what do you do when no one else believes in you and your not even sure you do yourself?

It does not matter what other people think. The part about not believing in yourself is another story. You should always believe in yourself and cast the doubts and negativity aside.

 

[sija1]

So what do you do when no one else believes in you and your not even sure you do yourself?

You just keep going.

 

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[SmoothFranko]

You just keep going.

I deleted what I had put here, I don't wish to soil someone else's success with my woes.

 

[sija1]

For that I would have to start. I had a business idea that someone close to me shot full of holes and my business partner (my best friend) has lost all interest, so I find myself back to square one with no ideas or ambition

I used to think like you and I still do. I have certain insecurities and I already asked for advice on this forum. Some of the things I applied easily, while others I understood perfectly in theory but wasn't able to change them.

I made a whole mind map actually because I was curious to know how the whole process of knowledge gaining/idea generating/creativity/action taking goes. I was curious to see how many external or personal elements play a role in the way we perceive or take action. It took me only a couple of hours to make it (few things still need to be changed and added, but it has around I would say 50-70 different elements which all impact the way we make decisions and take action). It may sound like BS, but I am very analytical person (some of my relationships didn't work because my ex-gfs told me I tend to over-analyze everything as much as I can). Even tho it took me only a couple of hours to make it, it is based on couple of years of observation and research about human mind, psychology and personalities and it is also based on 12 years of personal struggles with almost everything I have ever touched or had in my life.

When I started making it, I didn't understand how beneficial it was going to turn out to be because it revealed me one thing - you need to have a mastery or great knowledge of a certain field and yourself in order for you to generate and apply a million dollar idea from the beginning. If you don't like ideas you have right now, just waiting for a big hit is not going to come. Big ideas come with big experience. Write down all of the ideas you ever had, and start with that which doesn't require you to go into debt. Start building and launch it. It will give you experience, much more than just waiting for a million dollar idea. Experience will give you new knowledge, which could fire anytime to give you yet new ideas which would have never popped into your mind. I didn't understand it in the beginning, but this is why people on the forum never stop saying just do. There are a lot of possible outcomes. Maybe you'll learn nothing because of your lack of capacity to learn from good or bad experience (I don't know you, so don't take this personal - it is just an example), maybe you will stumble upon a problem which will spark another ideas to help the people who have the same problem, maybe your initial idea will take new direction with time and make you rich. I don't know. Plus doing something will make you feel better, because you will feel that your time is being well used.

Everything I said is what I'm applying at the moment. Whenever a thought that this is not going to work pops into my head, I say: "F*ck you, it doesn't need to work but it needs to see the light of the day."

They say that creativity is just an ability to create connections between things than most of the others don't see.

Note how everyone who made it planned for something smaller in the beginning. They just adjusted it after.

 

[Phillipbro]

Gale4rc, What do you think of Dane Maxwell's content? Do you think it would be of much help to someone looking to venture in SaaS?

 

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[RoadTrip]

Congrats Gale4rc! And great practical advice you are giving to the unexperienced here!

Quick side rant about the idea:
I really hate this BS that everyone talks about of interviewing people and trying to find a problem. That is complete horse shit. Yes it works but you're a lot better off pulling from something you know and building something for someone like yourself who is a part of a much bigger market. When you do this you can think for your user because you are your user. When you build something you don't know, you have to question every step and there's a million chances to get it wrong.

So true! You better believe his advice. I tried the Dane Maxwell approach for too long. I really didn't want to give up so ended up spending about 3 months calling hundreds of companies in different industries. Yes, I got some pain points, but nothing really actionable. It's also extremely risky to build software for a problem you only partially (or not) understand.

Like Gale4rc said: scratch your own itch. What frustrations or improvements can you think of in terms of products, services, or available information related to your hobbies, jobs, health, or sports?

 

[Andy Black]

So what do you do when no one else believes in you and your not even sure you do yourself?

Confidence comes from within.

Dan Sullivan talks about the different attitudes to confidence here:

And Dan talks about confidence again here:

 

[Leo Hendrix]

@Gale4rc

I cannot thank you enough for this thread!

I really appreciate it, as I am building something right now and all your posts and advice are exactly what I needed.

One question I have is, Did you pay your technical co-founder to build the MVP or Outsource the MVP at cost?

 

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[seanjohn]

I would also suggest partnering with a developer so you hold each other accountable. I've never had a problem finding one to work for equity, just surround yourself with them online + offline.

My childhood friend is a developer. I've come to him with prototypes and mockups in the past, and developed sales funnels while he works on the application... but now he has disowned me because of our past failed projects.

How do you surround yourself with developers who will work for equity?

PS. Congrats on the exit -- this thread is inspiring.

 

[AgainstAllOdds]

My childhood friend is a developer. I've come to him with prototypes and mockups in the past, and developed sales funnels while he works on the application... but now he has disowned me because of our past failed projects.

How do you surround yourself with developers who will work for equity?

Actually provide value. You coming up with "prototypes" + "mockups" + "sales funnels" that have no sales is the equivalent of you doing nothing. If you generate no sales, then you provide no value. No one will work for equity unless the sum of you + them > then them by themselves.

 

[seanjohn]

Actually provide value. You coming up with "prototypes" + "mockups" + "sales funnels" that have no sales is the equivalent of you doing nothing. If you generate no sales, then you provide no value. No one will work for equity unless the sum of you + them > then them by themselves.

This was 4 or 5 years ago. We had sales but the margins weren't enough to sustain. The things you learn in business!
Since then I've improved my sales abilities and helped generate millions in increased revenues for some businesses locally.
I usually outsource my web work, but for larger projects, it would be great to have someone as invested as I am in the success of the project.

I'm looking for more insight for /where/ to hang out to find developers that will work for equity, as Gale4rc mentioned.
I'm sure this would be helpful to others as well.

 

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[Torobaro]

Quick side rant about the idea:
I really hate this BS that everyone talks about of interviewing people and trying to find a problem. That is complete horse shit. Yes it works but you're a lot better off pulling from something you know and building something for someone like yourself who is a part of a much bigger market. When you do this you can think for your user because you are your user. When you build something you don't know, you have to question every step and there's a million chances to get it wrong.

Hey Gale! congrats for your hard work and never giving up! you´re an inspiration for me

However just one comment with the interviewing part, I think you can´t interview people to try and find a problem but you can and must interview people to see if they share a common pain you´ve already found.

I am currently doing this and although most of the interviews are useless I have found some very interesting insights I hadn´t thought about.

One guy even told me they where actually building something similar in their company

Anyway, amazing journey and thanks for all your valuable insights!!!Best

 

[TedM]

I have a SaaS idea that I want to build but I don't have the programming skills. I am interested in learning the basics though just so I can communicate better with the programmer I'm going to hire.

you can mock-up screens with powerpoint. just show what you want to appear and what behaviors /options you want...

it's easier this way, since you can monitor your data flow more easily than trying to program....

 

[fastattack03]

you can mock-up screens with powerpoint. just show what you want to appear and what behaviors /options you want...

it's easier this way, since you can monitor your data flow more easily than trying to program....

Thanks for the response, Ted. This comment is actually more than a year old. I have a full-time developer right now. The time investment to learn the basics has been really helpful. I can relate to what he's talking about and sometimes I even offer solid suggestions in our brainstorming sessions.

 

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[TedM]

Thanks for the response, Ted. This comment is actually more than a year old. I have a full-time developer right now. The time investment to learn the basics has been really helpful. I can relate to what he's talking about and sometimes I even offer solid suggestions in our brainstorming sessions.

LOL. So much for adding value. I've been in IT for long time, so maybe my approach works for me better than others w/o my background.

What "basics" did you learn? I'm really interested in learning that - it's a constant theme here on the forum "learn to code or not to code....", and one of my kids is asking me too. Since I've lost my perspective on this, it would be refreshing to hear from you.

 

[AlphaWulf]

It's Saturday night 11:51PM and I'm just taking a break from reading my new book "Adweek the copywriting handbook".

My business which took a year to get here is about to reach $100k/yr and it feels great. Everyday I wake up comfortable knowing I've finally built something successful.

Our growth is only getting better and I can see the path to $100k/month.

What's different between before the business and now?

Not much.

I think I can better evaluate ideas (I'm also starting another startup on the side) and I have more experience now but nothing is really different.

Why?

Because I always believed in myself and that's really all it takes. I never once gave up. Ever. I just kept going through every failure knowing that I would eventually make it.

You can see I joined this forum in 2013 and I've been on the grind even before that but was a little immature and didn't take my ideas as seriously as they needed to be taken to succeed.

If you factor in all the time/failures you can easily say it took 3-5 years to reach the point I'm at today.

It was worth it.

The grind feels the same at $100k as it did $1.

Commit to something and don't stop.

Short and sweet. I love it!

 

[Fox]

@Gale4rc Any updates on this now - how is the progress?

 

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