
Advice for young guys/gals in building a semi-successful online service - silentinteract
There is lots of advice on how to get funded and build giant businesses. But what about people who want to start small. Say make a few thousand a month on a app they&#x27;ve built. How do we go about doing the little things to get to those first few dollars? I find that it&#x27;s extremely hard.
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hbien
Here are some resources:

Podcasts:

* [http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/](http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/)

* [http://productpeople.tv/](http://productpeople.tv/)

* [http://bootstrapped.fm/](http://bootstrapped.fm/)

* [http://casjam.com/category/podcast/](http://casjam.com/category/podcast/)

* [http://www.chasingproduct.com/](http://www.chasingproduct.com/)

* [http://www.bootstrappedwithkids.com/](http://www.bootstrappedwithkids.com/)

* [http://www.kalzumeus.com/category/podcasts/](http://www.kalzumeus.com/category/podcasts/)

* more here: [http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/episodes/episode-104-p...](http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/episodes/episode-104-podcasts-for-startup-founders)

Books:

* [http://www.rachelandrew.co.uk/books/the-profitable-side-proj...](http://www.rachelandrew.co.uk/books/the-profitable-side-project)

* [http://www.startupbook.net/](http://www.startupbook.net/)

My favorite articles and talks:

* [https://training.kalzumeus.com/newsletters/archive/do-not-en...](https://training.kalzumeus.com/newsletters/archive/do-not-end-the-week-with-nothing)

* [http://youtu.be/0CDXJ6bMkMY](http://youtu.be/0CDXJ6bMkMY) (DHH @ Startup School 2008 on making money online)

* [http://vimeo.com/92087769](http://vimeo.com/92087769) (Nathan Barry @ Pioneer Nation on growing his business)

My advice is to:

(1) Make it a habit to work on your small online service every day -- or one
full day per week -- and stick to the schedule. It's a marathon, not a sprint.

(2) Subscribe to one or two podcasts. They're great learning/motivational
tools. Listening to other people talk about building a small business will
help reinforce your work habits. Don't overdo it, though! Your goal is to
build something, not to continually consume and never produce. I know I gave
you a huge list, just pick the one you like best!

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silentinteract
Haha, I was looking at startups for the rest of us yesterday. Looks really
good. Thanks for the links.

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User9821
If I had to give any advice, it would be to run through ideas quickly. If
they're not gaining traction, or they're a struggle to grow, drop them and
move on to the next idea.

This isn't going to be true for everyone, but each of my successful projects
was a success from day one. I posted them online, pointed a few communities
towards them like Reddit, and ended up with a few thousand registered users in
the first day. That then dropped to a few hundred daily registrations and went
up from there for the coming years. They've still been a lot of work, but I
knew I had something the instant they went live.

Every project I launched that was difficult, never went anywhere. There were a
handful of sites I started where I was working hard to build traffic and it
was always the same, a spike, then nothing a week later. Some of these I
worked on for months, one project I developed over the course of a year. My
two or three successful projects were built within a week or two. They were
rough, but provided something of value, and I could build them from there.

No one hits a homerun every time. Look at Facebook, Google, and Microsoft
struggle. These are companies with unlimited budgets, and some of the best in
the industry. They fail. Often. It doesn't matter if you fail 90% of the time
though, you just need to burn through those ten ideas to find the one that
works. If you get hung up on the first idea, and devote all your finances and
time for years, you'll never get to the good one.

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silentinteract
This is, I think, the best advice I've heard. I've been listening and reading
WPCurve (Dan Norris) - [http://wpcurve.com/blog/](http://wpcurve.com/blog/)
and he gives the same advice.

Love this post: [http://wpcurve.com/business-
ideas/](http://wpcurve.com/business-ideas/)

Thanks

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taf2
First make sure you complete what you start. Second keep it simple. Third make
sure it has a market. Fourth spend some money on ads. Finally, to grow listen
to your customers - put a phone number on your site and talk to people.

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vldx
> make sure you complete what you start.

Thumbs up, this really resonates with many creative professionals!

Regarding this, I would recommend checking [0] 99U.

[http://99u.com](http://99u.com)

