
My Second Year as a Solo Developer - mtlynch
https://mtlynch.io/solo-developer-year-2/
======
patio11
Two cents offered because this post really strikes a chord with me, and I also
spent some time chasing down rabbit holes early in my software business:

These products do not appear obviously commercializable and multiple years
invested into them without materially improving the businesses does not
decrease my confidence in that snap judgment. You could probably talk to
business owners with problems, launch an (appropriately priced; hundreds to
thousands of dollars per year) product against those problems, build
contingent on getting 10 commits to buy, and be at +/\- $100k in 12 to 18
months. Many people with less technical and writing ability have done this in
e.g. the MicroConf community. If you want the best paint-by-numbers approach
to it I've seen, c.f.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otbnC2zE2rw&t=2s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otbnC2zE2rw&t=2s)

(I'll note that What Got Done is probably a viable boutique SaaS business if
you somehow figured out distribution for it, at price points between $50 and
$200 per month. My confidence on this approaches total. HNers skeptical
because it is technically trivial should probably reflect for a moment on how
much time is spent on standups at a company with 20 or 200 engineers, what one
hour of their time is worth, and how likely that company is to put an engineer
on this project specifically.)

If you run an API-based business in the future: Usage-based billing is a
really tricky business model for a solo developer. Note that you can say
"Usage-based billing but we have a minimum commitment", and probably should
prior to doing speculative integration engineering work. Your minimum
commitment should be north of $1,000 per month; practically nobody can
integrate with your API for cheaper than a thousand dollars of engineering
time, right.

This also counsels aiming at problems amenable to solutions with APIs which
are trivially worth $1,000++ a month to many businesses which can hire
engineers. Parsing recipe ingredients seems like a very constrained problem
space. Consider e.g. parsing W-2s or bank statements or similar; many more
businesses naturally care about intake of those documents, getting accurate
data from them, and introducing that data into a lucrative business process
that they have.

I would encourage you, to the maximum extent compatible with your sanity, to
prioritize "Will this get me more customers?" over behind-the-scenes
investments like CI/CD which are very appropriate to Google but will under no
circumstance show up in next year's report as One Of The Most Important Things
I Did This Year.

For similar reasons, I would suggest devoting approximately zero cycles to
cost control. You don't have a cost problem and no amount of cost control will
bend the curve of your current businesses to sustainability. You have a
revenue problem. Your desired state in the medium term will make it
economically irrational for you to think for more than a minute about a $50 a
month SaaS expense; marketing and sales gets you to that desired state, not
cost control.

~~~
cs02rm0
_You could probably talk to business owners with problems, launch an
(appropriately priced; hundreds to thousands of dollars per year) product
against those problems, build contingent on getting 10 commits to buy_

I don't doubt that you're absolutely right, but this bit strikes me as _hard_.
I've struggled to find one business owner with a problem they perceive, let
alone 10 with commitments to buying a solution for the same problem.

Ironically, it strikes me that there's a gap here for a business to solve;
connecting entrepreneurial devs with business owners aware of problems.

~~~
amelius
> Ironically, it strikes me that there's a gap here for a business to solve;
> connecting entrepreneurial devs with business owners aware of problems.

This. Why hasn't this gap been filled yet?

~~~
poulsbohemian
>> Ironically, it strikes me that there's a gap here for a business to solve;
connecting entrepreneurial devs with business owners aware of problems.

>This. Why hasn't this gap been filled yet?

It's called Upwork.

No seriously, hear me out. When a business owner has a problem they perceive
could be solved with technology, they create a job or they go on job posting
sites seeking either an employee or a contractor to try and solve their
problem.

Where they get it wrong is that they frequently have unrealistic expectations
about what it will cost and how long it will take. They have no idea what
skills they should look for and who to trust.

Is there a market mismatch here? Absolutely, but you'll have to find a way
above the fray of recruiting sites as that's really the state of the market.

~~~
quickthrower2
Yeah I’ve tried another similar site and people’s expectations are a bit
loony, usually they want to pay the price you would charge a single customer
for 1 year as a SaaS for you to develop the entire solution! Maybe non
software folks don’t get the difference between say paying Atlassian
$1000/month or whatever it is for Jira and paying a dev $1000 to develop a
JIRA clone, because it probably seems like the same thing.

~~~
poulsbohemian
Recent client: "I took a fortran class back in college, so let me know if you
need any help."

Therein lies the problem: They know lawyers, doctors, accountants, heck even
plumbers are going to be expensive because they are educated / trained and/or
they get you out of an identifiable tight spot (the IRS isn't happy, water is
coming into the house, I'm having a heart attack, I'm getting sued, etc).

Software developers? Outside the FAANGs technical people are viewed as
fungible. Many, many small businesses are grossly undercapitalized such that a
business owner might very well be paying that technical person a lot more than
they pay themselves. Likewise, technical roles are typically compensated well
above many other clerical / field / service / business type roles such that a
business owner might not have ever paid so much to any other single employee.

~~~
balfirevic
> Outside the FAANGs technical people are viewed as fungible.

Fungible does not mean low-paying. Plumbers are mostly viewed as fungible,
however expensive they may be.

------
rickitan
I see a lot of comments criticizing your path and progress. Making remarks
like "why didn't you stay at Google".

I applaud your decision, effort, and perseverance. I admire your risk taking
and having skin in the game. Trying to make it out on your own.

People forget the journey is not just about the money. It's about learning,
growing and bringing your ideas to life. Being an artist, and expressing
yourself through products.

Keep on going my friend. There's no doubt you'll get there.

~~~
cambalache
Nice words, similar words were said to me. Now I am broke and semi-
unemployable. So onlookers beware.

~~~
roytang
May I ask why you find yourself semi-unemployable? I'm in kind of a similar
position as the OP in that I have a significant nest egg so that even if I
spend a few years derping around and failing at a bunch of things, I figure
that I just need to stop before that nest egg gets anywhere near dangerously
low and go back to looking for freelance or consulting work, even at lower
rates, should that become necessary to survive. I'm asking about your
situation in case there are other pitfalls I need to be wary of.

~~~
cambalache
I am right now an illegal alien in a country (not the US). My home country
monthly wage is 5 dollars or so, so returning is not an option unless I can
get a remote job.

~~~
anchpop
Without knowing your situation, if you're a good developer it may be possible
to get an H1B visa which would allow you to work as a software developer in
the US.

~~~
cambalache
I love to program but I am a career switcher. All my professional experience
is in logistics, I have a B.S but not in CS, also I am 41. By all means if you
have any tip to get a H1B (I have heard is crazy competitive) let me know.

~~~
sixtypoundhound
Why not Upwork? Or investing some time in studying up on digital marketing and
building your own products?

It isn't easy but you should be able to clobber $5/hour. Two questions which
my customers have never asked me:

\- What school did you go to? \- What country do you live in / are a citizen
of...

~~~
cambalache
Upwork rejected my resume some months ago. I am enhancing my portfolio to give
it a shot again in the next weeks. I want to diversify my income so I have
thought about producing digital products, but I need food-rent money now so
that it is what I am prioritizing. I am also working on my Algorithms/Data
Structures skills to try in TopTal, I dont know if you have any experience
with them.

------
mtlynch
Author here. Happy to answer any questions or hear any feedback about this
post.

Discussion from my first annual update last year:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19054150](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19054150)

~~~
JacKTrocinskI
So 2 years and you earned $18,000? Seems rather bad, you think you can
exponentially grow that in the next year or two?

~~~
icedchai
The totals on the first chart are wrong. In 2 years he _lost_ $23k. (Or you
could say the "totals" are correct, but calling it "net profit" is wrong.)

~~~
JacKTrocinskI
Yeah, either way, financially that would never make sense to me.

~~~
bdcravens
OP has significant savings. They are their own VC. Think of it in terms of a
startup, most of which don't turn profits for years.

------
rs23296008n1
Good stuff.

I've seen a bit of negativity about this being a waste of time since you're
not making equivalent money to old job. For those people: This isn’t any
different from spending time earning a degree by returning to full-time study.
And your attempts are growing. The compound interest from these investments in
time and effort will help you regardless. Even if you fail on every business
at first you'll still get so much experience and momentum you can't help but
do better next time. And I doubt any will actually fail: each will have an
element that wasn't good enough but still capable of being tweaked to fix it.
Even if you don't fix it, you've still learnt something in the attempt.

~~~
tempsy
OP isn't explicit about it but he's effectively F.I.R.E'd. These are projects
to keep the mind fresh in what is early retirement. If that weren't the case
building an actual business requires a lot more time, energy, resources even
as a solo founder than what I'm getting from the blog post.

~~~
ronyfadel
Or OP could be T.I.R.E.D. :) He’s doing his best to bootstrap his multiple
products, but is prioritizing intellectual curiosity, building neat things
while not burning out. At least, that’s my view of it.

------
swalsh
Just some honest feedback.

I have a use for Zestful, and the price is good. But playing around, it seems
good at the easy stuff (but I can do the easy stuff myself) it's not so good
at the hard stuff.

For example the string "3/4 cup risotto rice, Arborio or Carnaroli"

It identifies the unit and quantity fair enough, and it's right when it says
"Risotto rice" is the product. But then it says "Arborio or Carnaroli" is a
preparation method. I can totally see WHY it says that. But I'm not sure
that's correct.

At your price point though, I might still use it. Ultimatley to parse
everything I need to parse it would be a lot cheaper than spending even an
hour writing it myself. But that was my first thoughts playing around with it.

~~~
mtlynch
Thanks for reading and for testing out Zestful!

> _For example the string "3/4 cup risotto rice, Arborio or Carnaroli"_

> _It identifies the unit and quantity fair enough, and it 's right when it
> says "Risotto rice" is the product. But then it says "Arborio or Carnaroli"
> is a preparation method. I can totally see WHY it says that. But I'm not
> sure that's correct._

Yeah, I'm constantly improving the model, but there will always be cases it
gets wrong. For most of my customers, that's a mostly fine result, because
very few of the clients actually use the preparation note field. Most care
only about the quantity, unit, product, and USDA fields.

I'll fix the bad result on the risotto example, but it's definitely a game of
whack-a-mole. There are so many variations and corner cases that it'll never
be 100%.

> _At your price point though, I might still use it. Ultimatley to parse
> everything I need to parse it would be a lot cheaper than spending even an
> hour writing it myself. But that was my first thoughts playing around with
> it._

Haha, maybe I should raise my prices. But seriously, I'd be happy to have you
as a customer. If you'd like to chat more about about your use case, shoot me
an email at michael@zestfuldata.com.

~~~
jacurtis
Aren't you going to make him pre-pay for 3 months and not charge him until the
feature is implemented???

Just got to call you out on your own article. lol

~~~
mtlynch
Haha, minor bugfixes I can do without pre-payment.

------
willj
Naive question by someone who’s never started a business: when bootstrapping
companies while keeping your day job, how do you deal with intellectual
property clauses in employment contracts, such that your employer owns the
“inventions” you create in your free time, on your own equipment, unrelated to
the business area you work in? I know laws vary by state, but I would find it
especially disheartening if you spent years of effort and sacrificed your
social life only to have your product snatched away from you once it finally
became profitable or popular.

My non-lawyer reading of the internet’s opinions suggest that you need to
discuss it with your company, or possibly edit your employment contract before
signing, but the latter seems a bad suggestion if you’re afraid of not getting
a job. I’ve also read that these kinds of clauses can even apply several
months after you terminate at your day job, which suggests that you can’t even
_start_ on the product until months after you’ve left.

All of that makes me unlikely to try to build a business in tech, since I
would never have the capital to take such a long break away from a company,
nor to build a product for a long time before it’s profitable without having a
day job to support me.

~~~
jacurtis
Generally, when an employer owns your "inventions", this only applies to
"inventions" created while using the employer's resources. Most employement
contracts will make it sound like they own every waking thought, but in most
cases when this has been taken to court, the precedent has been set, that it
really only applies to inventions or ideas that happen in relation to and
using employer's resources.

So this means that an employer can argue they own software that you build:

\- On a company-issued computer

\- Using contacts you garnered through work

\- On company time (this is complicated for salary employees, but definitely
applies to time in the office, or standard business hours when you are
expected to be working)

\- Work collaborated on with other co-workers

Now I should clarify, I am not a lawyer. None of this is legal advice, yada
yada...

But generally you can work on side projects and skirt around intellectual
property clauses as long as you make sure to distinguish work time and work
resources from your personal projects. The biggest thing is to avoid doing it
while at work (or when expected to be actively working if you are remote), and
avoid using a company computer or piggybacking off company resources (for
example making a sub-account in your employer's CI/CD tool to run tests for
your software).

So make sure you have seperate accounts for everything, avoid doing it on
company time, and use a personal computer (not a work-issued computer) and you
should be absolutely fine with working on a side project.

~~~
adventured
> Most employement contracts will make it sound like they own every waking
> thought, but in most cases when this has been taken to court, the precedent
> has been set, that it really only applies to inventions or ideas that happen
> in relation to and using employer's resources.

A simple example of this that I like to point out to people in tech to help
them understand that an employer doesn't inherently own your soul, is picture
yourself starting a Pizza Hut franchise (convenience store, or anything
equivalent) strictly on your own time and dime entirely outside of work. Does
your employer get to own that business, get to take it away from you, just
because you work for them 9 to 5? Nope and it sounds particularly absurd when
you frame it with something more traditional. Or imagine starting a real-
estate renovation business, where you renovate houses in your own spare time;
same thing, does IBM get to own your house renovation business just because
you pull 9-5 for them? Hell no they don't.

The only serious risk difference re starting tech businesses (vs other
traditional businesses) while working in tech is in cases of competitive
issues if you start something directly in the employer's wheelhouse. Then you
better lawyer up well ahead of time and navigate it very carefully.

~~~
m_ke
But it's really more like starting your own fast food franchise while working
on a business team at Pizza Hut. It's an IP issue and could be a conflict of
interest.

------
avl999
Thanks for writing this. It is good to see a perspective where a business is
being built up slowly as opposed to the typical "I quit my job and now my side
project makes $30k a month two months in" posts we usually see.

Do you ever feel issues with motivation when you don't see growth as quickly
as you'd like?

~~~
mtlynch
Thanks for reading!

> _Do you ever feel issues with motivation when you don 't see growth as
> quickly as you'd like?_

Good question. For me, the more dominant feeling is frustration when I do
something that I expect will bring growth, and then there's no measurable
effect. That happened over and over again with Is It Keto. It was especially
tough because the site's growth depends so heavily on Google, and there seems
to be a lag time of weeks or months before Google reacts to certain changes or
decides certain pages are worth putting at the #1 slot for related queries. It
was tough to make a site change or publish a new post and think, "Okay, I
guess I'll just wait 6-8 weeks to see what Google thinks of this."

------
jakobegger
I read your previous post about Zestful, and this years update, and I just
don't understand who would buy this as a hosted API. To me, it sounds like
this should be a library, not an API. For every use case that I can think of,
having a library would be 100x better than an API.

In my experience, APIs are generally slow, unreliable, and tend to change
without notice.

I don't understand what advantage an API has, except making it easier for the
developer to charge based on usage.

Do people really buy APIs like this? Am I missing something?

~~~
agwa
Zestful uses machine learning, so there could be a fair amount of storage,
CPU, and memory requirements that make using a hosted API preferable to a
local library. Also, if you read Michael's posts on
[https://whatgotdone.com](https://whatgotdone.com) you'll see that he is
frequently improving the model. With a hosted API, customers benefit from
improved accuracy immediately without having to update anything.

~~~
BlueTemplar
"Without having to update anything" seems a bit disingenuous - does this
software even work offline, without having to ask for some data from an online
server, just to load the front page?

------
senderista
If you're netting at best a few grand a year and need to survive on savings
anyway, why not just drop the business pretense and work for free on stuff you
actually find interesting? A popular open-source project could yield more
long-term value for one's career than an unprofitable or barely profitable
"lifestyle business".

~~~
mtlynch
Thanks for reading!

The plan is for my income to increase over time. The benefit of launching
businesses is that each time, I learn skills to increase my chances of success
in the next attempt.

------
xchaotic
Sorry to say but this proves that for someone who actually has to work for a
living ie earn money, corporate life is absolutely the correct choice. Even
for Mr Lynch these experiments in charity wouldn’t be possible without the
nest egg from google (which he acknowledged). To go from net 100k+ to below
zero and still be unprofitable after two years is a financial disaster.

~~~
theli0nheart
> _Sorry to say but this proves that for someone who actually has to work for
> a living ie earn money, corporate life is absolutely the correct choice._

Not really. This just proves that corporate life isn't the most profitable
option for the OP. You just can't make sweeping statements like this based on
a single anecdote.

I'll offer this to other "corporate" folk out there. I was self-employed since
late 2010 until I recently (last month) joined a mid-stage startup. During my
last year of self-employment I took home ~$400k in cash, and lots more in
early-stage stock, and worked _maybe_ 15-20 hours per week. There are very few
corporate jobs that would even come close to that balance of take-home pay and
work-life balance.

~~~
reflectiv
I'll offer a counter example in that the startup I joined failed miserably and
I ended up losing out on a LOT of income.

I am now working for a decent 6-figure income and EXTREMELY happy with the
stability and 40-50 hour work weeks...in comparison to the ABSOLUTE GRIND I
went through trying to help that startup get off the ground - this is a
godsend.

Your scenario is VERY UNLIKELY IMO.

~~~
leadingthenet
WHAT is WITH the RANDOM CAPITALISATION?

~~~
jmnicolas
Hint : it's not random.

------
bilekas
How did you cut down so drastically on expenses in the second year, +50%, or
was there a large investment in the first year, sorry I havent read last years
update yet!

Also, I'm just coming accross your Zestful service and can't believe that is
exactly what i am looking for and actually started to write, but I have other
stuff to do so no point re-inventing the wheel!

Consider me a new client sir!

PS: Congratulations !

~~~
tristanperry
"in August, I bought a modest two-bedroom home in South Hadley, Massachusetts.
Population: 17,500."

"My living expenses here are ~$2k per month, which is close enough to the rate
of return on my personal investments that I'm kind of at equilibrium."

\- i.e. Michael moved to a much lower cost of living area.

~~~
onion2k
If that "I bought a house" is literal then he doesn't have rent or a mortgage
to pay. That's a _big_ chunk of most people's outgoings.

~~~
redisman
Outside of the super-star cities, housing is pretty affordable!

~~~
onion2k
Sure. Thankfully most people can afford their outgoings if they're sensible.
It's still a lot easier if you don't have rent or a mortgage though.

If you're trying to suggest houses are cheap enough that lots of people can
afford to buy one outright then you're absolutely wrong regardless of where it
is. Very, very few people manage that.

------
nlh
All personal stuff aside (and on that note - I’m a huge fan of this story Mike
and love what you’re doing!)

This is a great piece of advice for solo devs out there:

> Great! You can pre-pay for three months of service, and your billing cycle
> won't start until that feature is available.

> I've never been burned on a feature request since.

I imagine it’s super easy to fall into the custom feature trap when the
temptation of a big new customer is right around the corner, and this seems
like an excellent solution!

------
LeoNatan25
I like how you call that home "a modest two-bedroom home" in the linked blog.
I guess it's a matter of perspective. Here in Israel, where everything is
cramped, this would be something I'd be very content with.

~~~
mtlynch
Haha, I moved here from Manhattan, where I lived in a 1 BR that was luxurious
by Manhattan standards but tiny by real world standards.

I'm very happy with my house, but I think it's probably smaller than what most
software developers in the US would choose if they lived in an area this
inexpensive.

~~~
LeoNatan25
If you don't have children, a larger space would be more burden than
necessity. Be happy that you moved away from the jail cell. I'd move if I
could too. ;-)

~~~
tudelo
At least the jail cell comes with an amazing variety of food and unrivaled
convenience

~~~
LeoNatan25
Both a blessing and a curse. When you cook your own meals, you end up eating
much more healthy. Having a yard also means you can grow your own vegetables,
which is also normally much healthier.

------
dhruvkar
So awesome seeing your posts at the top of HN!

>> I've also noticed that readers are less interested in business lessons
unless the story involves thousands of dollars — earning or losing large sums
both seem to work.

I would love to read more about the mundane, small business lessons, because
that's where I am. And I'm positive I'm not the only one.

Keep writing about the smaller day-to-day struggles, you got readers!

~~~
mtlynch
Hey Dhruv, thanks for reading! Always fun to hear from you again.

------
fredgrott
last corner of graphic right bottom is a wrong amount.

I use to be a number guy, ie accountant hacker. Its not 18k positive as far as
net revenue increase from the two years.

the percentage is probably right but not the sign before the net rev number.

and note you have to reach profits soon per how you file with the IRS..sorry
to burst your bubble.

same sort of errors in the saas net rev numbers.

bone up on your accounting stats as there are books out there on how to do it

~~~
mtlynch
Thanks for reading!

> _I use to be a number guy, ie accountant hacker. Its not 18k positive as far
> as net revenue increase from the two years._

Can you clarify what you mean? What is the correct way for me to present this
information?

> _and note you have to reach profits soon per how you file with the
> IRS..sorry to burst your bubble._

Can you elaborate? Are you assuming that I file as a corporation or a sole
proprietor?

------
gbasin
Encouraging to see your progress, keep it up!

Reading about your projects, it strikes me that some have different potential
than others for perhaps one clear reason: solving a problem vs not. Why not
double down on Zestful? There is demand there, and some are willing to pay...

This post I wrote recently may be helpful for you:
[https://tinyletter.com/garybasin/letters/how-to-know-what-
pe...](https://tinyletter.com/garybasin/letters/how-to-know-what-people-want)

~~~
mtlynch
Thanks for reading!

> _Why not double down on Zestful? There is demand there, and some are willing
> to pay..._

Mainly because I don't know of any action I can take to grow Zestful. Large
companies have already rolled their own solution. Smaller companies who need
ingredient parsing have figured out some solution and they usually don't see
it as worthwhile for them to take a chance on a new service if their old one
is working fine. Customers need to find me at the time they're building a
product that needs Zestful, but I don't know other ways of helping them find
me beyond the SEO steps I've already taken.

~~~
gbasin
Large companies often end up getting hamstrung with homegrown solutions as
they try to scale, and look for specialized SaaS solutions

------
alexellisuk
If folks liked this story, check in with Daniel Vassallo who quit a job at
Amazon on well over 500k / year salary and benefits to start out on his own as
a solo, small-business founder.
[https://twitter.com/dvassallo](https://twitter.com/dvassallo)

He shares lots of personal stats like his incoming & expenditure - quite
inspirational and can show that circumstances and luck can also play a part.

------
microcolonel
Side note: when presenting a simple revenue-expense-profit-loss chart, it can
help to chart the expenses as cutting from the bottom of the revenue (tough
though, when you are funding the expenses externally, in this case you have to
put the loss below the zero line). Anyway, it makes it clear when your
expenses intersect your revenue, and you switch to profit rather than loss.

------
localhost
I think it's especially important to make sure that you interview customers
and find out what their problems are before you even think about writing a
single line of code. You should strive to get a mix of qualitative (because
the stories you hear will let you empathize with the customer problems) as
well as quantitative via surveys / small ad experiments. Once you have some
signal, then proceed to start exploring solutions (and again, this isn't about
writing code, you can do this entirely with mockups/napkin drawings, whatever
it takes to get your point across) and _test those solutions with the
customers you interviewed earlier_. Once you have some evidence that a) you
have a problem that customers will pay to solve, and b) you have a solution
that you have validated THEN you proceed to start writing the code.

The biggest change at my company is doing product development this way:
understand the customer problem and the solution before writing code.

Hope this helps.

------
davnicwil
Great post Micheal, and awesome to see it hit the top of HN - a reminder I
guess that the core bootstrapper/hacker community is on here and strong as
ever!

The numbers and stuff aside (which are looking promising, btw, congrats - look
forward to see how the trends continue in y3) the part I liked best was the _I
still love it_ section. It's incredibly important and, I'm sure you know, the
real driver behind doing what you're doing, not money.

I think there's a tendency, maybe especially for technical people, to want to
quantify and maximise etc, and money is an easy metric for doing that with and
therefore to focus on. But on reflection, it's pretty obviously not the main
reason we do what we do.

~~~
mtlynch
Thanks for reading, David!

> _It 's incredibly important and, I'm sure you know, the real driver behind
> doing what you're doing, not money._

Yeah, definitely. I ultimately do need to figure out a way to make _some_
money, but I'd be happy to work for myself for 1/10th the compensation I'd get
at a FAANG.

------
oliv__
FYI: on isitketo.org/cream-cheese, the link to "keto dessert recipes" is
broken (it's an internal link). Looks like it's being prefixed with the domain
and the url ends up having two http segments.

~~~
mtlynch
Fixed! Thanks for the heads up.

------
mpurham
I can closely relate to this post. Often times I build and develop software
that is simply not worth my time. I think one important thing that you are
doing well is capturing data for revenue. I think you should also take your
hourly rate and multiply it by the amount of time it is taking you and that
will give you a better idea of what this is costing you to build. I've started
to capture this data for myself ([https://marcell.me](https://marcell.me)) to
get a better idea of what it is actually costing me.

------
sealthedeal
love it! If my two cents matter to you... I did a similar thing for a few
years, and it wasnt until I went all in on one product/problem did I finally
start to see some great returns.

With that said, I have a friends dad who owns like 10 different businesses and
he has people manage all of them, while he sits back and collects. These are
not software businesses they are more brick and mortar like long term storage,
etc, but maybe you can build the same model with online businesses! :)

Good luck, and thanks for posting, really enjoy reading the content!

------
alexellisuk
I'm also a solo developer, or at least building a Ltd company starting at one.
I wrote up about my developer setup here, and thought it might be of interest.

[https://blog.alexellis.io/building-a-linux-desktop-for-
cloud...](https://blog.alexellis.io/building-a-linux-desktop-for-cloud-native-
development/)

Would folks like to see more posts about branching out and working for
yourself? I'd consider writing-up my perspective from the UK if it was
interesting to people here.

------
m0zg
What Got Done is basically Google's internal Snippets. I wish there was an on-
prem setup to do that. The idea is basically every week you write, in free
form text, what you've done, and possibly what you're planning to do, and your
team mates get to view it, and subscribe to updates conveniently. If you're
anything like me, you will find this valuable not only day to day, but also
when the review time comes and you need to beat your chest a little. I tend to
forget how much I've done.

~~~
mtlynch
I wish I'd found you when I was trying to gather enough customers to make What
Got Done a business!

Yeah, I loved Snippets as well. I wrote a little ode to them last year.[0]

> _I wish there was an on-prem setup to do that._

What Got Done is open source now. The standard version has a dependency on
Google Cloud Firestore, but I have a working branch that runs on Redis.[1]
You'd need to implement a new auth solution because What Got Done depends on
UserKit, which is still in closed beta, but you can still use their dummy
backend (configured in What Got Done by default) which accepts "password" for
any username.

[0] [https://mtlynch.io/status-updates-to-nobody/](https://mtlynch.io/status-
updates-to-nobody/)

[1] [https://github.com/mtlynch/whatgotdone/tree/redis-
persist](https://github.com/mtlynch/whatgotdone/tree/redis-persist)

------
gramakri
Great read, thanks for writing this. One of the hardest parts of doing a
bootstrapped startup is the peer pressure and the perceived opportunity cost.
The numbers won't add up for a bootstrapped business for many years (I am
talking upwards of 5 years even). The only thing that keeps you going is your
ambition ('this is what i want to do', 'nothing else i would rather do').

The best way I have learnt to deal with this is to surround myself with people
who think similar.

------
nonseobeliever
I work at a big tech company and also have my own small firm for freelance
work. Even though I don't have my own product and implement what customers
need, ranging from new website to SIEMs and stuff, I find it pretty lucrative.
And my prices are about $20/hr. But yes, I don't know if I can survive without
working full job.

LE: and revenue is not that small, about 25k per year.

~~~
cambalache
$20/h is shockingly low. That is an effective rate of around 10 bucks an hour,
at or below minimum wage level.

~~~
benhurmarcel
Depends where

------
aty268
These businesses all seem like something that very well could make you money,
but would never scale into a growth startup. And it seems the time it takes to
build one of these or a growth startup isn't going to be too different. I
might even say that you similar chances of making a similar amount of money
from either.

So why not shoot for the larger moon?

~~~
m_ke
Ingredient line parsing is a really small market and something that sounds
like a fun project to work on but is probably not a business venture that has
room to grow. The number of companies that have enough recipes to justify
automation, profits to justify paying for it and nobody inhouse who can
implement it is really small. There's no viable price point for a product like
this when you factor in the cost of customer acquisition.

Content based consumer sites are also really hard to get off the ground and
it's not something that I'd recommend any bootstrapper to try unless you can
charge for it.

I'm sure it's all a great learning experience though and if Michael keeps
iterating the way he is now he'll definitely end up finding a worthwhile
business venture.

~~~
riku_iki
> Ingredient line parsing

if he can scale his tech to more general cases, it can be very strong
proposition.

------
usr42
Interesting analysis. I especially like your personal goals and the "Raise
prices, even if nobody's buying". This is a really valuable insight. Thanks
for sharing that.

I have one question: Do you have a feeling about the market size you are in
and how does this influence your planning?

------
christiansakai
I read your original post 2 years ago, and was waiting for the conclusion.
Thank you for posting this.

------
bkinnard
Reading the post makes me most curious about how you live so cheaply? Halfing
your burn rate doubles your time to death which more than doubles your chances
of success

~~~
mtlynch
Thanks for reading!

> _Reading the post makes me most curious about how you live so cheaply?_

90% of it is just location.

When I was in Manhattan, I was spending ~$7k/month. Part of that was higher
cost of my apartment and health insurance, but another big part is just the
culture. In NYC, it wouldn't be unusual for me to go out to a $80/person
dinner, spend $25 on drinks afterwards, another $25 on Ubers, then another $20
on brunch in the morning.

In Western Mass, I do make efforts to live cheaply, but so much of it is just
the ease of not spending money when nobody in your social circle spends like
that.

------
let_var
Michael - firstly, kudos for sticking to your solo dev plans. Hiccups are part
and parcel of the game. I like your Is This Keto app. And second, keep at it!

------
say_it_as_it_is
@mtlynch you're brave for sharing your experiences and struggles with the
world. What kind of help are you searching for?

------
iamlily
God bless you for writing such a good post

~~~
mtlynch
Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed it!

------
snambi
Question: why did he leave a job to build these sites? He could have built
them while continuing a full-time job.

------
cdiddy2
Are health insurance costs included in your current $2k monthly expenses? Did
you buy the house outright?

~~~
mtlynch
Yep and yep. Health insurance in MA is $250/month for a high deductible plan
(I was paying $500 in NY). This year, my insurance is only $40/month because I
qualified for a subsidized plan based on my 2019 income (or lack thereof).

~~~
cdiddy2
Interesting. I am in MA as well and it seems health insurance would be 500 a
month for me(1 person). Maybe thats the higher end plans though.

------
ingend88
@mtlynch what tech stack do you use?

~~~
mtlynch
Different things for different projects. I'm trying to move toward mostly Go +
Vue stuff.

* Zestful: Python + Docker + CRF++

* Is It Keto: Flask + AppEngine

* What Got Done: Go + Vue + AppEngine ([https://github.com/mtlynch/whatgotdone](https://github.com/mtlynch/whatgotdone))

* WanderJest: Go + Vue + AppEngine

* mtlynch.io: Hugo ([https://github.com/mtlynch/mtlynch.io](https://github.com/mtlynch/mtlynch.io))

~~~
usr42
@mtlynch I've directly recognized the coder theme you use for the blog. I like
it pretty much. How do you host it? Do you use github pages?

~~~
mtlynch
Cool, I like it too! I host on Firebase. You can check out my deployment
script here:

[https://github.com/mtlynch/mtlynch.io/blob/f35d9cf947a3d2c23...](https://github.com/mtlynch/mtlynch.io/blob/f35d9cf947a3d2c2341775ad34f92dc0ea9a1224/.circleci/config.yml)

------
smnplk
The data for North Korea is missing.

------
epicgiga
Very illustrative warning to other devs.

Just because you're coding and building things, doesn't mean you're doing
work, or that you're going to make any money.

Most devs are salarymen because that's the best role they can play in society.
Their employer plugs them into what the market actually wants. 99% of them are
inequipped to perform any that business aspect themselves. They just want to
build stuff. Like this devs projects -- a hobby not an enterprise.

The best thing any likeminded dev can do is this: do not write a single line
of code until you've vigorously screened for market demand. If you can't pick
up a phone and talk to businesses, this isn't for you, or you need to partner
with a so called "extrovert" or sales type.

Do not even so much as ponder the technical implementation of an idea for at
least a month, don't touch a terminal, and don't type a single char of code.

If you can't restrain yourself from doing so, save yourself the wasted time,
money, and energy. If you want a hiatus, just have a real hiatus and fly to a
Thai island for 6 months.

~~~
heipei
Part of the problem that I have with some of these accounts is that they so
often focus on tiny and mundane problems that individuals have. I don't know
if this is a conscious decision or just an unintended consequence of the fact
that B2C ideas are easy to find (you just watch your own daily routines) and
are more shiny since everyone knows about customer-facing products but fewer
people know all the gears that power corporations large and small.

The "Is it Keto" site is a nice hobby but if I seriously wanted to make money
with a product/SaaS/platform I'd ring up everyone I knew from previous jobs
and ask them which problem I should solve to save them hours of work every
day. If you do that your product will become irreplaceable, while a site for
helping you with your Keto diet is probably the first thing anyone would cut
out if they wanted to save some money. That's the issue I have when founders
focus so much on these lifestyle and purely optional products.

~~~
epicgiga
It's worth noting quite how vigorously you have to apply this concept.

My first business attempt _did_ factor in market demand, but didn't consider
the depth or capacity to pay ("nice to have" vs "take my money"). So I burned
out doing 70 hr weeks for something that was never going to make real money vs
what I could get as a salaryman or contractor.

If you're starting out, you really really shouldn't be aiming for a new unique
solution to something, unless you're planning on the VC route.

It is far wiser to copycat. Aim for a massive crowded market (e.g. weight
loss), because your chance of missing is hundreds of times lower.

Indeed an even more effective tactic is to buy an existing business in a
space, and develop it. It rips out all the market risk. This is how
freelancer.com started for instance.

~~~
PaulDavisThe1st
> It is far wiser to copycat. Aim for a massive crowded market (e.g. weight
> loss), because your chance of missing is hundreds of times lower.

And hence ... the fuckery of the modern economy.

"Too many hands in too many pockets / Not enough hands on hearts." \- The
Housemartins (80s)

~~~
epicgiga
Nope, once you have revenue you can maneuver into fresh territory. One step at
a time.

~~~
henryfjordan
Or just be a strong competitor in an obviously valuable space. Nothing wrong
with that.

