Indie Hackers

I hopped on the Run With It podcast with Chris and Eathan to share 3 business ideas for indie hackers to run with in 2021. Two are brand new, and one was inspired by my recent episode on bundling with Tyler King. 

Subscribe to Run With It: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/run-with-it-business-ideas-from-successful-entrepreneurs/id1477133536

Jordan O'Connor (@jdnoc) is one of the more impressive solo founders I've had on the podcast. Saddled with student loan debt and eager to take care of his growing family, Jordan embarked on a years-long journey to learn as much as he could and help everyone in his path. In this episode, we talk about how he developed the skills to build a $38,000/month SaaS business all on his own, and the importance of understanding that not only *can* your business help people, but it *has* to in order to succeed.

• Closet Tools, Jordan's SaaS for selling more on Poshmark: https://closet.tools
• Follow Jordan on Twitter: https://twitter.com/jdnoc

Tyler King (@TylerMKing) and I discuss how indie hackers can take advantage of the current cycle of bundling and unbundling. What is bundling, anyway? Why does it present an opportunity for new business ideas? How can fledgling founders take part in what seems like a game for big companies? And who's already doing a good job of this?

• Startup To Last, Tyler's podcast about building lasting, profitable SaaS businesses: https://www.startuptolast.com
• @TylerMKing, follow Tyler on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TylerMKing
• Less Annoying CRM, Tyler's CRM with 22k paying customers and $3M ARR: https://www.lessannoyingcrm.com
• Indie Hackers Episode #128, the full story behind Tyler's CRM business: https://www.indiehackers.com/podcast/128-tyler-king-of-less-annoying-crm

I've been procrastinating sharing my own story on the Indie Hackers podcast for years now. But when Ben and David (the co-hosts of the Acquired podcast) asked if they could interview me, it was impossible to put it off any longer. They're among the best podcast storytellers I know, so before you do anything, search for "Acquired" in your podcast player and subscribe to their excellent show! In this episode, Ben and David walk through my entire startup history, including my early childhood and college years. We talk about the creation of Indie Hackers, how I got it off the ground, and deep dive on the Stripe acquisition. I hope you enjoy it!

• Follow Courtland on Twitter: https://twitter.com/csallen
• Fmail, Courtland's first startup to check your Gmail in Facebook: https://mashable.com/2007/10/02/fmail
• Syphir, Courtland's second startup, advanced Gmail filters: https://www.engadget.com/2010-07-16-syphir-gives-you-more-gmail-filtering-options.html
• Taskforce, Courtland's YC startup, convert emails into tasks: https://techcrunch.com/2011/02/16/taskforce-helps-you-organize-your-inbox-and-become-a-taskmaster
• v1 of Indie Hackers, v1 of Indie Hackers on its launch day in August 2016: https://web.archive.org/web/20160811221549if_/https://indiehackers.com/businesses
• Indie Hackers launch on HN, Hacker News launch post for Indie Hackers: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12269425
• Acquired by Stripe, announcement of IH being acquired by Stripe: https://www.indiehackers.com/blog/acquired-by-stripe
• Indie Hackers acquisition on HN, Hacker News post when IH was acquired by Stripe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14090063

Dan Pierson's (@DanPierson) first entrepreneurial experience was a walk in the park — he was making $10k/week as a 23-year-old college grad, thinking life was easy. But when his business came to a halt, it set Dan on a 5 year walk through the "entrepreneurial desert" to find a business that could work. In this episode, Dan and I talk persisting through hardship, new ideas for indie hackers to help shape the future of work, and how he made $60k in a week by selling services before products.

• Unsettled, Dan's business helping shape the future of work: https://beunsettled.co
• Follow Dan on Twitter: https://twitter.com/danpierson
• Read Dan's writing on Medium: https://danpierson.medium.com
• Gather, a virtual space to gather: https://gather.town
• Branch, a virtual HQ for remote teams: https://branch.gg
• Grain, transcribe Zoom calls: https://grain.co
• First Base, physical equipment for remote employees: https://www.firstbasehq.com

Chris Oliver (@excid3) is a solo founder who recently passed $1M in revenue from his suite of projects targeted at Rails developers. He's had a wild journey, from being so broke he had to get a job, to getting to the point where he was literally living the 4-hour workweek while making a full-time salary. In this episode, Chris and I discuss the tradeoffs of different indie hacker business models, the right path for building and selling to an audience, and how to use combinations to come up with unique ideas.

• GoRails, Chris' Ruby on Rails screencasting business: https://gorails.com
• Jumpstart, Chris' pre-built features for Rails apps: https://jumpstartrails.com
• HatchBox, Chris' SaaS to build, deploy, and manage Rails apps: https://www.hatchbox.io
• Follow Chris on Twitter: https://twitter.com/excid3

Mubashar Iqbal (@mubashariqbal) is the most prolific indie hacker I know. He's got nearly 100 side projects under his belt, and more than a few of them are serving the burgeoning podcast space. In this episode, Mubs and I discuss opportunities for indie hackers to serve the podcasting market, what Mubs is working on in the space, and whether or not Spotify is building the Death Star.

• Pod Hunt, Product Hunt for podcasts: https://podhunt.app
• Podcast Ping, uptime monitoring built for podcasters: https://podcastping.com
• Podcast Hosting Review, reviews of popular podcast hosting platforms: https://podcasthosting.review
• "I Worked On…", a list of all the projects Mubs has worked on: https://iworkedon.com/@mubashariqbal
• Follow Mubs on Twitter: https://twitter.com/mubashariqbal

David Hsu (@dvdhsu) was able to grow Retool to almost a million dollars a year in revenue before making a single hire. Rather than stopping there and resting on their accomplishments, Retool set an even more ambitious goal: to literally change the way developers write code. In this episode, David and I discuss the benefits and the perils of deciding to "go big," the keys to finding product-market fit and word-of-mouth growth, and opportunities that founders can take advantage of in the low-code space.

• Retool, David's low-code SaaS for building internal tools very quickly: https://retool.com
• Follow David on Twitter, even though he has yet to ever tweet: https://twitter.com/dvdhsu

At some point, Tara Reed (@TaraReed_) decided that she didn't want to build a funded, scale-at-all-costs, move-fast-and-break-things type of business. The trouble was, by the time she realized this, she was already headed down that path with investors, employees, and high expectations. In this episode, I talk to Tara about quitting one business to pursue a new idea, bootstrapping her way to $5M in annual revenue, and what she's learned about the future of no-code from teaching others to build no-code businesses.

• Apps Without Code, Tara's business for teaching people to build businesses and apps without code: https://www.appswithoutcode.com
• Follow Tara on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TaraReed_
• Idea to Income in 60 Days, Tara's free webinar: https://www.appswithoutcodetraining.com/ewwebinar-1/?utm_campaign=indie-hackers

Traf (@traf) is a designer and a serial indie hacker. Just over a month ago, he made over $100,000 in a week. No, not by selling a course or a book to some email list he spent months growing. He did it by whipping up some icons and putting them online. It barely took him two hours. In this episode, Traf and I discuss how to get lucky by both spotting and capitalizing on opportunities, the importance of no-code tools and a clear schedule to help you execute quickly when the time is right, and the power of permissionless marketing for reaching audiences much bigger than your own.

• James' app for publishing your Notion docs to the web: https://super.so
• Follow James on Twitter: https://twitter.com/traf
• The iOS 14 icons James Created: https://icons.tr.af
• "Six Figures in 6 Days", James' popular blog post: https://tr.af/6
• The Boring Token, James' digital currency: https://boringtoken.com