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🚀 Bootstrapped to $143K MRR in 2023. This is my advice; 🚀
Are you a budding entrepreneur looking to take your startup to the next level without external funding? Do you want to learn from someone who has successfully grown their business to $143K monthly recurring revenue (MRR)? If so, keep reading for valuable tips and advice that can help you achieve similar success.
**1) Don’t quit your day job too soon:**
Quitting your job is not to be confused with progress. While you are employed, do everything reasonably possible to validate and build your business. If you have a 120k+/year annual salary, use a percentage of your salary to hire help.
**2) How to go about it: (1) Validate (2) Build (3) Sell:**
This advice goes double for fellow developers. DO NOT start with the coding! Schedule some calls from would-be buyers and ask them verbatim what their problems are. DON’T PITCH AT THE VALIDATION STAGE. Listen to their problems, and then listen again.
**3) Solve a real problem**
My first startup (Creatorfy) was a spin on GoFundMe for Creators. My second startup found a model to rent out competent, vetted developers for $6/hour. Guess which startup makes more money?
**4) No one cares about your FAANG experience**
The market doesn’t care about your resume. When you start a business you start fresh. Be prepared to be humbled.
**5) Don’t build consumer apps. Only B2B**
This one correlates with “Solve a real problem”. Businesses are simply more motivated to pay for a problem solved than consumers
**6) Never do agencies before PMF**
Most agencies will promise you the world and then do the bare minimum to get your check.
In conclusion, bootstrapping a startup to $143K MRR is no easy feat, but by following the advice above and staying committed to your vision, you can increase your chances of success. Whether you’re looking to validate your business idea, build a strong customer base, or make a real impact in the B2B market, these tips can serve as a roadmap for your entrepreneurial journey. Good luck!
what does it mean to be bootstrapped? i’ve been hearing it a lot.
How do you find a problem worth solving in the B2B space ?
Solid advice, especially on validating before building!
Thanks for sharing!
wait, so your business model revolves around paying slave labour wages to devs?
So you run a dev sweat shop? $6/hr is ridiculously low
PMF = Product-Market Fit?
I think that instead of characterizing this as advice you should say “this is what worked for me” vs it being the ultimate strategy.
What did you build ?
interesting! how far did your first startup get?
> My first startup (Creatorfy)… My second startup…
> Guess which startup makes more money?
The second one because you can pronounce the name?
*”5) Don’t build consumer apps. Only B2B. This one correlates with “Solve a real problem”. Businesses are simply more motivated to pay for a problem solved than consumers”*
This one is just dumb. What about the tons and tons of companies making shitloads of money with consumer-facing tech? I could make tons of arguments AGAINST B2B — like, needing to deal with office politics, layers of beauracracies, tire-kickers and non-decision makers wasting your time, the time- and money-suck of managing a direct sales force, the need to have an extremely expensive product to make it remotely cost effective, etc. Both have their pros and cons and it really comes down to what you’re selling, what need you meet, and how badly your target market is wanting to pay for it.
Looking for 10 up points to be able to post if anyone wants to help I’d appreciate it!
all of these kinds of threads use the shittiest examples of why they failed as if the reason wasn’t it was just a shitty idea. “I made an app for poop dating, match each other based on bowel movements, I called it TurdTango but it failed so making apps for consumers is a horrible idea”
I’d like for once to hear an actual good idea that failed.
Bootstrapping to 143k/ year in rev is super impressive – good stuff!
>2) How to go about it: (1) Validate (2) Build (3) Sell:
Did you already build in a vertical that you are already a part of the ecosystem? How many interviews was your benchmark before you had *’enough’* validation on the problem? How did you gather people to answer these questions?
I’ve traditionally just built landing pages to test ideas – but looking into actual customer calls if that can get me better feedback
At what point did you decide to quit your job? I make 110k a year and bootstrapping my own saas(development phase). At what point what you recommend to me quit my job?
Thank you so much !!!