Making $384 in a Week with my Digital Product 💰

I mentioned "Side Projects Making $$$+" - my first digital product back in April of this year. I'd spent a significant amount of time compiling all the Hacker News side project threads from 2022-2017 as a notion database and felt it was probably worth something to someone. I priced it very low and made a total of $15 on the first day it was available. Since then I bumped the price to $10 and I've made a handful of sales.

A little over a week ago I decided that it might be worthwhile holding a discount sale for it over Black Friday. Every other indie hacker seemed to do so I thought I might as well. Since sales had been small through til that point and it was an asset I have ownership of which can be reproduced at no cost, discounting it for a week to market it again seemed worthy of my time.

So I added a discount code to my store and submitted to a number of deal threads and sites, before carrying on with my day. I really didn't expect much. Later that evening whilst watching tv, my phone buzzed with an email from Gumroad - someone had purchased it! 20 mins later, another buzz - "Hmm - I wonder if Gumroad is sending out duplicate notifications?" I mumbled to my wife. Nope, another purchase - woohoo. I was beyond excited at this point. Is this what it was like for the big names at the start?

This happened a total of 46 times over the week of the discount for a total of $384 in sales. Ok, so it's not quit-your-job money - but enough to take a day off a year maybe?

It's got me excited for what else I may be able to create and makes me realise that I, an introverted dev may well not be very good at marketing my work but I do create things of value.

There’s plenty of other great stories and code from developers in this months issue. I've also included affiliate links to discount kindle books you might like.

Until next time, keep on shipping!

Ian

Articles

Building a Portfolio of Small Bets with Daniel Vassallo

Arvid Kahl chats to Daniel Vassallo, writer, founder, and person with very strong opinions. Daniel talks about his business philosophy of taking small, low risk 'bets'.

Cloudflare made it much easier to become an indie founder

Our software is built on top of other software. When we release a new feature, it opens up a whole new world of opportunities for our users to do things...

How My Startup Survived a DDoS Attack

Jon Yongfook from Bannerbear explains how he survived and mitigated a DDoS attack.

Shameless Plug

Side Projects Making $$$+

Looking for inspiration for your next side project?

I organised over 180 listed on HN side project threads complete with MRR, founder and original project links - yours for just $10.

Get inspired by other founders to build your next big thing!

Code

iwootten/revue: Archive Your Revue Issues with Python

In my last issue I said I wanted to migrate this very newsletter to something else. Turns out revue doesn't easily export your issues to markdown. I created this python script to help.

Awesome deals on Black Friday: Apps, SaaS, Books, Courses, etc.

A collection of great Black Friday deals from indie developers - some of which are still available (just) - be quick! Organised by serial maker Tony Dinh.

SQLforDevs.com - Database Tips & Tricks

A collection of practical examples on how to use lesser known SQL features by Tobias Petry.

I continued my Steam Deck adventures over on my YouTube channel this month, looking at how it can be used with Distrobox for coding.

Bargain Kindle Books

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup, John Carreyrou - £0.99 on Kindle

Ego is the Enemy, Ryan Holiday - £2.84 on Kindle

Make Time: How to Focus on What Matters Every Day - Jake Knapp, John Zeratsky - £0.99 on Kindle

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