How I failed 6 side-projects in 10 months
- Thread starter john861
- Start date
Trying to market via social media and not spam folks. Any advice would be appreciated@john861 Sell Like Crazy - https://www.amazon.com/SELL-LIKE-CRAZY-Customers-Possibly-ebook/dp/B07N7GRHNK
Launch - Launch: An Internet Millionaire's Secret Formula To Sell Almost Anything Online, Build A Business You Love, And Live The Life Of Your Dreams https://www.amazon.com/dp/1630470171/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_BnZKFbPS4N4NM
EMyth https://www.amazon.com/Myth-Revisit...h+revisited&qid=1603482486&sprefix=emy&sr=8-3
Basically what you’re missing which these 3 books go into is sales and marketing formulas.
First, these formulas work. But they take time, practice, and patience. There’s many tools now to automate a lot of this for you, like Hubspot or any of the other major marketing automation platforms.
Secondly, is processes and business models. You can’t just sell one-offs (I mean you can if you’re
selling a physical good), but when it comes to software, software as a service is the way to go. The reason? Recurring revenue. That lets you invest, forecast, and continue to deliver sustained value and revenue.
But it also means building processes to maintain and run your business so you can scale it, and bootstrap at the same time without working 100-hours a week.
You want to create playbooks on how to do everything in your business, and either automate it, or make it repeatable by others so you can train someone else to do it exactly the way you want it done.
Lastly, PR, SEO, and getting mentioned on major websites is important but those are icing on the cake. You can’t rely on them forever. What you can rely on forever is targeted advertising.
What you need to figure out in your pricing, and business model is the following equation: If I spend X on targeting advertising, what kind of sales can I make?
For example, let’s say you spend $1000 on targeted ads for a product that charges $29 per month. That means you only need to convert 35 people to paying customers to draw even / a slight profit. If you can optimize your conversions and sales pitch so that $1000 of ads gets you 50 customers, you’re now making $450 in profit on top of your original ad spend. That’s a solid return on investment, and now you can start printing money, because the more you spend on ads the more profit you make as long as your conversions hold. Plus since you’re charging monthly, each month the money snowballs and your Monthly Recurring Revenue MRR grows. Which in turn gives you more money to invest in getting new customers.
Crack this equation on any of your products and you’re printing money.
Launch - Launch: An Internet Millionaire's Secret Formula To Sell Almost Anything Online, Build A Business You Love, And Live The Life Of Your Dreams https://www.amazon.com/dp/1630470171/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_BnZKFbPS4N4NM
EMyth https://www.amazon.com/Myth-Revisit...h+revisited&qid=1603482486&sprefix=emy&sr=8-3
Basically what you’re missing which these 3 books go into is sales and marketing formulas.
First, these formulas work. But they take time, practice, and patience. There’s many tools now to automate a lot of this for you, like Hubspot or any of the other major marketing automation platforms.
Secondly, is processes and business models. You can’t just sell one-offs (I mean you can if you’re
selling a physical good), but when it comes to software, software as a service is the way to go. The reason? Recurring revenue. That lets you invest, forecast, and continue to deliver sustained value and revenue.
But it also means building processes to maintain and run your business so you can scale it, and bootstrap at the same time without working 100-hours a week.
You want to create playbooks on how to do everything in your business, and either automate it, or make it repeatable by others so you can train someone else to do it exactly the way you want it done.
Lastly, PR, SEO, and getting mentioned on major websites is important but those are icing on the cake. You can’t rely on them forever. What you can rely on forever is targeted advertising.
What you need to figure out in your pricing, and business model is the following equation: If I spend X on targeting advertising, what kind of sales can I make?
For example, let’s say you spend $1000 on targeted ads for a product that charges $29 per month. That means you only need to convert 35 people to paying customers to draw even / a slight profit. If you can optimize your conversions and sales pitch so that $1000 of ads gets you 50 customers, you’re now making $450 in profit on top of your original ad spend. That’s a solid return on investment, and now you can start printing money, because the more you spend on ads the more profit you make as long as your conversions hold. Plus since you’re charging monthly, each month the money snowballs and your Monthly Recurring Revenue MRR grows. Which in turn gives you more money to invest in getting new customers.
Crack this equation on any of your products and you’re printing money.
@ironhorse Thanks a lot for this!
I will read them. I read the first one a while ago.
Ads is something that scares me... but I have to try it.
I will read them. I read the first one a while ago.
Ads is something that scares me... but I have to try it.
@ironhorse Solid post. Saving for book recs
kaylaherin
New member
@timmygvsu Thanks a lot! That's true I read many success stories and I always think that I will be next.
But it doesn't work that way. Thanks a lot for your kind words!
But it doesn't work that way. Thanks a lot for your kind words!
@john861 I don't know if anyone mentioned it yet, but there's a podcast called: Startups for the Rest of Us.
It's all about bootstrapping, and I have heard them say to start with market validation first. It just seems counterintuitive ... Because I always worry someone will just dev my ideas while I am validating them.
It's all about bootstrapping, and I have heard them say to start with market validation first. It just seems counterintuitive ... Because I always worry someone will just dev my ideas while I am validating them.
pastornichols
New member
@pastornichols Nice! What are you creating?
pastornichols
New member
@john861 I'd like to create something to help people deal with the sense of loneliness and isolation they may be experiencing not just from the coronavirus, but ironically from technology itself.
I'm not particularly sure where to start, I'm just using Wireframe services to spec something out at the moment.
Any ideas would be appreciated
I'm not particularly sure where to start, I'm just using Wireframe services to spec something out at the moment.
Any ideas would be appreciated
@pastornichols What about using no-code tools? Have you researched that? I think you can create an MVP using those tools and test it!
pastornichols
New member
@pastornichols I saw a member of a fb group that I’m in, trends.co, looking to build a fitness/mood tracker. It seems to have some aspects to your thoughts around an app for managing depression. I’ll post the description that he wrote, and if you’re interested, I can try to connect you to him:
Fitness/Mood tracker?
I've suffered massively with mental health over recent years for the usual myriad of reasons - work, money, family problems etc. What has always helped me has been exercise.
The struggle when you're depressed is doing anything, even if you know it will help, is a challenge. In my case the longer I don't exercise the worse my mood gets and the harder it is to break that cycle.
I'm thinking about a simple app, that encourages you to exercise for the mental health benefits. Some sort of mood tracker linked to the exercise you do. It can give you regular affirmations of the positive impact exercise has had in the past, help maintain momentum while training, or send prompts to exercises you've done before which gave you a boost.
I'm considering this as a side project to motivate me personally but if it could be useful to others and viable then I could see myself running this as a business full time. I know the fitness and mental health spaces are massively saturated right now, so:
1) Do you think there is an opportunity for an app like this
2) Can anyone point me to any sources about how to track mood in a clinical or objective way? This isn't intended to be super science based, but if there's standards I can use instead trying to come up with my own metrics it would be much better
Fitness/Mood tracker?
I've suffered massively with mental health over recent years for the usual myriad of reasons - work, money, family problems etc. What has always helped me has been exercise.
The struggle when you're depressed is doing anything, even if you know it will help, is a challenge. In my case the longer I don't exercise the worse my mood gets and the harder it is to break that cycle.
I'm thinking about a simple app, that encourages you to exercise for the mental health benefits. Some sort of mood tracker linked to the exercise you do. It can give you regular affirmations of the positive impact exercise has had in the past, help maintain momentum while training, or send prompts to exercises you've done before which gave you a boost.
I'm considering this as a side project to motivate me personally but if it could be useful to others and viable then I could see myself running this as a business full time. I know the fitness and mental health spaces are massively saturated right now, so:
1) Do you think there is an opportunity for an app like this
2) Can anyone point me to any sources about how to track mood in a clinical or objective way? This isn't intended to be super science based, but if there's standards I can use instead trying to come up with my own metrics it would be much better
pastornichols
New member
@ncts I was having a think about the range of solutions out there that currently exist.
I believe one of the problems with mood trackers is the attempt to fit mental health into a narrative underpinned by progress. You go onto headspace and it logs how many minutes of meditation you've done. These fitness trackers will measure how many reps and sets of exercise you've performed. Doesn't the notion of self acceptance directly conflict with the obsession of measurement we've placed on ourselves? Likes on Instagram/Facebook, Karma on Reddit, how big your daily calorie deficit is.
The major asssumption I'm making here is that improving the general sense of self acceptance around us will have a positive effect on people's mental health.
How do you build a successful app from this? I'm not too sure.
I know i've gone off on a tangent to loneliness and isolation, but I think these ideas are all somehow linked
I believe one of the problems with mood trackers is the attempt to fit mental health into a narrative underpinned by progress. You go onto headspace and it logs how many minutes of meditation you've done. These fitness trackers will measure how many reps and sets of exercise you've performed. Doesn't the notion of self acceptance directly conflict with the obsession of measurement we've placed on ourselves? Likes on Instagram/Facebook, Karma on Reddit, how big your daily calorie deficit is.
The major asssumption I'm making here is that improving the general sense of self acceptance around us will have a positive effect on people's mental health.
How do you build a successful app from this? I'm not too sure.
I know i've gone off on a tangent to loneliness and isolation, but I think these ideas are all somehow linked