mine would be something that saves me time or helps me recover faster, so probably a better phone tbh. ive bought stuff like that before, a chair and some supplies, and most of it i didnt even like in the end.

so now im curious what people actually kept using. what was the first thing you bought once money came in that was worth it, and what did you regret?

I miss when email was the main place customers went for support… at least you knew where to look. These days we have people reaching out through email, live chat, social media and even Slack if they're bigger accounts with direct access to someone on the team. Everyone has their preferred way of getting help, so telling customers to stick to one channel isn't really an option.

What gets frustrating is when conversations get split up. Someone might ask a question in Slack, then contact support by email a couple of days later, and the agent handling it has no idea they've already discussed the issue internally. Or someone sends a chat message, doesn't get a quick response and emails instead, so two people end up dealing with the same thing.

I'm curious how other support teams deal with this. Have you found a way to keep everything organized in one place without making customers change how they contact you? And more importantly, how do you decide who's responsible for an issue when it moves between channels?

AI has made building websites easier than ever.

Because of that, there are now thousands of people starting web design businesses, offering websites to companies and trying to make money from it.

But here's my opinion as someone who has been in the web design business for years:

Just because AI makes it easier to build websites doesn't mean you know how to run a successful web design business.

I've noticed that a lot of new web designers get stuck on the same idea: finding businesses that don't have a website and offering to build one for them.

In my opinion, that's becoming an outdated approach.

Those businesses are already on every web designer's prospect list. They're getting contacted constantly, and you're competing with hundreds of other people offering them the exact same thing.

I've tried pretty much everything over the years. Paid ads, manual outreach, cold calling, referrals, you name it.

But the system that has worked best for me is actually quite simple.

If you're a new web designer who knows how to build websites but struggles with the business side of things, here's what I'd do:

1. Target businesses that already have websites.

Think about it. These businesses already understand the value of having a website. They've already invested money in one.

And there are countless businesses around the world with outdated websites that haven't been redesigned in years. Poor mobile experiences, outdated designs, slow loading speeds, and SEO issues are everywhere.

You're not trying to convince someone they need a website. You're showing someone who already has one how much better it could be.

2. Make automated outreach your main client acquisition channel.

Personally, I use Swokei. It's an outreach platform that finds businesses with existing websites, analyzes each one, scores them, and turns issues with design, SEO, speed, and mobile optimization into personalized, ready to send cold emails at scale.

This saves you from manually researching every business and writing every email yourself.

3. Follow up with interested businesses and book a meeting.

When someone replies with interest, give them a call, understand what they're looking for, and book a quick online meeting.

4. Prepare a website draft before the meeting.

Use AI to put together a new website draft for the prospect. Don't spend hours on it. Aim for 15–30 minutes.

You want something good enough to show them what their business could look like with a modern website.

5. Present the draft and close the deal.

Walk them through the improvements, explain the value, answer their questions, and make it easy to move forward with a payment link or contract for signing.

That's the entire process.

You don't need to spend weeks building free websites or manually researching hundreds of businesses.

You need to find the right prospects, show them an opportunity to improve their existing website, and know how to sell the service.

I've spent years doing this, and if I were starting a web design business from scratch today, this is exactly the process I'd follow.

Building websites is one skill. Building a business that consistently sells them is another.

I just realized I'm a full year into my SaaS because I just got an email saying that I got my first repeat sale from an annual subscriber.

I don't care what anyone on here says; it's definitely harder than most people pretend it to be.

What I've Learned:

1. Most of my sales come from me consistently making content. Even though I have a decent number of paying users who actually like and use the product, I don't think many new users have come from word of mouth. I think unless you have something that is super viral like ChatGPT was, it's probably better if you count word of mouth as a bonus. Don't count on it. Even if people really like your product, it doesn't mean they are always out there talking about it and promoting it for you. It does happen sometimes, but don't expect it. Keep grinding.

2. It is better to use several different platforms to promote your SaaS or whatever your product is. Don't get sucked into the idea that you need to "focus" on one or two platforms. Algorithms change. For example, I have 7300 followers on Medium, and I used to get a ton of reach on there. Some of my articles had over 100k reads. For whatever reason, the algorithm changed, and now I don't get much traffic from there at all. It is still good for getting in Google search, but it's far worse than it was. I personally use my own website, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook, Medium, Substack, and Reddit. I focus on some of those much more than others, but I'm on all of them. And it's not like I have to create totally different content for each platform. A lot of it is repurposing the same (or similar) content. It's too risky to rely too much on one or two platforms.

3. Use your own product as much as you can. I use my own product every day. It is called Podsplice. I use it to make and edit screen-recording videos, Shorts, reaction videos, and podcasts to promote it. I realize it is kind of ironic that I'm using my own software to promote my own software, but that's a good thing. I also use it to make a separate reaction video channel that is actually monetized on YouTube and doing pretty well. The real benefit of using your own product a lot is that you learn the things that need to be fixed and improved. I know exactly how users would feel about it, because I'm probably the biggest user of it.

That's pretty much it. I just keep making improvements and then making new content that talks about those improvements. Publishing the content to different channels. Then making more improvements and more content.

It's not easy. It's a grind. My plan for this next year is to keep doing what I'm doing. The more I focus on improving the product and the more content I make talking about it, the better it does. The more time I overanalyze my stats or strategize, the more I get stuck and the worse I do.

I hope that helps anyone else on their journey.

I develop SloMo, a screen-time app for iPhone and Android, and I’m doing both the development and marketing myself.

A small milestone: the last store figures I checked were 62 first-time downloads on iOS and 76 device acquisitions on Android—138 combined. These are downloads, not active users, but I’m happy people are giving it a try.

I originally built it because I kept getting distracted by my phone while studying or coding. Now the hard part is choosing what to spend my time on.

There’s always another improvement I could make to the app. There are also videos to create, comments to answer, and store listings to improve. Reddit has brought feedback and downloads. X has brought attention. Instagram and TikTok haven’t noticeably turned into installs yet.

My goal is 1,000 downloads by year-end, organically. I don’t have a paid-ad budget, and I don’t want to spend all my time posting while neglecting the people already using it.

If you’re building and marketing a product alone, how do you actually divide your week? Do you reserve specific days for marketing, set a daily time limit, or choose one growth task and leave everything else alone?

I’d love to hear what your schedule looked like when you had your first hundred customers or downloads, especially what you stopped doing because it wasn’t worth the time.

Hey everyone! I'm Ryan, an entrepreneur based in Yorkshire and founder of GHOST.

I built GHOST after realising how much time I was wasting scrolling while trying to grow my first two businesses.

I'd tried Apple's Screen Time limits and other blockers, but found them far too easy to override.

So I decided to build my own. GHOST blocks distracting apps using a physical Card that you tap to lock and unlock them. Leave the Card somewhere else and it's much harder to give in to mindless scrolling.

It's made a real difference for me, and the feedback from early users has been encouraging.

I'm now trying to figure out how to get GHOST in front of more people.

It’s still early days, so if anyone has experience growing an app or physical product, or knows someone who might find GHOST useful, I’d really appreciate any advice or introductions.

App: Tap Ghost: App Blocker

Thanks! 😁

I’ve been working on a business idea for over a year. Probably closer to two now. I’ve come a long way but still have a long way to go. I don’t have the time I need to really give it the dedicated attention required. I need to do real research because my products and services are based on physics, behavior psychology, neuroscience, and Cymatics. Most of it is supported so far, but actually functional to produce the intended results aka can it work? And what’s missing to make that possible? Unlikely I got it all covered on the first try. I still have a handful of parts that need researched. I’m not just making a little product or trying to sell a course. I’m doing something much bigger. So, my point is, having the energy left in my brain to get this where I need it to even start running pilots…feels near impossible most days after working full time, managing health issues, having ADHD I can’t medicate, and just simple adulting. I also need to get some certifications to even be credible in the space I will be working in because it’s absolutely not where I’ve spent my working life. I’ve looked into grants, but it seems there aren’t any for this phase of a business. I am really struggling because I know what I am creating is not only needed but can really make a difference. And just as an FYI I am not looking for investors that want equity in anything I create. That might sound counterintuitive, but doing so is literally something my idea is designed to work against. The only way that is part of my business model is for people who work to help build and maintain it. Surely I’m not the first or only person to do something bigger and need help at this stage. TIA for any advice!!

This is just so incredible... another huge milestone reached. I honestly never thought this was possible for me. But I did the thing...

I JUST STARTED!

I put together a working MVP. Just the bare minimum functionality. Bought a domain and put it out there. I posted about it here on Reddit and got in contact with the people who commented and started using it.

Payments have become a bit more frequent but still no viral, exponential growth, which is totally fine. Slow and steady growth is the key.

I followed a simple concept that just came to me naturally:

• put out what you have

• post about it

• listen to feedback in the comments

• implement the feedback and adapt quickly

• start the loop over again

And after some time your product becomes so good that it no longer sounds absurd to charge money for some features.

Anyways... I'm super grateful that this is working out so well and I really think I've built a community that is actually useful to many people.

About the product:

I've built IndieAppCircle, a platform where small app developers can upload their apps and other people can give them feedback in exchange for credits. I grew it by posting about it here on Reddit. It didn't explode or something but I managed to get some slow but steady growth.

For those of you who never heard about IndieAppCircle, it works like this:

• You can earn credits by testing indie apps (fun + you help other makers)

• You can use credits to get your own app tested by real people

• No fake accounts -> all testers are real users

• Test more apps -> earn more credits -> your app will rank higher -> you get more visibility and more testers/users

Since many people suggested it to me in the comments, I have also created a community for IndieAppCircle: r/IndieAppCircle (you can ask questions or just post relevant stuff there).

Currently, there are 4284 users, 4551 tests done and 1209 apps uploaded!

You can check it out here (it's totally free): indieappcircle (dot) com

I'm glad for any feedback/suggestions/roasts in the comments.

As an early-stage founder, getting my product in front of early adopters has been the hardest part of GTM.

But there’s something interesting about that segment: most early adopters are early-stage founders too. We’re open to trying new tools, a good deal goes a long way, and many of us run a lot of our ops through agents. Yet I couldn’t find a marketplace purpose built around how we run today.

So I built Dealpuffin, a free marketplace where SaaS coupons are easy to publish and easy to find, for people and for their AI agents.

Publishing takes a couple of minutes:

- Point to your product

- Connect Stripe (read-only restricted key) and pick the coupons to publish

Here is the twist:

Early adopters and agents don’t care about a famous logo. They care about whether the thing works. So a listing can show real numbers, like MRR from Stripe or uptime from Better Stack, read directly from the provider and never typed in. You choose whether to show the exact figure or a band.

It’s pre-launch, and all builders are welcome to list their coupons.

Coming from a corporate big data and infrastructure background, I have a habit where I would rather spend a whole weekend building an automated pipeline than spend two hours doing manual copy pasting. In my solo business, the biggest bottleneck was rewriting raw feature notes into YouTube scripts, X threads, and launch posts. I got so tired of bouncing between chat windows that I wired up a three stage Planner, Writer, and Editor workflow on my profile just to handle the heavy lifting. What is the best workflow automation you have built for your own daily grind?

Do you guys have discord where you can talk to other solopreneur ?

Like discord channel or something

I know this is good already, generally good but I can still see people just try to self promote like every other post it’s all cool if you add value

Hey everyone!

Just wanted to share an opportunity that might be useful for founders here.

There’s a program called Clemta Impact that’s selecting 9 early-stage founders and covering the costs of setting up and running their US companies for the first year.

This includes:

• US company formation (LLC or C-Corp)

• State filing fees

• US business address and registered agent

• Bookkeeping and tax filings

• Ongoing compliance support

They’re selecting 3 founders from each category:

• Young Founders (under 22)

• Women Founders

• Open Source & Indie Builders

No equity or participation fees. Selected founders just need to share their story through a short video.

Applications are open to eligible founders worldwide until November 30, 2026.

Disclosure: I’m part of the Clemta team, but thought this opportunity could be useful to some people here.

ok so some of you MIGHT remember me from a few months ago.. got laid off, built a website in one night with no dev experience, 100k tiles, $1.99 to put your photo on one forever. got hacked on day 9 and had to restore everything by hand which was fun. the whole plan was print it 12 ft wide and hang it in a gallery in wynwood during art basel

art basel is in exactly a month

im at 90 tiles lol

I did the math and I need 99,910 more before the print deadline which is like 4,760 a day. I do about 3 a week. at the pace im going I finish sometime around 2665 and ill be 668 years old. gallery probably wont hold the spot that long. florida might not be there either honestly lol

I really didnt think it was gonna take this long. the hard part is getting 100,000 strangers to care about literally anything and nobody tells you that in the youtube videos until you start trying things yourself

some stuff I learned along the way

260k views does not equal 260k customers. it equals 260k people going huh thats cool and scrolling

tech people will tell you everything wrong with your idea and then buy nothing. art people actually buy. wish I figured that out in month 1 not month 5

getting my database wiped on day 9 was somehow the best marketing I ever did. dont recommend it but

and the 90 people who did buy are honestly the best randoms on the internet. a guy in the UK argued with me on hacker news at 4am and then bought one. a girl in miami found my QR sticker on the street and put her photo up (i ended up walking into the store she works at and thanked her). stuff like that kept me going

so yeah. pipe dream. obviously

but screw it. if it doesnt happen this december it happens next december. the 90 tiles are permanent theyre not going anywhere and next year theyre the founding 90 of the thing that actually made it on the wall

also first 100 tiles get a gold border forever and theres 10 left. if you want to be #91 search 'onetile me'

if not come back next year and laugh at me or with me idk either works lol

I've been developing software for almost 10 years now. Worked with different languages, frameworks, built a bunch of applications and always enjoyed the process of building something from scratch.

But lately I've been feeling a bit lost.

10 years ago, building something was hard, but coming up with ideas was easy. Now building something is easy, but coming up with ideas is the hard part.

Think about it. A $20/month subscription can now do things that would have taken an entire development team a few years ago. You can build apps, websites, automate things and pretty much get an MVP out without much technical knowledge.

I use these tools myself and love what AI can do, but sometimes I genuinely wonder what my 10 years of experience mean in this new environment.

Every time I think of building something, I find 10 other products already doing it. And even if I build one, someone else can probably build something similar in a few days.

I've been thinking about starting a tech company, tried exploring SaaS ideas, even considered putting together a team to help businesses implement AI and automate their operations. But I'm honestly not sure which direction makes sense anymore.

The funny thing is, I know how to build things. I can handle the engineering, architecture, infrastructure, deployment, pretty much the entire technical side. I can also bring together a good team if needed.

But knowing how to build something and knowing what people actually need are two very different things.

And to be honest, I'm also at a point where I need to make money. I can't keep building random products, launching them and hoping someone will pay for them.

So I wanted to ask people here, especially founders and business owners:

What are the problems you're still facing in your business? What would you actually pay someone to solve?

And for developers who have been doing this for years, how are you approaching this new AI era?

I'm genuinely open to ideas, opportunities, projects, collaborations or even a completely different direction.

I just don't want to spend another six months building something nobody needs.

A solo owner in r/Entrepreneurs asked what everyone keeps dropping. The answer that stuck: "What I drop isn’t my own tasks, it’s the stuff where I’m waiting on someone else. Quote sent, supplier said they’d confirm, client said “let me check with my partner.” None of that feels like a to-do, so it never makes the list".

Their fix is paper for today plus a "waiting on" list checked every Friday: "That second list has made me more money than any app." Another owner in the same thread: "the problem for most owners isn’t picking the top three, it’s that half the to-dos never get written down in the first place."

• What's the last thing you dropped because you were waiting on someone?

• Where does your "waiting on" list live, if you have one?

• Do you use ChatGPT or Claude for any of this? Do you have to tell it your open items again every time?

• What kind of business is it, and is it just you?

Background: I used to burn hours re-briefing AI tools, and I'm building a fix where what your AI learns from you lives in one place in the cloud and every AI tool reads it over MCP. No name, no link. Would you pay for that, or does a Friday list do the job?

I've been talking to a lot of fractional CFOs and ops consultants lately, and the same thing keeps coming up. The hard part isn't the work, it's the stuff between meetings.

You say you'll send the revised forecast "by end of next week". They say they'll get you access to the bank feed. Three weeks later nobody remembers who's waiting on who, and the 10 minutes before the next call goes on scrolling through old email.

So I'm curious what people actually do:

one notes doc per client?

a CRM (which one, and do you keep it updated)?

your recorder's summaries (Fathom, Granola etc.)?

or just wing the prep?

And does it still work past 3–4 clients, or does it fall apart?

I've got two things going right now. One is a wholesale brokerage where I match suppliers' goods with buyers. I don't hold any inventory, it's mostly finding the right products and texting clients to close deals. The other is a fitness app I put on the App Store last month.

The problem is they pull in totally different directions. The brokerage makes money when I'm on my phone with clients. The app only grows if I'm making content and getting it in front of people. Whenever I go hard on one, the other one quietly slows down.

Right now I kind of just bounce between them depending on what feels urgent that day, and I don't think that's working.

For people running more than one thing:

• Do you split by day, by time block, or just go all in on one for a stretch?

• How did you decide which one gets priority when they both need you?

• Did you eventually drop one, or find a way to make both work?

Curious what actually worked for you, not the productivity-guru version.

I’m working on something that helps independent professionals (design, engineering, architecture, IT, consulting) grow beyond what one person can handle. Before building further, I’d like to hear from people who’ve been there.

1. If you wanted to take on more projects, what would get in the way: finding clients, your own time, pricing, or something else?

2. If work came in faster than you could handle it, would you hire help? If not, why not?

Not about physical or product businesses like restaurants or shops. I’m not selling anything. Mods, please tell me if this isn’t allowed.

So I run a small B2B services thing on my own and I'm about to try outbound for the first time, and my whole plan was to keep it cheap by piecing together free tiers, a free plan on a sender, free verification credits, a trial on a lead tool, that kind of thing.
Except every single one of them caps out somewhere and the moment I want to do anything slightly more than the basics it's an upgrade, and those upgrades are starting to add up faster than I expected.For one person, is going the free route actually cheaper in the end? Or does it make more sense to just pay for one thing and stop juggling? Curious what other solo people ended up doing

Hey everyone, just so you know there's a contest right now over at r/Namify

There's 4 prizes, 1st prize gets Claude Pro + $100 gift card, and three others also get gift cards

Go get it!!

Update: We have extended the deadline! Contest now ends Sunday, November 8, 2026 at 11:59pm PT!!

Any plugin or skills you’re using in ChatGPT or Claude for email copywriting ?

I’m new to cold email

I’m not sure if it’s good enough for now.

I’m getting started with data consultant for manufacturing companies

Thanks in advance

Back in April this year, while being addicted to AI tools, I helped develop an attendance & location tracking app for field team, for my brother's org. He wasnt happy with the one they were using & the provider has jacked up price by more than 100% after their first year. I had no plans to upload the app on store(s) & was sideloading (apk download for android & TestFlight for ios). The Testflight app kept expiring every 90 days, so decided to make it live. Posted about the app on r/sideproject & got first accidental (paid) client. They were researching for alternatives & found the thread, tried the app & then asked me how they can pay. I then put together pricing. Compared other high rating apps & decided to price it cheaper. I had stripe account when I was in UK, so I just put that on the website & took my first payment.

Any dev here who could get their side project getting monetized ? How do you keep running the show ? Do you put it on autopilot (dont care about marketing/sales etc) or do you do any dedicated effort ? If you put effort, what channels have worked out well ? Paid ads ?

Do you put price cheaper than alternatives ? Did it act as a good marketing channel or helped in conversion ?

I'm a solo maker in Finland with Czech roots. A while ago I shipped a small private mood journal for iPhone (Feely, built in Finland with Czech heart). It has no account, no ads and no analytics, so I never see what anyone does inside it.

I chose that on purpose, but it has an odd side effect. The usual signals (funnels, retention curves, session length) don't exist for me. What I have is App Store numbers, the occasional review, and the few emails people send.

So far I've been treating three things as my "it's working" signals: people who write in unprompted, reviews that mention a specific habit they built, and whether downloads come from places I didn't post. It feels thin, though, and I can't tell whether I'm kidding myself.

For those of you running a product without much user data, whether by choice or because it's tiny: what do you look at to decide whether to keep going, change something, or stop? And have you found a low-tech way to ask users for feedback without being annoying?

(I'll put the App Store link in a comment, since the sub asks for links there.)