Built a finance kit for freelancers, three weeks live, $0 revenue
I built this because my own freelance books were a mess of spreadsheets I rebuilt every quarter. Setting aside tax, chasing late invoices, working out what a project paid per hour once you count the unpaid admin. Same math every time, done badly.
So I made a proper version. Quarterly tax set aside, an invoice tracker that flags what's overdue, and a rate calculator that counts the hours you don't bill for. It's live on Gumroad now. Revenue is about zero.
That's the part I want help with. A handful of visitors, no sales, and I can't tell whether the problem is the product, the page, or that I'm posting into a void. I don't have an audience. I've never sold anything before this one.
Two questions for anyone who's been here. What got you your first ten paying customers? Not the general advice, the specific thing you did that week. And if you freelance yourself, would you pay for something like this, or is a spreadsheet kit the kind of thing people just build for themselves on a Sunday?
Blunt is fine. I'd rather hear it's boring now than spend another month polishing something nobody wants. Tell me the page is bad and I'll rewrite it tonight.
Anyway, here it is if you want to poke at it: https://petescribe5.gumroad.com/l/dpvaop?utm_source=indiehackers&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=freelancerfinancekit_202609
Been in the same spot — shipping the kit is the easy half; figuring out whether the void is product vs distribution is the hard part.
One thing that helped me: treat “tax set-aside %” and “cash runway months” as two different numbers. A spreadsheet that parks 25–30% for tax can still leave you blind on how many months of bare-minimum bills you can cover if invoices slip. I keep a tiny free estimator for that split here: https://runway-desk.pages.dev/estimator
Also agree with the kill-date-per-channel advice in the thread — if a channel gives zero signal in ~2 weeks, stop and go where freelancers already complain about late pay / quarterly panic. Worth more than another directory listing.
Curious which channel you’re testing next after Gumroad?
Really solid approach — I'm juggling something similar myself (building Xstream4K on the side), what's been the hardest part for you so far?
Honest on first ten: I don't have them yet. Same spreadsheet-kit lane — free monthly P&L + quarterly tax set-aside at https://solopreneurpl.com (Close sheet + Confidence Check so you know when the number is trustworthy). Pro is $19 when someone wants one file. What I'm testing is whether strangers grab a free download before anyone pays. On WTP: freelancers will pay if the sheet answers "am I done closing the month?" without becoming QuickBooks. Boring demand replies beat another page rewrite. Not tax advice.
Distribution gap is the real problem. €150 Ads → 4 clicks → 0 installs. First 10 users for us came from replying in live Threads conversations where freelancers already complained about taxes/invoicing. The page matters less than the channel. Find 20 places where your exact users complain, answer them one by one. Boring work, beats every ad euro. Kill date per channel: if no signal in 2 weeks, stop. Go deep where people come back.
@rethreads_app same story on our side. We spent €150 on ads too. Four clicks, zero installs. What you said about Threads hitting different is spot on. We tried the same approach for StudyLoop and found the exact pattern you described, where students were already complaining in r/medicalschool and study Discords, not anyone searching for our product name. The boring work really does beat the ad dollar. Our first ten customers came from replying to people who had already described the pain, not from any landing page optimization. Thanks for confirming what we learned the hard way.