3 Things We Learned Getting To $3k/Month

Back in May, I wrote about how we made our first $49. We were over the moon! Since then we’ve been hustling hard and are happy to have hit $3k/month 🎉

Of course, there’s still a long road ahead but I wanted to take a second to share our most valuable lessons & insight so far, as I think it could be super useful for those of you just starting out.

☎️ Support, Support, Support

We have big plans for Coldlytics, but the two of us only have so much time. We don’t have the resources to recruit, and we’d like to maintain our equity stake. This ultimately means the product is not perfect and some users will experience issues.

When that happens, live chat is crucial. And not the automated chatbot kind. I mean actual live chat with a human being. Right there, when they need it.

Having someone on the end of the line is hugely reassuring and maximizes customer satisfaction. Some of our users even mentioned it in their reviews.

Live chat support has also enabled us to convert many prospects. When we launched, we honestly didn’t put much thought into our landing page - sections were missing (most notably pricing 🤦‍♂️), but people reached out via the chat and we got them over the line.

On a related note - we’ve learned not to worry too much about our bottom line. If someone wants a refund, we give them a refund. If someone had a bad experience, we give them free credits. As far as we’re concerned, all of this is an acquisition/growth cost - customer satisfaction is key to long-term growth. Last month we refunded someone for a task gone wrong, and this week that same customer purchased more credits!

💡 Find Shortcuts (No-Code Will Save You)

As mentioned, we’re both super stretched. We’ve had to get scrappy and find shortcuts - in our case, this has mainly involved augmenting our tech stack with various no-code tools and integrations.

Around a month ago I sat down to build a new fulfillment system. A developer by trade, I put on my AWS hat and began defining the API schema, custom resolvers, and authentication flow. Then all of sudden we had a spike in signups and a ton of trial tasks to fulfill.

We needed the new fulfillment system yesterday! I started playing with Zapier and Airtable - I never explored these tools in much depth but pretty much immediately my mind was blown. 24 hours later we had an automated fulfillment system that honestly was a 10x improvement on our existing process! As a developer the temptation to build from scratch is high but as a founder, you must always consider other options.

🚪 Be Willing To Let Go

Some people will take to your product like a fish to water, some will struggle but ultimately find value, and others will simply be in the wrong place.

It’s important to establish a clear framework to help you quickly distinguish between the latter 2 groups. Engage and help everyone who needs it of course, but if the customer is trying to do something the system is not designed to support, for example, it’s important to make that clear up-front and let them churn.

An early-stage, indie product is inherently a niche product - you're not going to be able to cater to everyone’s needs, nor should you try to. It’s always painful to see someone go, but it happens and it’s totally normal. Oh, and as @yongfook suggests, turn off your churn notifications!

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I hope you guys find this useful. And to those who have been here - we'd love to hear from you! What was the most impactful lesson or takeaway during the first 3 months of launching your product?

Thanks for reading 🙏