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45 Comments

Exactly WHY did you make your startup?

My own project began because I was bored with the PH and Betalist style of listing the startup. I thought it would be more exciting to pit them against each other in a tournament. Then have all the winners of the first 8 tournaments compete against each other in one tournament of champions.

www.leagueofstartups.com

So my project came to light by being bored with the listing platforms.

Now it's your turn please. Just a few sentences (answering WHY) then your link below.

  1. 3

    I built HireVise because I was tired of recruiters reaching out without job descriptions. The only way I could find out more was to set up a call. And even then, I would still have to ask for an actual job description to know the exact details.

  2. 2

    I thought it would be easy. Its not but I'm still here for some reason.

    1. 1

      Keep at it! Nothing worth having was ever easy, and maybe secretly you love it! :)

  3. 2

    As makers we struggled with finding the right tool to create forms for our previous start-up’s and jobs. Unsatisfied with the countless limits and paywalls other form builders impose, we set off building Tally with a different business model in mind. We wanted to make form building easy, beautiful and free without limits.

    https://tally.so

    1. 1

      Cool man. So right now you cannot embed? In the lower part of your landing page it says 'embedding coming soon'. I'd love if you would submit this into my startup tournament.

      1. 1

        Hi Scott,

        Embedding is not possible yet indeed, working on it and should be live in the next month. Will definitely check out the startup tournament!

        1. 1

          Well thumbs up to you man.

  4. 2

    Your product is cool Scott, looks like you had some email trouble recently.

    I think you're missing out on some serious engagement by not having accounts, discussions, etc.

    Anyway,

    • Portabella basically because I'm sick and tired of people buying and selling my data without my knowledge. Sick of all the bloat that comes with modern website tracking. Annoyed that I don't have access to more end-to-end encrypted tools. Fed up with seeing data leaks in the news every week.

    • How to X with Y I want a place to store my code snippets. But if my code snippets suck I want to have access to better ones as well

    • Just Launched no real reason other than having another startup index to list my products to.

    1. 2

      Hey Alex I appreciate your words of advice. I'm working on a wiki kind of discussion board that will make it easy for founders to have a step by step model to follow while they build, market and find investment for their startup. So anybody can pitch in their 2 cents on any of the steps to follow and if new founders have a startup that will help in any of the steps they can post it there and reply to questions. Simple but complex at the same time. It has to be done right. Okay, now looking at your project. I love the landing page. I want to click your ph link but the wifi in this coffee shop is too slow so I will do it later today, I promise.

  5. 2

    I built Wicked Templates because I heard many developers say that when they buy a template, they end up change the whole of it and sometimes can't even use it.

    1. 1

      So they end up changing the whole template then they cannot even use it? So what are you doing about that? You are also offering templates just as your competition is.

      1. 1

        They are only using the CDN and only using the CSS framework classes... is just an HTML file.

        But all of that is told on the landing page.
        Have you read it?
        I am making sales, so customers there is.

        change the whole of it and sometimes can't even use it.

        Sometimes developer has not enough skills men then they could make it work...

        Sometimes developers change the style so much that they could have made it from scratch....

        Also I am working on the new Wicked Templates.

  6. 2

    I made Divjoy because I felt like it should be way easier to build full stack React apps.

    1. 2

      So is your target client no-code developers? Great looking website but it is hard to know exactly what you can do for 'me' as a potential customer.

      1. 1

        Focused on devs who don’t want to deal with configuring all the various services that go into building a full stack app with auth, db, payments, analytics, etc. Pick what you need then export a custom codebase. Thanks for sharing your impression. Will think on how I can make that more clear!

  7. 1

    I built Xoba because I was frustrated having to search and organize information across the 10s of apps I used at work on a daily basis. Needed a better way to search and organize the chaos.

  8. 1

    I started https://www.buildbettertogether.org/ as a business mastermind where independent business builders can meet every week to discuss their challenges.

    Being an indy hacker can be isolating. Having a real community of people with similar mindsets and daily challenges can help people get through difficult times. It’s also more fun to share ideas and see the same faces every week

    1. 1

      It's quite an expense considering most of my time (seemingly) will go toward giving support to others.

  9. 1

    I built https://bearblog.dev cause I wanted a minimalist blog for myself. Turns out other people wanted one too :)

  10. 1

    Haven't launched yet, but I'm building my startup to support the local musicians in my area. Probably not a million dollar niche but it's what I'm passionate about.

    A great friend once told me do what you love and the money will follow.

  11. 1

    I made https://tabextend.com to scratch my own itch really. I found that I wasted a lot time copy pasting links, that I wanted to save, from my browser and into note apps. I also often end up having a window filled with 20-30 tabs and I can feel my focus getting worse and worse. There are bookmarks and other apps that try to solve this problem but after having tried a bunch of different solutions I wanted something that was not out there.

    So i built my own browser extension that replaces the new tab where the user can drag and drop, and thereby close and save, tabs into spaces(groups). From there on out I added a few extra things aswell like notes and to-dos.

    1. 1

      Interesting. Currently I use bookmarks tab whenever I want to save a link. It does get cluttered and I do need to reorganize my bookmarks every week. I do like your landing page.

      www.leagueofstartups.com

  12. 1

    To help people find information related to product and services in new ways.
    To help businesses use automation and AI to boost sales and reduce costs.
    To explore new ways of enabling trade.

    https://boostlane.com

    The Social Platform for Online Shopping

    1. 1

      It seems as though it is a news site?? kind of confused. As I see it does none of the 3 things you mentioned. And the website is low quality.

      Don't take this the wrong way.

      My 2cents advice is to focus on a specific niche. If you want to:

      To help businesses use automation and AI to boost sales and reduce costs.

      Then do just only this and make it clear within 5 seconds of a visitor landing on your page.

      1. 1

        Thank you for your feedback. If you could take a few seconds to explain what makes the website low quality, I would really appreciate. The great thing with quality is that it can be improved over time.

        I don't use the website's main page to sell to businesses, it's not a SaaS but there are SaaS modules within the platform. I have landing pages to sell services to businesses.

        I have been selling Software services with email and Skype for years, B2B services don't require a landing page.

        This is the main landing page for businesses:
        https://boostlane.com/about/selling/

        The reason most of the features are not obvious is by design, the focus is on providing information to the public. The AI contributes to the content produced without making it obvious. The goal is to present content like the page of a book and keep the design as simple as possible. I don't sell AI services but it helps a lot as an 'employee'. Sellers buy services but they can only guess how the work is done - Human? Machine? Whatever.

        For instance, the AI helps produce pages like this, without saying it:
        https://boostlane.com/h/underrated
        https://boostlane.com/h/top_10

        The focus of the main section of the platform is information, and that's all there is to see. It's an information platform that does other things as well.

        Your additional feedback would be loved and cherished, if you find the time, and you can understand the concept.

        The product is still in development, there are many things left to do, to fix and improve.

        Thanks

        1. 1

          the low quality comment was centered on this being some kind of template i'm assuming? Personally, in my opinion it is much better to just be simple and high quality. For example compare:
          https://boostlane.com/about/selling/
          vs
          https://helloguru.io

          High quality logo, text and layout.

          -----another thing----
          BOOSTLANE
          is the Social Platform for
          Online Shopping
          with Support Services to help
          Boost Sales and Reduce Costs

          What does this mean?
          If you say social platform for online shopping - i'm going to assume i'm chatting to other shoppers.

          Next you mention "Boost Sales and Reduce Costs" so the target market are people with online shops?

          Scroll down and it says:
          Find out more and Request
          a Free Consultation

          But I don't even know what this site is about so why would i want a free consultation?

          Overall: for this site I would really start out with a simple tag.

          For example: "Boost sales for your online shop".

          Then explain how you do this.

          Less text is better

          1. 1

            Thanks, Scott. Really useful feedback.

            https://helloguru.io is a great looking landing page but it also looks like 100 landing pages I have visited this year. It could be a template as well. I don' like small font but it's a matter of taste and design choice.

            Most SaaS landing pages I visit nowadays look like https://helloguru.io. Nothing wrong with that, it must be what works best - I'll think about that possibility.

            I don't use templates so it's interesting that you see a template, but it means I must be doing something right considering that popular templates are usually made by good website designers. Maybe it looks like a template because it's basic - basic is often a good starting point.

            The free consultation reference does not come with a CTA, you would not be able to find the widget at that point because it's too early; it refers to the landing pages that give more information about particular services so people know what to find on the next pages.

            I'll improve on the logo and the design over time... There is a long list of version 2.0 of things to do before that. Everything has to be improved incrementally, and there's a lot.

            Your feedback will be used to improve the landing pages flow and the content.

            Thanks again for taking time to help.

        2. 1

          One more thing: Some content only appears after browsing because the website has to have some input to generate those recommendations. You will not see that info when the platform knows nothing about what you are interested in.

  13. 1

    I built Inoffice because now that my company is working remotely, I miss the small chat I had with my team members when working in an office.

    1. 1

      So the obvious quetion is why would people just not have small chats using zoom?

      www.leagueofstartups.com

      1. 1

        It's a lot easier to use Inoffice than Zoom. I like to categorize Zoom as the "official" meetings with time and date wheres Inoffice is for "unofficial" meetings without the time and date.

        1. 1

          What is the significance of time and date?

          How is it easier to use can you give an example?

          How do you talk to your remote team prior to making this and what was the main issue you had?

          1. 1

            What is the significance of time and date?
            I was trying to differentiate between official meetings that zoom does so well and unofficial meetings that Inoffice is trying to solve.

            How is it easier to use can you give an example?
            With Inoffice, if you see your team member is online, you can just click a button an instantly talk to him/her. There is no "call" concept. Similar to Discord.

            How do you talk to your remote team prior to making this and what was the main issue you had? The talking was not the issue but the purpose of talking was. With a lot of solution out there you have to "call" that person in order to talk. This makes it feels like it's only for business talk and not casual talk. Previously I would open a meeting with myself and tell everyone to join if they want to have a chat.

            1. 1

              Okay thanks for explaining. The aha moment for me was that you have to make a meeting using zoom in order to talk to people. I have never used zoom. However, your solution is comparable to what skype does. So again, how do you differientiate from skype, unless people just arent using skype anymore.

              1. 1

                One of the key difference is there is no "call" concept. If you see someone online you can just hop in and voice chat instantly. By breaking this so called "call" barrier, I'm hoping to make the conversation more instantaneous.

                The analogy I like to make is in an office environment, if you have a question for your senior developer, do you call them and ask the question or do you bring your laptop and go directly to his/her desk? With Inoffice I'm trying to achieve the latter but remotely.

                Another thing that is different to Skype is that you can look around and see who is talking to who. That way, you can join in the conversation if you want. Just like in a real office environment. :D

  14. 1

    I started Inbound because I wanted email routing without being tied to an email sending provider...then after some feedback/convos I began to build out a Rules Engine for workflows and started a Parsing system to extract email data to other tools.

  15. 0

    So, how many million dollars does the winner get? What will be the grand championship? I hope there's neither singing nor Simon Cowell involved - I can't sing. How can startups that have little in common compete?

    1. 2

      Its not about a prize. I mean why do people post on betalist and product hunt. For exposure. This tournament is no different. If two startups compete its about you and which one of the two you like better in your own opinion. Then the one with the most likes will move to the next round.

      1. 2

        Thanks for the reply, I was just teasing you. I also understand better with your explanation.

        1. 1

          okay thumbs up man

  16. 1

    This comment was deleted 2 years ago.

    1. 1

      What do you do that shopify does not do?

      1. 1

        This comment was deleted 2 years ago.

        1. 1

          Hey man great reply. I enjoy these problem/solution conversations. I'd love for you to submit this into my startup tournament platform if you can.
          If I were you I would definitey use the word shopify on your landing page. Are shopify clients your target market?

          1. 1

            This comment was deleted 2 years ago.

  17. 4

    This comment was deleted a year ago.

    1. 1

      Perfect example man. Solving your own problm. I'd be honored if you would list this on my startup tournament platform.

      1. 1

        This comment was deleted a year ago.

    2. 1

      I've seen this before in passing but I am definitely sending my band mates songbox! We're working with a label right now and this will be a great tool for sending tracks to publications.

      1. 1

        This comment was deleted a year ago.

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