Many successful Indie Hackers have said it themselves: Build fast.
With AI apis like ChatGPT available, putting a product together in a week or less is now possible.
I built the first version of turbolink.io in under a week, then spent two weeks researching launch strategies.
How long did it take you to build your startup? Was it successful? What did you accomplish?
Let's hear about it!
Curious how other founders manage business emails early on =
do you create separate accounts or use aliases?
Totally agree with the "build fast" mindset.
For my current project I focused on launching a working version as quickly as possible instead of polishing everything.
The first version took around a week to get the core functionality working. After that most of the time went into refining the idea and understanding how startups actually use it.
One interesting thing I noticed while talking with founders is how many of them pay for multiple business email accounts (sales@, support@, info@ etc.) even when those could often be managed from a single inbox using aliases.
So the main progress after the first build was less about code and more about understanding the real problem founders face and simplifying the solution.
Hey! quick question.
I’m exploring a tool for technical solo founders:
“Tell us what you want to build. We design and generate a clean, extendable web app using the right AI for each step.”
I’m not selling anything yet, just validating.
Does this solve a real pain for you, or am I missing the mark?
Built myvisa.app in one day: https://www.myvisa.app/
Built on webflow in a few hours. I then added a typeform to collect responses. To generate the visa cover letter, I use a few templates and prompts on top of chatgpt.
Added a ChatGPT enabled bot in another few hours. I used Social intent.
it's been 3 weeks since launch and I've gotten >1k page views and 70+ people completed typeform to request visa application letters.
Neat idea! How you gaining traffic?
This is soo cool! I love this!
Wow! That looks great!
Just released gptbricks.cøm that i made in a long week without seeing the daylight. I didn't perform any validation for my project, the gotomarket is going to be painful 😊
Looks like a great product.
If you don't mind me asking, what will be your gotomarket strategy?
That's the question, I'll post it everywhere until I find my right audience I guess
We have built up this MVP: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/chatgpt-linkedin-email-ge/ahlmkaafohhhbocahhjlcgofddbhcaef
Dang, that looks like an extension worth having! I’ll have to try it out!
Thanks @jrberendt, let me know your thoughts/feedback on the tool 😊
Built https://ai-poetry-generator.pages.dev a while ago.
Yesterday I updated it with a new UI and the latest open ai API updations.
On using AI for development.
I use GitHub copilot a lot. Sometimes use their new chat mode too.
Also, as I'm a single developer, I use ChatGPT/ bing ai as a developer friend or something :)
The new UI looks great!
Thank you man!
Robofy.ai - Built & went live in 5 weeks. Still not launched on any launch websites as still refining the chatbot.
I spent 2 days building chatmap-ai. It has been released for a week and has a total of 1060 registered users and 2 paid users. This is an intelligent map search software that I think is very interesting and can help me learn geography and history. So I built it.
I built BeMyRobot (https://bemyrobot.xyz/) in 4 days!
And I am so excited about the launch!
I build and deploy automations powered by AI, to perform any repetitive or tedious tasks, so you can do business at a faster pace 🤙
I already close some monthly and annual contracts to build AI robots that handle automatically:
Just visited your Twitter and the first post on there was a super helpful workflow for content creation. 👏 👏 👏
BeMyRobot looks legit cool and helpful for biz owners. Congrats on the idea and the launch. Can't wait to see more of your journey!
I built IconMage (https://iconmage.com), an AI icon generator tool, over a couple of months, but the time I actually spent was surely less than a week.
I launched my first AI-powered application today: https://productwriter.ai
This was a problem I had identified with a client's online store last week and I thought AI would be great at assisting with it. It works through a custom WooCommerce plugin right now but I hope to add more platforms in the future.
Built Twitter news posting automation bot in 30 minutes using Nekton.ai - https://www.indiehackers.com/post/automate-news-posting-to-your-twitter-community-in-2-minutes-a067254642
Built a floral arrangement image generator for users based on their flower choices. Good for weddingsl bouquets. https://FloralMix.com
Great application of AI! Looks awesome!
This exactly took 2 days to build https://www.clearphrase.io/ . This can be considered as a hello world of any application but I got 3000 users so far and its not making money yet.
3k users? Impressive. What strats have you used to launch? :)
Not on the same week but over the period of a 2 months now. I believe making it free helped too :)
Still, it's impressive! How were you able to gain initial traction? Any advice you can share with people launching their startup?
I’m wondering this too! How long ago did you launch?
Built an AI this weekend and already using it for my main startup to make revenue.
Here's the landing page I launched this morning: https://newaiforlearning.com/
I used Adalo to build the base concept in 3-5 hours. From there I shared it with my co-founder and he told me to expand it so we hired an assistant to use it for our core work (developing learning content for clients) and we've already seen about a 100x boost in productivity and our net profit margin is floating around 100% (plus we easily see how to increase it).
Our line work was started mid last year and has led to $100,000 (non-recurring) of work so far. Recently we started getting partnerships around this line work which caused us to hit a capacity issue. We were using other AIs, but over time our hands started hurting from all the copying and pasting. We knew there was a better way.
In short the AI I built over the weekend is helping us make ~$60/hr up to 40 hours per week while our assistant uses it.
Now we're hoping to launch something in early Q3!
Wow! That's amazing!
I hope to see your product when you launch!
Built Script Scan in a day and took another day to set up a landing page and sort out hosting. This is the first project that I have actually published instead of just open-sourcing it; didn't take a lot of time to do market research and just got caught up in the technical implementation so don't know how it's going to perform 😅
What it does is scrape code from GitHub file URLs and convert it into natural language. This can help you recall your old code, fastrack open-source contributions, and can help beginners actually understand the code they're using instead of just copying and pasting it.
Chrome Extension ID (paste in on the webstore): kljkclbeopgkgkilideimbkdjihdlkag
I just built https://quickly.codes in a couple of hours. I have not launched yet and I'm not sure how this is going to go, but I am hopeful!
Created yourgpt chatbot module and spent almost 2 weeks.
I built PagePundit in free evenings within a month. PagePundit is an AI-powered book recommendation service that takes the hassle out of finding your next great read. Example recommendation here!
Any advice on how I can market the service / suggestions on how to improve the site are appreciated!
Oooh this is so cool! I've learned a thing or two from books via ChatGPT. This is a great concept.
Have you looked at a TikTok strategy? There seems to be a great community of book lovers on there.
Since it's books, maybe you can try creating a fictitious character to be your spokesperson on TikTok. A book-loving gnome, a storyteller librarian fairy-type thing? Just thinking out loud, obviously has to be aligned with your brand, but might be fun. :)
I think you're right that I should explore TikTok as an option.
I had been trying on various book related subreddits which was working well. I had my first affiliate sales this way, however most subreddits have an anti-ai stance and its a battle avoiding bans unfortunately...
Best of luck! You have a very nifty idea. :)
Created a coffee table book full of AI generated art and published on Amazon in under a week.
Was it successful? I mean I think it looks great but it takes time to find and build an audience as a new artist/author, so I've been working on that for the last two weeks. Time will tell!
The book looks stunning! Good luck with your sales. Where are you sharing your work? Would love to follow you and give some love.
Wow, thanks so much.
I'm trying to build a following on Instagram at @anthony.brunello so you can follow me there. It's only been on sale a few days so I'm hoping when some reviews come in on Amazon it will pick up steam.
Really appreciate the kind words though, thank you.
Following!
Surely reviews will help.
Looking forward to seeing you on my feed :)
qrdiffusion about 2 to 3 month
About
Our app goes beyond the pixelated grids of traditional QR codes. Instead, we use Stable Diffusion, a powerful generative AI model that creates intricate images resembling artwork. Our ControlNet model ensures that the final QR code will keep all the necessary details that are important to your desired prompt.
This is super cool! I can totally see these at trade shows.
Victrays - Share your Ai tool
Exam.Cafe - https://exam.cafe (or https://app.exam.cafe to see what it is without signin in)
Took a week, still progressing.
Let me know if there is any feedback.
Macaify - Make your Mac-AI-ify.
The first version took one week, but it has not been released yet. It has been two months now, and there are 20 users.
Can't post url still lol~~
Convert Podcast to EPUB - https://ebook.bluepill.life/
Built in five days
https://rewriteme.ai - built it in a weekend. got #3 on product hunt yesterday!
Built Interview AI in a weekend, and just launched it on Product Hunt today.
LLM is amazing, the landscape has completely changed (worked in the AI/ML space for the last 15 years).
https://www.producthunt.com/posts/interview-ai
Thanks for sharing
Hey Guys, Jimmy Salsa here, new to IH, just got here 5 minutes ago. This place is amazing! I'm trying to hack together a productized content creator site. If anybody has a need for FREE custom content for websites, emails, product description etc. Let me know. I'm casting a wide net because I don't know where else to start. I am offering free content to IH to gain some experience and feedback and to contribute value to the group.
I do use ChatGPT to get started but I translate almost all of it into human bc well....you know.
Any feedback is welcome.
I built the travelfeed(dot)io/ai MVP in a day and asked a few bloggers to test it, but it took me a while to launch as I made a landing page, tutorial video, payments and improved the results and UI
I had the Thank You GPT app working as a plugin for Zendesk for almost two years, but without AI it wasn't very useful. With ChatGPT plugged in, it's now making 1k$US/per month and we're investing in developing it further!
I built for 5 days my new app MVP https://ArchitectAI.app and then brought it to the production level for a few more weeks
in fact, with AI my productivity has increased 10 times
I have been using midjourney to make images for my agency and new startup. Got my landing page up for my new startup in about 3 days.
Didn't build this in a week since I was starting to learn to code while creating this project, but I created an SMS-based resume generator. Text +1 (306) 500-5821, answer some questions about yourself, and get a link to your ready-to-use Word Document resume. Designed for those who find resume creation challenging and want a tailor-made document that's easy to send and edit as needed.
I built your social team’s website on Shopify with custom code completely out chat gpt
We built SudoAi.Dev to help Apple IT Admins with bash scripting!
I built Dash Bean with ChatGPT to help me quickly build functions and write API calls. Was able to move so much quicker
https://dashbean.com
Not in a week though. But I built my product Gist AI within 3 weeks while working a full time job!
I am curious about your initial launch strategies. I am planning to launch soon and it would be really helpful to me!
Im starting my first ai start up this week and im almost done but i was wondering if you guys think that the quality of the site should be my number one priority or should i release get my first few user and just improve the site as i go.
Launch and then improve!
Don't get caught by the perfectionist mindset
(been there, it's not a cool place to be in)
Built Charades AI over a weekend recently :D
Looking for a charades partner? Let our AI algorithm fuel your imagination and keep the guessing game alive.
https://www.charadesai.com/
That was so much FUUUUN!
Very cool app.
I did not win. haha
glad you enjoyed it!
We built docs.twilix.io in under a week for the first version of our retrieval-augmented infrastructure :) the purpose of it was to build an API-first company to power applications like being able to talk to PDFs and generative AI search. I was lucky to be working in the AI space for several years to get this out this fast :) 3 weeks in and managed to maintain feature velocity by refactoring a lot of code! Check it out on twilix.io! Love reading the other startups here. Super interesting.
I made a Chrome extension that captures any products on any website with AI.
https://buylensai.com/
Made this for a recent hackathon
https://pyvu.in
It is simple event planning and collaboration webapp built with sveltekit and appwrite. It has a chat feature and also shared todo lists.
I made dashai.xyz in about 2 weeks. It's a chrome extension that gives you access to chatgpt from every webpage!
How can I start an AI startup?
I’ve just built MailBunny, an email based AI assistant in one week: https://mailbunny.ai/
You can summarize a long email simply by forwarding it to [email protected] or
start a conversation by sending an email to [email protected]
All the conversations are saved in your inbox, naturally searchable, organized by email threads and accessible from anywhere you have email access
You can try it out for free let me know if you try it :)
Built this personalized portfolio AI summarized news updater in a week-long hackathon: https://www.investorevolution.tech
I love seeing all these cool AI tools. Everyone moves so quickly!
It took me a week to gather the photos needed to train the AI model. A startup that doesn't use a ready-made API won't be created in a week. We have been building https://www.tripoffice.com for several months, but we encountered many problems along the way.
10 days here! 👋 https://medium.com/startup-stash/from-zero-to-saas-building-and-launching-a-saas-in-10-days-66e262615d66
Very impressive. We live in some amazing times. The tools that will be available to us next week, and the week after that, and after that will be more powerful and abundant than the collective tools developed over the course of an entire decade in the past.
I built the MVP for https://www.linqmeup.com over multiple days, but in under 24 hours during the December holidays of 2022.
It uses AI to convert SQL into LINQ code (nowadays, also vice versa). This was something normally done by (competitors who) use conversion rules and syntax checking to do this. With AI, the advantage is that you get a per problem specific conversion generated.
It slowly got tractions since then. Since I formally released it begin 2023 and started to put out some LINQ and SQL related content, and engaging devs on social media.
Of the 1000+ registered users, many are re-registering with gmail variants to use the free credits (used to provide 10, now 2) after registering.
I've been working on things to get people paying for the worth, like:
Most people are from lower income countries (India, Vietnam, Iran, ...) so I need to add more value for the buck or find other (western) devs that can use this microsaas.
It's only about $20 per month income now, I learned a lot from it.
Hope that extra features will help more people see the time-saving value and gain me more income to stay viable. Also thinking about affiliated content/ads on the site for related dev stuff that helps.
https://www.aircal.co MVP was built in a week-end 🚀
What source do you use for such great cover images? 💗
https://dreamstudio.ai/
https://pomotastic.com/
I built https://utubescripts.com in a week. Still working on the marketing aspect though.
Very inspirational!!
Build an AI based app for learning vocabulary - https://voc-squire.web.app/
It enables you to store words and practice AI based sentences with these words.
Looking good! Do you mind sharing what AI you’re using?
Best of luck with the project!
Thanks! Would love to hear your thoughts and feedback!
For now it's chatGPT
interesting
Not in a week, but our team built SaveDay (https://www.save.day/) in 3 weeks!!!! Quite impressed with our own product!
I built the first version of tidyrise.com in 2-3 weeks by working part time
Would love to gain some insight with anyone that’s willing to have a chat about launching an AI notes app I have in concept at the moment
Took 3-4 days to make http://future4days.com/. Not many job posts as it is totally new. Still trying to spread the word to recruiters and job seekers.
I think theres some bugs I tried to search for jobs and 0 results
This comment was deleted 3 years ago.