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What wins or struggles have you had this week?

Whether you've had ups or downs, congrats on surviving the week!

We sometimes have wins that are too small to share as a normal post, or maybe struggles that we are worried about sharing.

So, no matter how big or small, what wins or struggles have you had this week?

Bonus rosie points for if you:

  • teach us all something you've learned along the way
  • help someone who has been struggling ๐Ÿ™Œ
  1. 3

    This week we made a lot of progress with our MVP. We hired a second developer to help speed things up. Transferred another $4k from my savings to my business account. We met with three of our advisors to help formulate an investor outreach strategy.

    I am learning to become more comfortable asking for money. I am still not 100% there yet, but I am getting better.

  2. 3

    I had the conception that building a product was hard. After prelaunching my product, I realized that the hardest part is, in fact, getting your first customers.

    Currently I am contacting people on Twitter through DMs and replies to tweets that match a certain search criteria. I found interesting that less than 20% of the people actually answers back.

    1. 1

      In a similar boat here. Getting someone to even put their time in to try your product is so hard. I got my first trial user this week so lets see if they close but as a result of it, found a few use cases and bugs which I could resolve.

    2. 1

      The earlier you realize all of that, the better, otherwise you spend too much time on the creating process.

      The world is very noisy, it's difficult to be heard, but it's a very interesting challenge too :)

  3. 3

    Anxiety kicked in (and I thought by launching number of other projects I am over this) and I almost didnโ€™t make my side-project public. But then realised, so what that it is not perfect, it will never be, but it works. Sure, plenty of things to improve, but now that it is public, anxiety is gone. Next step is getting it ready for launch at the end of March.

    As a side effect, got 10 new beta testers, some followers and a number of feedback, just from the twitter alone. Which helps with motivation.

    Donโ€™t wait, ship, this is just the beginning of your journey. No more anxiety. :)

    If you want to check it out - it is called Kairo - getkairo.com - added as a project here on IH.

    1. 1

      This comment was deleted a year ago.

  4. 2

    Thanks Rosie, congrats on your survival too :)

    Iโ€™ve been struggling with the fact that there are only 24 hours in the day, and that we donโ€™t have teleportation machines yet, and landing dev work :)

    On the plus side...I released the first โ€œSpecial Editionโ€ of my javascript, technology and web development newsletter.

    This week is a โ€œJavascript Core Special ๐Ÿ’ฏโ€ inspired by recent discussions on HN.

    If you are looking to learn about javascript on a deeper level this could be the issue for you! I learnt a lot putting it together.

    Iโ€™ve been running the newsletter every week for several months, so creating a special edition feels quite novel.

    I also like doing small experiments with the format, production tools and methodology, then writing about it.

    Iโ€™m also hoping that it will make it feel a bit more personal.

    Tips: eating good food and sleeping make a big difference, kind of obvious but can be easy to miss if you are too busy.

  5. 2

    This week I launched my newsletter where I building in public:
    leits.substack.com

    From this I have both wins and struggles.
    About wins: I got 300 views and 20 subscribers.
    About struggles: I have exhausted the limit of distribution among acquaintances and organic growth has almost completely disappeared.

    I don't know what to do with it. At the moment just don't think about it and preparing a new issue.

    1. 2

      That's a cool idea. Subscribed!

      1. 1

        Thanks, man!

    2. 2

      I've just signed up. I was actually going to build exactly the same thing a while back, I'm really interested to see how you get on.

      As far as growth, I know how you feel. I've found some subscribers by just hanging around where other people are; Twitter, IndieHackers etc.

      I'm not actively trying to promote in those places, I'm just there anyway because they're awesome communities and I'd be here regardless. As a side-effect though, people notice what I'm doing and occasionally sign up.

      1. 2

        Wow, an interesting coincidence.
        I will be grateful for your feedback during the development of this idea.
        And thank you for your support!

        That's how today I came across your newsletter, subscribed!

        1. 1

          Thank you!

  6. 1

    This week I struggled with having the energy to work the side-project. It's easy to celebrate the hustle, but hustle has a cost.

  7. 1

    hey guys, I'm a noob who just learned some HTML, css and a bit of javascript. I'm taking cs50x and at the week 8 we were asked to build a simple webpage. But I thought in something I could monetize, then I wrote a BMI calculator with space for native ads of personal trainers, doctors, etc and fitness products. It has already taken me 3 weeks. This week I'm doing some adjustments to make it responsive, and the next step is to add a web app manifest. Here you can check a video of how the page is behaving https://www.awesomescreenshot.com/video/2855499?key=6cfc6763985492ff32ffa4fa19775ac4 (it's Portuguese). Any feedback would be very appreciated. Thank you and good luck to all.

  8. 1

    Hi Rosie,I joined IndieHackers this week. So I feel good.

    1. 1

      Sounds like an excellent win if you ask me! ๐Ÿ˜‡

      1. 1

        haha True Rosie. I am happy to see many people making their own products here.

  9. 1

    Wins this week:
    Finally got my new web app live! ๐Ÿ˜ƒ
    https://justmywish.com

    Tons to fix, but it's up and running anyways! Would appreciate if people could give some feedback! ๐Ÿ™๐Ÿ‘Š

    1. 2

      Congrats! Did you make a progressive web app, with a web app manifest? I'm about of doing that.

      1. 1

        Thanks Kizzy,
        Havent thought about it - now when you say it I'll add id. Thanks ๐Ÿ‘
        Awsome, whats your site?

        1. 1

          I didn't launch it yet. I said I was "about" to work on the web app manifest, but I'm actually making it responsive at this moment. It's a BMI calculator with space for native ads of professionals and products. https://www.awesomescreenshot.com/video/2855499?key=6cfc6763985492ff32ffa4fa19775ac4 this is a preview of the desktop version, which also needs to be fixed.

          1. 2

            Ah I get it, nice! Well done! Cheers! ๐Ÿš€๐Ÿš€

  10. 1

    I had a struggle in creating a UI flow for my new app this week. Drew lot of prototypes on pages. None of them were satisfactory for me. All of them sucked at screen flow

    Then during mid of this week early morning around 6 AM I again started drawing UI screens on the paper.

    Within 1 hours 80% of the UI screens and it's flow was ready and finalized.

    Last 3 days before this , I had spent more than 20 hours and could not make the progress. But I was able to make a good progress in just one hour ๐Ÿ˜Š

    Then I realised, I am a morning person.
    Creative thinking flows into my mind at high speed immediately after I wakeup.

  11. 1

    This is great idea for a thread! ๐Ÿ‘

    Wins:

    I got lucky and got a huge traffic spike which drove a couple of hundred subscribers to my newsletter.

    Struggles:

    Now the self doubt is kicking in.. What if they all unsubscribe after the next email? What if I run out of content? What if I've already reached everybody and this is the biggest it can get?

  12. 1

    I had to put one project idea to rest because after thorough evaluation, it just didn't seem worthy to pursue in the long run. Even though the urge to build was high, it seemed better to not continue with it at all.

    My lesson is to think through things, when building your next product. See if it actually solving a problem or just satisfying your hunger to "create".

    1. 2

      That's really true, I think it's important not to be too attached to ideas, to be able to discard them, and to move forward. Nice job :)

  13. 1

    Got rid of a nasty preflight CORS error that was nagging me for days. Felt good but it drained me quite a bit.

    1. 2

      Lol. I hate CORS. light and the web thing too ๐Ÿ˜Ž

      1. 1

        CORS can be real nasty and could easily make you pull out your hair. lol @ light. Don't have it in my country so I wouldn't know but I can imagine.

  14. 1

    I've released my first free update for the buyers of my book.

    Why free update?

    • I like to help even more!
    • It's a good way to put all my buyers on a special newsletter. I consider them as my best supporters.
    • I can iterate on the book (it's not a physical book, that's how) following feedback.
    • Technical books are outdated quickly, I want mine to stand the test of time.
  15. 1

    Just finished pushing out our donation/tip widget (www.centipenny.com). It allows creators, non-profits, etc to add a virtual "tip jar" on any page that they can add a <script> tag to. It is designed to allow users to tip small amounts, like $0.10 or $0.25 to show appreciation for that specific piece of content. Users can tip/donate with 1 or 2 clicks, without needing to put in CC information or leave the page. A kind of "that was cool, here's a quarter".

    It will be good for getting casual and 1-off users to contribute where they probably wouldn't donate several dollars, but for whom a quick $0.25 appreciation tip is reasonable. Creators can always keep other donation buttons, such as Patreon or Ko-Fi, for larger dollar donations.

    Really hoping that this will be a very useful tool for creators to monetize their audience directly.

  16. 1

    I recently started a newsletter in which I always include a link to my buymeacoffee.com page in case anybody is willing to support me monetarily.

    So far I've had 9 people "buy me coffees" and the overall reception has been good to the newsletter.

    It feels good and I'm excited to keep going!

    1. 1

      Congrats!

      I had "buy a coffee" links but nobody bought me any. I don't like coffee, maybe that's why :D

      What's the newsletter? I'm curious.

      1. 1

        Thanks Matthieu :)

        The newsletter is https://straightforward.fyi - a concise write up of interesting topics in technology + the internet.

        1. 1

          Nice! Looks interesting, and I never understood bitcoin :D

          Subscribed.

          1. 1

            Thank you, hope you enjoy!

  17. 1

    This week's win is getting interviewed by signals.page The interview was about small businesses starting lean and simple which is what I'm doing with Startup Without Code.

    My struggle is trying to get the web design just right.
    It's rough to say the least but I'm having fun doing it ๐Ÿ˜Š

  18. 1

    https://24hourhomepage.com had its first sales this week (launch week) ๐ŸŽ‰

  19. 1

    Zlappo at ATH MRR/monthly revenue 3 months in a row.

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    This comment was deleted 2 years ago.

  21. 1

    This comment was deleted a year ago.

    1. 1

      This is why I don't use reddit.

  22. 1

    This comment was deleted 2 years ago.

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