Makerkit

After a few weeks of work - I finally released a course to build an AI SaaS with two of the hottest technologies, Next.js App Router and Supabase.

The course teaches how to build an AI SaaS from scratch, from authentication to shipping the code to production.

Here's the outline of the course:

1. Introduction: A quick introduction to Next.js 13
2. Next.js App Router: Understanding the new Next.js App Router
3. Project Setup: Creating and setting up a Next.js App Router project and Supabase
4. Authentication: Building a complete authentication flow with Next.js Supabase
5. Database: Setting up a database schema with Supabase
6. ChatGPT API: Generating posts with OpenAI's ChatGPT and writing them to the DB
7. CRUD Operations: Displaying, updating and deleting data using Next.js Server Actions and Supabase
8. Payments: Accept payments using Stripe Checkout and Stripe Billing Portal
9. Permissions and Thresholds: Limiting access based on the user's subscription plan and recording usage
10. Going to Production: Deploying to Vercel and Supabase and using Next.js App Router in production

It supports PPP - so you'll find a discount at the top of the page if eligible!

Grab a copy! https://makerkit.dev/courses/nextjs-app-router

I skipped the January update! So let me catch you up on what I've been up to.

Makerkit has made much progress with design improvements, new features, and a fantastic community.

1. The Remix + Supabase is out of beta ✨
2. I've just released the Next.js RSC + Supabase as an experimental kit to a few customers! 🔥

💵 With $8606 in revenue, February has been the best month yet! (+ 27%)

📊 The other super exciting stat is that the website gets over 10,000 clicks per month from Google, which is a massive milestone for me.

I've been very focused on content since day 1 and seeing the strategy and all its efforts pay off is pretty exciting!

💬 290 users in the Discord community!

My current goal is to ship the new Next.js + Supabse kit and reach feature parity with the original Starter kit (Blog, Docs, and MFA). And, of course, keep writing lots of content!

Thank you for reading, ciao!

Giancarlo Buomprisco

December has been great 🎉 After four months, Makerkit is making enough to support my lifestyle!

Here are this month's stats:

💵 $3,489.75 in sales (+120%)
📊 4k users and 10k page views to the website (+100%)
💬 Over 120 users in the Discord community

This puts me just above ramen profitability. I am not a big spender, but Italy isn't famous for being a tax-friendly country 😂

All I can say is that this wildly exceeded all my expectations for a side project, and I'm super excited to ship more kits and content in 2023.

Happy new year, people!

Wrote a small post about my plans for the coming year, and a short retrospective on 2022.

I launched Makerkit rather late, but it already reached ramen profitability. I couldn't be happier, since it's exceeded all my expectations 🎉

Here are my plans for 2023 to grow Makerkit:

1. Launch the Supabase versions of the Next.js and Remix kits
2. Build and launch a React Native kit
3. Maybe an eCommerce template with Remix/Hydrogen
4. A template for building Shopify apps
5. I'm planning on adding a lot more content and documentation. Content is a big part of the overall value, and my main marketing channel.
6. I'd also love to launch one or more courses. Seems like a natural way to complement the current offering.

What about you? What are your plans for 2023?

https://makerkit.dev/blog/changelog/planning-2023

November has been the best month yet for Makerkit!

✅ Sold 16 licenses, totaling $1,584 in sales
✅ Had 1.9k visitors (+105%) and 5.6k page views (+86.9%)
✅ I removed Github Sponsors and the monthly plans
✅ I released the Remix Firebase kit (1 sale). I think this will improve next year as Remix becomes more popular.
✅ I redesigned the website since Makerkit is now a collection of kits (and not just Next.js + Firebase). I got good feedback on it, but I think SEO is slightly diving due to the changes.
✅ Will release the new Supabase version of the kits (one within this year) and start the transition to the new Next.js RSC as soon as it becomes ready for production

Thanks for reading,
Ciao!

After 2 weeks of work, I finally released the Remix + Firebase SaaS Starter! 🥳

The functionalities are virtually the same as the original Next.js kit, without the blog and documentation generators, since I haven't seen much interest in these functionalities from the existing customers. I may add it in the future: I think every SaaS should have these.

Since the website wasn't set up for multiple kits (both in terms of copy and structure), I put a lot of effort into updating the design/messaging/documentation.

✅ Added a landing page to each kit
✅ Removed Github Sponsors; no one was using it, does handle VAT, does not handle refunds
✅ Updated primary heading to "React SaaS Starter" instead of "Next.js SaaS Starter." I may update in the future since I can see more technologies I'd like to add.
✅ Added multiple documentation. The existing ones point to the new URL using a canonical link. I hope that works out well in terms of SEO since a lot of content is duplicated.
✅ I Bought Screenflow, and now I can make cool videos 🤣

I plan to raise prices from $99 to $149 after Black Friday. More customers = more support, and it takes some time.

Next, I'm planning on adding the Supabase version of the kits. The goal is to do it by Christmas.

Hope I can do it 🤞

Ciao!

I wanted to try upgrading the Next.js Kit to the new Layouts/RSC, but it's so far from ready: I've decided to wait until it's more stable and complete.

Given the hype from the Shopify acquisition (and some customers enquiring), I've started working on a SaaS Starter kit with Remix and Firebase, a migration from the original kit based on Next.js.

I have doubts about how to restructure the website with multiple kits, so there's some work to do on that front:

1. How does my SEO strategy change using multiple kits?
2. What should the landing page feature?
3. How to handle the documentation for multiple kits?
4. How to update my tagline?

Now, on to the technicalities.

I've really enjoyed using Remix! It's fast, DX is excellent, and it just clicked quickly. Additionally, the conversion has been seamless: because most HTTP requests are performed client-side using Firestore, the kit only has a few HTTP calls that require API routes.

The UX/UI and overall functionalities will be the same as the original kit, but I'll skip the blog/documentation generator at the beginning since they can easily be added later.

I've added a page to collect early sign-ups and gain some SEO juice while I finish the kit. I reckon it's 80% there. I will launch it sometime next week, with beta testing starting this week.

Sign up to get updates: https://makerkit.dev/remix-firebase

October has been a rollercoaster.

🥳 Makerkit finished the month with 15 sales, which amount to $1188 one-off payments, plus two recurring subscriptions at $19, one of which has been canceled.

But it started badly: no sales for the first two weeks! 😬

Many were making it to the checkout step, but something prevented them from purchasing: I had made some changes that were putting them off from purchasing.

I introduced an additional plan for teams of people, 2x more expensive. However, most customers are solo developers, so they shouldn't have been impacted: I feel like the additional plan could have made them feel like buying a lower product.

✅ I finally removed the other plan, and sales restarted. However, I will try again in the future since teams of developers take much more support time.

I also introduced a live version of the kit: users can now see a version of the project starter and play with it. Unfortunately, authentication had a bug for some time, so I guess I lost many clients. I will forever thank whoever signed up with youroauthisbroken@checkyourdemo.com 🤣

📊 Organic traffic is the primary channel from which I obtain visitors: thanks to a ton of focus on SEO, Makerkit gained the top of the SERP for many important queries. So I'm now going to focus on adding more sets of keywords.

In total, the website received 780 unique visitors and 2.4k page views. Nearly 2x the previous month, so not bad!

🤖 I automated adding purchasers to the private repository using the Gumroad and GitHub API. Automating this was important since many customers thought the process was automatic, but I had to add them manually: for some, that meant waiting nearly 12 hours.

I explained how I built the automation here: https://makerkit.dev/blog/tutorials/sell-code-gumroad-github.

🚀 Ok, what's next? I'm still thinking of adding new stacks. I am not sure which, but lately, I've been investigating a kit for starting Shopify Apps. I have a small working codebase; it will require some changes. But all in all, I am confident I could publish it in a few weeks.

Thanks for reading!

While the domain has been up since January, I only started collecting payments at the end of August.

🥳 I'm closing September with ten sales totaling $830, which is more than I expected!

✅ The small community of users has helped a lot with feedback and driving the future of the kit's codebase. I started weekly office hours for support and to discuss all things SaaS/code.

✅ As for the product, I added many fixes, improvements, and new features, such as:

• Multi-Factor Authentication
• Phone number auth and Email link auth
• Ability to link an account to multiple auth providers

✅ Had 399 unique visitors and 985 Page views according to Google Analytics. Due to the tech-savvy demographics, it should probably be 20-30% higher in reality. Very happy about this as it's mostly thanks to hard SEO work!

🚀 What's next? I plan to continue improving the demo application, adding more articles for SEO (which is growing!), and improving the documentation. At some point, I'd like to release other tech stacks (Remix, Shopify, etc.).

Ciao! 👋

After months of beta testing and content writing, I've made Makerkit available for purchase.

While I'd like to add some more features, this is good enough for now, and I will focus on content, SEO, documentation, and dogfooding with another product I'm building.

Once it's refined, I plan on adding more technologies, such as Remix, SvelteKit, Shopify, etc.