Lifelog

Calling it now. You first heard it here:

**The 10x AI-powered developer.**

I'm generally cautious about being overly bullish about AI, because there's so much snakeoil hyperbole right now. But I also recognise that my restraint is not homogenuous. For specific niches and use cases, I actually feel pretty excited and optimistic about it.

Like for software development.

Two types of tweets that's been recurring in my timeline that made me think so:

1. Non-technical folks who never coded a day in their life shipping apps like nothing
2. Devs who know code but become 10x more productive

Like Charlie here. A maker but don't know how to code. Now making apps using [ChatGPT and Replit](https://twitter.com/charlierward/status/1637887392626384903?s=20):

> Everyone’s laughing at all the ChatGPT threads, but I (a man who can’t code), just built and shipped a functioning and IMO useful Chrome Extension in ~45 minutes using just that and @Replit - it was the weirdest feeling ever.

He even [showed us](https://twitter.com/charlierward/status/1638303596595892224?s=20) how he did it:

> You asked for it, and here it is.
>
> "How I built a functioning Chrome Extension in 10 steps and 45 minutes, with no coding experience. Using ChatGPT + Replit."
>
> Let's dive in people. 👾

Adam's a dev, but he made [a year's worth of apps in one month](https://twitter.com/adamlyttleapps/status/1653603465757855744?s=20):

> Last month I shipped 9 new apps ✨
>
> (a year of apps in a single month 🤯)
>
> My secret?
>
> ⭐️ Boilerplate created by GPT-4(better results)
> ⭐️ Debugging with GPT-3.5(faster)
> ⭐️ Bigger bugs in GPT-4(smarter)
> ⭐️ Icons by Mid-Journey
>
> Then: I polish clean it up and release it ✨
>
> 

Two great examples demonstrating how powerful AI can be if you know how to work it for your specific niche or industry. With *real* proof of work and output. But I don't think normies will be able to do it just yet. You do need to be relatively well-versed at prompting, knowing the ins and outs of how ChatGPT works to be able to get to production-ready apps, and be savvy enough to navigate the bugs and errors that crop up. But it just goes to show how low the barrier is now and can go in the future.

And I thought nocode was great for lowering the barrier to entry for coding.

Now with AI it's like writing code in plain English!

I was a competitive sportsperson in school. All my life in school till early adulthood, I believed in mind over body. Great quality to have for sports and grades, but brought to extremes, the downside is that I became pretty disembodied.

And that disembodiment is the root of my chronic stress, burnouts, acute to chronic health conditions right now.

Lately I've been trying to learn to be more embodied, specifically in exericse, diet and sleep.

The first big epiphany: After decades of being disembodied, it’s not easy to listen to the body because I’ve wired myself to ignore the whispers the body sends me, until it becomes screams (in the form of acute/chronic health conditions). I simply didn’t have the capacity and capability to listen, so it’s hard to use the body as an indicator how to act at first, not because body is unreliable but my listening was unreliable.

So in the beginning, trying to be embodied gives mixed signals, and seem like the whole "listen to your body" advice is ineffective. If the connection between your mind and body is a relationship, there just isn't much trust at the start.

That's why having rules and structure in the beginning helps. Like when I started on keto, I followed the rules strictly. Now after more than 3 years, I'm getting the hang of intuitive eating, of catching and trusting what the body tells me. Similarly for sleep - after 3 years of sleep biohacking, I'm starting to know when I need more rest and naps.

Gradually, then suddenly.

Maybe this is an indie hacking approach we can double down on:

**Making many small bets within one small bet.**

That's what I've been doing for my Carrd plugins, and recently doubled down on it and starting to see some nice results. Some benefits I see from making many small bets within one small bet:

- I get to channel my itch for creating new things by creating new free/paid plugins.
- I get to help individuals solve their problems because usually my plugins are inspired by someone asking a question in a forum.
- I get to give value to the wider community, generate goodwill and word of mouth for my brand.
- Not just marketing but I get financial returns too – affiliate revenue goes up when people sign up for Carrd in order to download one of my plugins. Seller revenue goes up too when they donate or pay for one of my templates.
- The free plugins are like top of the funnel capture, warming leads and bringing more potentials customers in. The paid plugins are more preium offerings lower down the funnel.
- All the plugins are like stand-alone products, but they amplify one another in terms of marketing and utility, and together act as a multiplier for my plugins project.

I feel optimistic about this project and approach. And seeing these successful small-bets-in-small-bet projects made me feel even more hopeful!

- [tinywow.com](https://tinywow.com) is a productivity tools page where you can use free internet tools to edit/format PDFs, images, videos, AI writing, files. It's super comprehensive, and recently did 7M page views in just March alone, at $20k revenue that month.
- [Finsweet Attributes](https://finsweet.com/attributes) is like Webflow plugins without the code. Passed 140,000,000 page loads permonth!
- And of course, the OG indie hacker, Pieter Levels - he build Nomadlist, a travel listing directory for digital nomads, then moved into an adjacent space of remote work that many digital nomads are doing with RemoteOK. Now building out Rebase, an immigration-as-a-service SaaS.
- Oh can't forget to mention, the OGs I followed when I just started building were the builders of Wordpress templates/themes! They built many themes, some free, some paid. I think deep down that influenced my view of how to make money on the web. My Carrd plugins project were totally influenced by those WP builders. Even choosing to use the word "plugins" is a WP thing! (I could have called it components, scripts, widgets as others did).

The key here is to build many small bets but all within a specific niche or problem space, so that despite being separate products they all converge in one particular direction or topic. You kinda get to have your cake and eat it – the benefits of diversity, variety and resilience from having multiple products, yet all centered around a singular focus.

*What do you think? Is this the best indie hacking approach ever or what?*

Now there's two schools of thought when it comes to product focus: Go all in on one product, or go for many small bets.

I'm usually not a fan of going all in on one product, especially if you're just starting off. All too often, those who find the ONE true product on first try is super rare. Your shipping muscles and instincts just aren't as developed yet. And if there's some incremental results, it seduces you to keep trying on that one thing. All it takes is a rug pull event, some platform risk, like Twitter API price hike, for the castle to fall into pieces. Over night their MRR goes to zero. It was heartbreaking to watch. There's no diversity, very little resilience to shock with this approach.

Personally I tend to prefer building a portfolio of small bets, but it's not without downsides. Observing others who try the same, it sure is a spectacle to witness, fun to watch, but after a while, after like the 10th product or beyond, I don't even remember what they are building, what they stand for. All the different products starts to blend into one another. Most of the time they continue to struggle with revenue. They're launching a lot, it feels like progress, but it's *false* progress, especially if their aim is to make money and be ramen profitable. If there's no happy ending, it starts to get poignantly painful to watch.

So I think the reality is somewhere in the middle for indie hackers who succeed at the game:

Launch many small bets serially, one after another not all at once. Focus more on one that has potential. Build it out to stable state. Find a reliable distribution channel for customer acquisition. Grow revenue to steady state. Then sell it, or keep it running for stable revenue. Try another small bet(s) again. Rinse and repeat, while only working on a 2-3 products at any one time.

After a few years trying small bets, it feels like I'm settling on this approach. A happy middle where you're not over-exposed to risk nor grasping at straws.

*What do you think? What's your happy middle?*

May's going to be consulting season again. Back to juggling product work and consulting. Busy times ahead.

I realised recently I have to work in sync with my energy seasons. Working against it is a recipe for burnout or poor moods. An example: I feel low in energy and in spirits. I try to work anything. Force myself a bit. Feel even worse after that. Mood gets worse. The mind and body doesn't get what it needs. Rinse and repeat every day for a few weeks, and you'll burnout. It's a viscious, lose-lose cycle.

The month of April set an example for that.

Come May I don't have the luxury of dwadling in those negative whirlpools.

*Just follow your energy. Trust it, dammit.*

And that's it. That's my intention for May. That's all of it.

As for the spring cleaning and Marie Kondo-ing I didn't achieve in April? Back to basics. 1% compounding rules. I'll spring clean a piece at a time. Remove/re-arrange one item a day.

Just 1 item a day. A scrap piece of paper. An old reciept. An stray pen lying around.

Shouldn't be hard right? Right?

Onwards!

APRIL METRICS:
📈 Current MRR (all from Lifelog): $99 (↓$10)
💰 One-off revenue: $907 (↑$11)
💵 Total revenue: $1006 (↑$1) 🎉
💸 Total costs = $165
💎 Total profit: $841 (↑$159) (excl. consulting revenue)
📊 Profit margin: 84%

At the start of April I thought this month will be a month of self care and rest, while doing some spring cleaning. I had the month for downtime before the pace picks up again for my consulting in May, so I thought I can finally spring clean my work space and by extension, my mindscape.

BUT no Marie Kondo-ing happened.

I was heading into an energy slump, and no number of plans could pull me back up. It sucked being in low spirits, being neither here nor there. I thought I accomplished nothing this month. But as monthly reviews go, the amount of output always surprises me, in a good way. In the end, it wasn’t half bad.

My mood just added a negative lens to everything, but thankfully, the real data showed otherwise. Despite it all inwardly, things were going just fine outwardly.

Another important demonstration of why I do these monthly wrap-ups so religiously. It shows the work without ambiguity, based on objective reality. Even if the impression in my head was otherwise. And my mind’s wrong pretty often.

NGL..had been in a slump lately. When that happens, I build for FUN to feel better.

Today's fun build:

Added typing sounds of a mechanical keyboard when writing a post. I have a mech kb but this audible feedback makes me feel like a typing maestro! 🤓

🔊 Turn on sound 👇

Mood these days.


It's uncanny how life's seasons work, with its characteristic peaks and valleys. In February and March I was consumed with an energy to build build build. I shedded some of the anxeity I'd been unconsciously carrying and charged ahead. Yet very soon after that epiphany, work happened, life happened, and challenges happened. When April started, things started to dip every so slowly but noticeably, till now – the slump. The build energy all but faded. The excitement and sense of adventure of starting anew, gone. I wrote about how these are [the hardest days](https://golifelog.com/posts/hardest-days-1682673017554), yet a part of me knows...

***This too, shall pass.***

It had always done so. It always does. It always will. Just as the sun rise and set. Just as the seasons come and go. The seasons of life, the summers and winters of the inner world, arise and fade. Knowing that, makes it easy to not celebrate too soon or worry too much, today. Maybe there's no need to jump in to set things right, since time itself will fix most of it. Maybe there's no need to hold on too tight to our wins, when time itself will loosen them.

***All shall be in place, in time.***

The hardest days aren't days when there's fires to fight, bugs to squash, customer crises to solve.

Those are—in fact—the easy days.

Because you know what to do. Immediately. The direction is clear. The task is obvious. The need is expressed.

The hardest days are the days when you're slumping in your chair, running on fumes, low on energy and motivation, unsure why you're feeling so 'off', and the day passes in a hazy daze. You're clicking around online looking for something to bite into, but nothing bites. And you just wish for the day to pass and night to come because you hope tomorrow you'll find your normal self again.

Except that it doesn't.

The next day comes and it's the same old same old.

For the nth day. You've lost count already by now.

And day by day the self-doubt creeps in. *What if this doesn't go away? What if I need to get some serious work done? When will I see the daylight of optimism and adventure again?*

Self-doubt gives way to anxiety. Anxiety unfolds into fear. Fear grows into panic.

These are the hardest days.

I saw this funny meme yesterday but saw the seed of wisdom in there.


I was all in on Vue.js and Nuxt.js back when I got serious on coding. With Nuxt I got to make this very app I'm writing on. I love being able to build SaaS on frontend frameworks. I thought I can write less code, use battle-tested code that others used, and not need to reinvent the wheel all the time. I assumed with the added abstraction, I can ship fast.

But 3 years in, I'm feeling the burden. What I thought initially were the savings on time/effort were simply offloaded elsewhere. Less code to write but more tooling to install, more dependencies and points of failure, packages to maintain, configs to set, less cross-platform, transferrable code etc... To be honest, I'm tired of the convoluted and bloated ways to build software. Same reasons why I no longer use Wordpress. A lot of the performance and optimization benefits seems more geared towards enterprise teams, not a solo dev like me.

The funny flipside is, I'm rather enjoying using just plain vanilla Javascript now. I've been building Carrd plugins in plain JS, and because they need to be standalone in 1 code block, I'm essentially making a lot of single `index.html` micro-apps. And with just the holy trinity of plain HTML, CSS and Javascipt (and the occasional CDN script or nocode tool), it's been so much fun. Zero build. No fuss whatsoever.

People say you should just use the tech you know best. I'm actually more familiar with Vue/Nuxt, but recently building more in plain vanilla Javascript and surprisingly enjoyed it more even though less familiar. So contemplating if possible to switch.

*Is it possible to build a modern SaaS these days on just plain vanilla JS?*

I asked this [question on Twitter](https://twitter.com/jasonleowsg/status/1651164219646025728), and got some good examples from the indie hackers I follow:

- [Zlappo](https://zlappo.com/)
- [Closet Tools](https://closet.tools/)
- [MentorCruise](https://mentorcruise.com/)

Most of them end up creating their own resuable components, some rudimentary form of a framework. And with [browser-native web components](https://gomakethings.com/how-to-create-a-web-component-with-vanilla-js/), you now can do that.

I also learned about ["the stackless way"](https://tutorials.yax.com/articles/build-websites-the-yax-way/quicktakes/what-is-the-yax-way.html). It sounds really interesting, and checks off all the boxes!

> Build websites without frameworks or build tools:
>
> - use custom elements (for modular HTML without frameworks)
> - use the in-browser package manager (for JavaScript packages without build tools)
> - match pages with files (to avoid routing and simplify architecture)
> - stick to standards (to avoid obsolescence and framework fatigue)

Maybe my next tech stack could be:

Frontend: Plain vanilla Javascript
Style: Plain CSS
Backend: Headless CMS like Strapi/Contentful or a nocode API generator for
Database: SQL/PostgresQL

*What do you think?* 🤔

The other day I was [complaining](https://twitter.com/jasonleowsg/status/1650462628614123523) about having to do 3 times the work because my products are on 3 different ecommerce platforms – Gumroad, Payhip and Lemon Squeezy.

It started being a hedge against platform risk, after what I experienced when Flurly shut down. Then it took me a week or more to migrate everything out of Flurly. Maybe I over-compensated a bit by going for 3 platforms. 😅 Now I'm realising that it's real tedious everytime I wanted to add new products. Worse that every platform is ever slightly so different, so you can't really copy-paste directly and be done. The optimal image formats are slightly different. Some have fields that others don't.

A real PAIN. IN. THE. ASS.

I wished there's a Buffer equivalent for ecommerce platforms. Where I key in once, and it creates the products in the respective formats for each platform. Upload an image, and it auto-crops into the right format or size for the platform. The problem is not every platform has APIs for that. So far only Gumroad seems to have a more fleshed out API endpoints. Lemon Squeezy is read-only. Payhip has only webhooks and Zapier integration.

To save time, maybe what I can do is to build an asset generating app where I key in the fields and it auto-generates the required assets and text for me, with copy buttons for easy copy-paste. A bit like what [Headlime version 1](https://twitter.com/dannypostmaa/status/1277497120090537989?s=20) looks like. A side panel to key in my product information, and the right panel where it spits out the text and images for Payhip, Lemon Squeezy and Gumroad.

*What do you think? Worth building?*

Here's a hot take for ya:

Those who think focusing on one project is a better approach to indie hacking just needs to learn how to better organise their time/costs of context switching.

I might be biased because I'm already all in on the portfolio approach. But that doesn't mean that I don't face challenges managing multiple products. Context switching is the hardest. And it's not even the time. It's the cognitive costs of switching. And worse if you switch multiple times within a day! I think my brain would turn to mush doing that (and it did on some crazy days).

So even while we small bettors run multiple products, there's definitely a skill to doing it well versus doing it poorly. It's something like a muscle. If all along you're used to doing just one thing, then the muscle of context switching will be under-trained, and the first few weeks you'll struggle, and then call it quits because it's too hard or unproductive.

Truth is, there's many ways to better manage the costs of context switching. The most common seems to be building products *serially*. Build, launch, iterate till stable state, automate, then move on to the next bet. Influential makers like Pieter Levels and Tony Dinh comes to mind for this approach. If you create digital downloads, self-paced courses, info products, or any product where the after-purchase support is minimal, doing it serially is even easier.

Another way is to timebox. Jon Yongfook does the 1 week coding, 1 week marketing approach exactly to manage the cognitive costs of context switching. It could be 1 week Product A, then another week Product B. It doesn't have to be 1 week if that's too short for you. Think in sprints, 1 week to 1 month.

So here's my point: Running multiple bets is possible and can be done sanely. But it's an approach amongst many. Focusing on one is an approach too. Sometimes it's a personality preference. Ultimately it's a choice and comes with different trade-offs.

But saying it costs too much in context switching isn't one of those trade-offs you have to make.

It's intellectually dishonest and disingeuous to say so, because context switching can be managed. At best, you can say you don't *prefer* it. You can't say it doesn't work when you've never committed to learning and doing it well. It's like saying running doesn't benefit you because you get out of breath the moment you try.

Context switching is a muscle. Use it or lose it.

I've been musing over some new approaches for new product ideas:

- The SEO product
- The simple and helpful product
- The single feature micro-SaaS
- The info product
- The premium/B2B product

### The SEO product
This follows [Danny's approach](https://twitter.com/dannypostmaa/status/1646368426246680579?s=20) of researching SEO keyword difficulty and keyword volume, and finding opportunities for products where the KD is low and volume is relatively high. I like this because the customer intent/demand is somewhat verified. But the downside is also aligning the SEO opportunities to a product that I enjoy making and have personal insight to. Perhaps I can consider the current spaces I'm already in, and search for keywords for that. Maybe this could be a way to pivot Sheet2Bio as well...?

### The simple and helpful product
This follow [Peter's approach](https://twitter.com/searchbound/status/1648811605935681536?s=20) of him finding an opportunity in an available domain and building a scrappy static site showing seating views for his alma mater's football stadium. It started off as a very simple HTML website, and now it's Wordpress. But helpful because people often wanted to preview the seating's viewpoint of the field before buying tickets. So it served a niche need. And he peppered it with Google ads to monetize. This approach made me realise I'm probably overthinking things when it comes to my new product ideas. What opportunities are there where I can buy a good descriptive domain, be helpful in addressing a niche need, and let SEO do the rest? My directory products like Keto List Singapore, Public Design Jobs, Inclusive Design SG could fall into this category.

### The single feature micro-SaaS
Recently discovered fixmyspeakers.com, which is a site that plays a sounds to expell water from your phone speakers. Knew the indie hacker from Makerlog and he mentioned he's making $5k/m from ads from it! Super impressed by that. A single feature micro-SaaS, just doing one thing - play an audio file. But addressing a super common pain - when your smartphone gets water damage. I love this because it's closer to what I enjoy - coding a product. That it's a micro-SaaS feels way less intimidating as well, because that's what I've been pretty much doing all along with my Carrd plugins. Micro, or even nano software apps that does one thing, provides one feature. Maybe I can build a micro-SaaS for other builders, for Twitter users, or in a problem space I'm familiar with right now. Writing, Carrd, Twitter. What else?

### The info product
This is the easiest path to launching something new. Launch a quick info product on Gumroad, sell it on Twitter. Templates, ebook, guides, mini-courses. About sleep, writing, Twitter engagement, building in public, keto. Maybe this won't be a high revenue-generating product, but it could be a gateway to something else, an attractor for new ideas that I can use the other approaches for.

### The premuim offering &/or B2B product
Recent Twitter discussions got me thinking – the belief that I have to work my way up incrementally in small steps is actually holding me back. "Small incremental steps" because that's what I expect for B2C. If I can charge a higher premium for a product, my steps will be bigger, and hitting my revenue goal will be faster. I could offer a premium offering for an existing project, or go B2B for my next new product. The funnel for my Carrd plugins is now free tools to $15-30 products. It's captures the top half of the funnel. But I could potentially offer a premium offering that's Carrd-related, like premium, same day support for Carrd. Or Carrd done-for-you design or premium templates that integrates my various plugins (e.g. a SaaS template). A B2B offering could be related to my consulting, since that's my only in-road to corporate world right now. All along, I keep thinking I will eventually transit away from consulting. But what if I built an indie product related to my design consulting work? How would that look like?

*Any other good approaches to product development that you use?*

👷 Builds this week on Lifelog

No new features this week, just repairs and fine-tuning.

Fixed bug where the footer overlapped with preview text (see image).

Also all-round style fixes when the textarea didn't resize properly to text input.

Sundays are best spent under the sun.

We cycled at the beach today. Blue skies. Blazing hot sun. Breeze lightly brushing our hair.

Everyone's out. It's a long weekend after all. Hundreds of picnics. A bunch of beach volleyball players. Whole families on family cart bikes. We're usually here on weekdays to avoid the crowd, but it's interesting to see different people who come here on weekends.

We make a stop at a breakwater. Then a tiny jetty. And then head off to the cafe to hide from the sweltering heat, for some much-needed lunch. Like any normal family on a Sunday. Just hanging out and chilling.

*I don't do this enough. We don't do this enough.*

I remember I just said to my wife that at our life stage, our time with our kid and our elderly parents are limited. And decreasing fast everyday. The less time spent in front of a computer, the more time spent out in the sun with them, is how winning at life looks like.

Not accolades, money, or status.

A question I heard about recently that stuck with me, and almost brings me to tears each time i think about it:

"Imagine you're 80 and you're given the opportunity to travel back in time back to this moment, with your kid/parent. Only this moment. How would you choose to spend it?"

I'll definitely spend it with full presence with them. Soak it in. Enjoy it.

Everything else doesn't matter.

[Alex Hormonzi](https://www.instagram.com/reel/CrRUih8q5y9/) talked about infinite games vs finite games:

> "The infinite frame always conquers the finite. You don't win by getting in shape but staying in shape. You don't win at business but stay in business and keep doing business. The point of the game is to keep playing. If you put all those together success is an inifnite game."

This is so damned true.

If I were to sum up my failings and therefore learnings from the past 3-5 years, this is it. I was simply applying finite game rules on infinite games.

I thought winning was:

- Going viral for my tweets and posts
- Getting 100K followers, having a huge audience
- Posting hockey stick MRR growth screenshots
- Hitting $10k MRR
- Going for moonshots, like aiming for $1M revenue in 1 year
- Winning awards
- Getting acquired, making a grand multi-million exit

But winning was actually:

- Blank calendar, time freedom with my family
- Location freedom to work and live anywhere, even with kids
- Staying in business, not having to go back to 9-to-5
- Jumping out of bed to work on my products, enjoying it
- Happy times with my kiddo
- Being physically and mentally healthy

Notice how the things on the second list don't have an end date, a destination, a target. Winning is when you get to keep doing it, as much and as deeply as you want. They are infinite games. And my folly was using the finite rules and goals of the first list to measure if I'm achieving the second. It seldom does. In fact, it often contradicts! The more I get after finite goals, the harder to achieve the inifinite ones.

Infinite games > finite games

Someone made a [remark](https://twitter.com/Domthenic_H/status/1649065684511625217) about my products:

> Sounds like either there is no p/m fit, no distribution or no market for the products. Shouldn't be that slow.

It was kind of blunt, but sharp and on point 100%. What struck me like a tonne of bricks was how my 3 main products each suffers from one of the factors mentioned:

Sheet2Bio has no product-market fit.
Lifelog has no distribution.
Plugins serves a small, niche market.

Damn. 😅

The unholy trinity of bad product performance, and I got them all.

Sheet2Bio was dead on arrival. I launched it on Twitter, it got lots of attention, but no one paid. Bio links managed via Google Sheets just wasn't something that mattered to people. Worse: Recently Instagram introduced a new feature where you can have up to 5 bio links. The market's gone now. Sheet2Bio needs a pivot for sure.

I've struggled with distribution for Lifelog for the longest. Back in the early days I even did a #100daysofmarketing challenge to find a distribution channel for it. The conclusion from that challenge was Twitter was the channel. But I kid myself. When I was marketing it like crazy, there were some new customers, but not enough to really say Twitter was a *the* distribution channel. Most of the sign-ups didn't stick around either. And once I stopped sharing it, the sign-ups all but disappeared. Even leaving it on my Twitter bio didn't help, despite having 6k followers. So suffice to say, I've not found a distribution for Lifelog. Basically, it's hard to find my target customers – creators who want to build a daily writing habit and write long form for the long game. There's not one place where they seem to hang out. I probably need to reposition Lifelog's marketing angle so that I know where to find my customer, or continue to build it out and figure it out along the way.

Carrd plugins continue to sell, but not at a volume that can help me reach my goal of $5k/m soon. Ahrefs tell me that the search volume is just 30 (i.e. average monthly number of searches for "carrd plugins" on Google in the US alone). Google Trends can't even show me any data. So even while my SEO game is great, the search volume—and by inference, the market size—is just too small perhaps. By "small", that's of course with reference to my $5k/m revenue goal. It might be big enough if you have a lower target. Right now, I'm trying to grow it by building more plugins, be in more distribution channels. But the nagging concern is that there's a natural cap to its growth. I can and want to keep growing it, but realistically speaking, I can't bank on working my way up to $5k in small increments... it'll take too long. I need to try new bets where the market size and/or revenue steps are bigger.

Damn...these realisations hit **hard**.

But it's good pain, good lesson.

At least now I know what went wrong, and what I should look out for and do the next time.

So I shared about the dismal [$6200 I earned from my indie products last year](https://golifelog.com/posts/hard-truths-from-my-2022-indie-revenue-1681698643587) on Twitter and [it went viral](https://twitter.com/jasonleowsg/status/1648627500338282496). Beyond the fancy engagement stats, the real gold was in the replies. I felt supported, encouraged, and above all, given new perspectives, questions to ask, and possible answers ahead.

***Now this*** is why I'm on Twitter. This kind of support and peer learning on this depth and breadth is not found anywhere else in my life or work. It's like a mastermind group with thousands of peers and experts.

Summing up to do justice to the great points there:

 
### Affirmations
- *"It took me 10 years before finding the right thing. Picked the wrong market. Bet on the wrong horse. Worked on shitty products no one needed. Worked on things with no product / founder fit but didn't realize. I think this is what most people must endure, unless lucky / outlier."* I don't feel like I'm betting it right yet too with my products. The past years were definitely to endure those hard lessons, for sure.
- *"Took us over three years to start making proper money too."* I suspect my chart is still in the no-to-low traction phase too, as James shared:


 
### New questions to ask
- Why has it been this slow?
- What needs to change to accelerate things?
- What beliefs do you have that are holding you back from progressing?
- What do you need to reach that 5k MRR milestone faster? What needs to be done? Visualise yourself in 3-5 years. Then work backward.
- Where do you want to be and what do you think are the barriers to you reaching your goal?
- Think about the market you're in
- Think about your way of marketing products
- Think about how to spend more time on revenue-generating activities

 
### New point of views
- Somewhere in the back of my mind, the thought of "3 years is too slow" has some association with the successful outliers I follow on Twitter. Definitely a non-zero influence. Why should I compare my journey to others? I have to run my own race.
- Not harshly labelling myself and giving some emotional distance by saying something like "My products didn't earn enough." instead of "***I*** didn't earn enough."
- Maybe I should see $6.2k profit not as an absolute measure of my progress but as a signal that I can do it and should keep going. I *must*.
- *"If progress were linear, nobody would quit."* I'm still in the phase where there's nothing huge happening even though there's enough incremental progress to keep me motivated and going.
- *"The "total" lens is a harsh one. Since building indie products is a compounding process, it much kinder to look at the trajectory of your revenue than at the total. I bet the graph is (ever so slightly) exponential. The best way to think of compounding for me is "gradually and then suddenly". And the things that compound aren't just code, users and marketing exposure, it's also your skills and experience, which are even harder to account for."* Perhaps assuming progress in 3 years to be incremental and linear is unhelpful, because often nothing happens and then something happens.
- *"I am calling it The Reverse Tuition Fee - think of it as being paid to learn how to be an indie builder."* Reverse tuition fee is a great way to put it. I do feel like a lot of why it felt slow for the past years were due to learning and unlearning, and only recently started to feel like I'm getting more of the hang of it.
- Eli lays out the journey in an insightful way here. I think I'm still somewhere in between #2 and #3:
> Here are four stages of progress:
>
> 1. You're doing nothing and just dreaming
> 2. You're doing but not enough
> 3. You're doing enough but the universe hasn't caught on yet
> 4. The universe has caught on
>
> What you're supposed to do at each stage is pretty obvious:
> 1. Do something
> 2. Do more / different
> 3. Wait for universe to catch up
> 4. Celebrate


 
### Possible answers
- *"Launch 10x more things, try 10x more markets, etc. (my strategy, not the only strategy)"* Despite the diversity in my portfolio, I feel I'm still not trying enough bets. There's something to Pieter's advice here that points to what that phrase I often hear: To get good ideas, you need to generate many, many ideas. I need to go for volume, to arrive at the good bets.
- Likely barriers for past years, and therefore what to remove or get better at:
- Didn't know how to do marketing/reach my customers when started
- Unlearning unhelpful narratives/ideas about startups
- Lots of false starts and time wasted in the past years
- Market for my products are niche/narrow
- Not enough time because got a kid, but kid is also my motivation to go indie
- Spend more time on revenue-generating activities and less time on non revenue-generating activities, like spending too much time on Twitter
- *"Sometimes half the battle is stopping this belief that you have to earn your way up to your goal. You gotta ask for your goal right away. find someone who will pay $5k/mo for something you can build, and then go build it. Rather than earning your way up, you get immediate feedback on what people will or won't pay for, and just having to get 1-2 customers is 1000x easier than tens or hundreds of customers. And then if you want to double your revenue, you just add one more customer."* B2B is definitely something worth considering. But the main point is in breaking down the belief of small, incremental steps. It can be big steps because my target revenue is a finite, achieveable number!
- *"It's also about solving problems that are just big enough to go with your goal."* My products' had been pretty niche. Perhaps the market's pretty small, and so the revenue might have a natural cap. I do feel I need to continue building new ones to find that problem big enough for my goal.

Most days I'm not sure why the amount of time I spend on Twitter is justified.

I average 2h a day on it, some days 3h or more when it's interesting. That's a substantial chunk of time. Yet the ROI isn't always clear.

My customers are mostly not on Twitter. My most important engagement for Plugins are in the Carrd groups and communities on Facebook, Reddit, Telegram. I do have a Plugins Twitter account but it's not adding much. Twitter also isn't a great customer acquisition channel for Lifelog, on both my personal and Lifelog account (in fact, I've not found any sustainble channel for Lifelog).

There might be some word of mouth effect from other indie hackers and creators, as I often build in public and share about my indie journey on Twitter, using examples from my projects. If someone needs help with Carrd, they might redirect to me perhaps, but based on experience I don't see that as a substantial pipeline. I don't think my 6k followers contribute much to my profit bottomline, to be honest...

So 2-3h a day, that's 14-21h a week. I'm spending almost 1 waking day out of 7 days a week on it. Without any noticeable returns on investment.

So ***why***?

*Why bother?*

Even if I do enjoy connecting to like-minds, get exposure to ideas, and gain some emotional/social support from Maker Twitter, does it really justify the amount of effort and time I'm spending on it?

And when you ask, sometimes the universe replies, unwittingly through others:

> "Your personal brand is the single most important investment you can make in your business. Usually, that means a time investment. How are you growing your personal brand? 🤔" – [@robertodigital_](https://twitter.com/robertodigital_/status/1647993330700107780)

So okay... I'm actually building personal brand on Twitter. I don't really like that term, but it points to something about it being an asset. Something that persists beyond and outside of my products and services. So that even if I close one or all my products, I don't lose everything that I invested in that products. I still get to keep something. An asset. Assets that originated as a side effect, a by-product of building something else, but outlasts the main product's lifespan.

And this asset can be helpful in my next project. Thinking about it from the lens of the ten forms of capital framework: If making products are about making assets that grow your intellectual, experiential or material capital, then building a personal brand is about growing your social capital. And these various forms of capital can be transformed from one form to another. Social capital can be transformed into financial capital.

In a way then, building an audience, having a personal brand, building trust and reputation, is a hedge against risks of rug pulls on my products. It's diversification of my various forms of capital. It's building resilience.

It's worth *something*. Even if measuring it is hard.

I talked about how my [indie products made only $6.2k total last year](https://golifelog.com/posts/hard-truths-from-my-2022-indie-revenue-1681698643587). It ain't great progress. I know **something has to change**.

*What should I do?*

Broadly, I see three ways.

1. Increase revenue of existing projects
2. Find new sources of indie revenue
3. Cut costs

Specifically, some ideas:

- Double down on Plugins to increase revenue - launch more free and paid plugins, buy more ads, find more distribution channels, launch projects for it, get affiliates to distribute it for me. I'm already doing a lot here, so it's a matter of compounding further.

- Continue building Lifelog - side project weekend is working, keep going.

- Launch/pivot the projects that's already half-completed anyway, to see if they bring in new revenue sources - Sheet2Bio, Career Conversation Cards, Inclusive Design SG.

- Launch something(s) completely new to create fresh income streams. Truth is, diversity in my portfolio is down. Launch info products, digital downloads, single feature micro SaaS (like fixmyspeakers.com earning $5k/m from ads).

- Cut costs. Cutting monetary costs will have minimal effect as I'm not spending much on servers, ads etc. But cutting effort/time (also a cost) will help. Where is my focus? If someone were to see where I spent the most time on per day, what conclusions would he draw? My days are generally split in Outsprint, Plugins, and building in public on Twitter. First 2 pays, the last one, not so sure other than being fun and social. I can cut down on time spent, but all the sunk costs on building up momentum there will be lost. Since I'm spending so much time there, perhaps it's time to build something based off my Twitter audience? Some Twitter tool, info product, community?

*What else do you think I can do?*

It's tax season. Was doing up the sums and came to this figure for my indie* revenue in 2022:

~$6200

* indie means revenue that's everything outside of consulting

That's total revenue for the entire year of 2022, at about $510 average monthly (non-recurring) revenue. I believe most of it came from sales of Carrd plugins, about $1.2k from Lifelog subscriptions, the rest of about $200 from Buy Me A Coffee donations.

I remember right around the same time last year I did the same calculations for indie revenue in 2021 and I actually did [around $11k!](https://golifelog.com/posts/seeing-my-portfolio-of-projects-through-a-different-lens-1653373054845):

- Lifelog = $1200
- Plugins For Carrd = $900
- Sweet Jam Sites = $500
- Keto List Singapore = $1100
- Social impact patronage = $1300
- Others (random freelancing) = $6000

Sweet Jam Sites and Keto List had stopped earning since, and donations in 2021 were high due to a viral project. I also still did occasional web design freelancing back then that contributed to the indie revenue, which I no longer do. All these were stopped in 2022. I'd trimmed my portfolio a lot. So that explains the dip from last year.

But if I compared just year-on-year growth of only Lifelog + Plugins, it's $2.1k vs $6.2k. Not too shabby, almost tripled. Which checks out with what I knew about the [3x growth of Plugins](https://golifelog.com/posts/i-tripled-my-revenue-for-plugins-1675388499473) while Lifelog was stagnant.

So it's **$6.2k spread across 2 projects, across 12 months, after 3 years of being indie**.

Not a great report card, if you ask me...

Frankly, $6.2k feels pretty insignificant in the bigger scheme of things, especially for the things I need to pay for to feed the family. That's like maybe enough for 1 month... 1 year's revenue just enough for 1 month! 😅 It's not a great look if I'm seeking ramen profitability.

And I won't sugarcoat this or try to find a positive glass-is-half-full angle. It's nice to get $6.2k extra cash, and I still have my consulting as the main income stream to feed the fam, but realistically, objectively, $6.2k isn't not even close to what I aspire to be. And at this rate, I won't ever hit the bare minimum of my aspiration—to be able to survive on indie revenue, at least $5k/m—in a decade maybe.

Even if I do want to keep consulting in my portfolio, am I really okay to wait a decade to grow to ramen profitability? Not really. I'm not even sure I want to nor have the energy to keep going at consulting for another decade, well into my 50s.

There's only questions now, no answers.

But one thing I know for sure – whatever I'm doing now isn't enough.

**Something has to change.**

Indie hacker, indie maker, indie solopreneur, indie creator – what's the difference? We throw these labels around but honestly I've never really delineated their differences.

So just for fun, arising from a random conversation on Twitter, I made this sketch:


We know what indie means, i.e. "independent", free agent, self-employed, or bootstrapped. [Eli said](https://twitter.com/finereli/status/1647256362429325318) is about the focus, about what you're focusing on and they're not always talking about the same thing.

Indie hackers are focused on whether there's coding involved. Usually for folks who are developers coding their SaaS product. Indie makers are those who are making products but not necessarily coding it themselves. It's usually via nocode tools, or info products. Solopreneurs as a label is to highlight that the person is running a business solo or mostly alone, doesn't hire a team, but might work with freelancers or contractors. Indie creators, seems to be a catch-all for everyone who's indie and creating something, anything, even content. They don't necessarily have a product.

OK now that I've drawn lines, time to tweet this and start a semantic war. 🤣