Indie Lessons

I curate the journeys and lessons of Indie Hackers

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

@Pauline_Cx This post annoys me more than it shuold :P

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

I primarily use lists on Twitter. Only the people and products that interest me. It's the only thing that keeps me on here.

It's changed so much in the past 15 years. It used to be cyclic trends; people moved on when they outgrew it. Now so many are people leaving due to negativity or lack of impressions.

I've given up on it for networking or promotion. Too much going against you.

Still great for unearthing trends and patterns. You have to work to find the good stuff though

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

Honestly I’m less likely to reply to anyone at the moment because of all the accusations of being AI slop. So many people will just block if they suspect it.
Before I’d be more friendly and send a smaller message of support. Now I’m worried that if I’ll get blocked if it isn’t personalised enough.

If it means anything, I’m enjoying following your progress even if im not publicly engaging with it :)

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

Have you looked at ways to calm your body down before going to bed? Progressive muscle relaxation and diaphragmatic breathing. I’m an insomniac and fit they are hit and miss, but it does work sometimes.

My real issue is I’m so hyped about my projects it’s hard to shut my brain off and my sleep quality is poor. It’s taught me that sleep isn’t always about the time spent asleep, but how well you sleep. May be worth seeing a doctor to see if there are any issues impacting on sleep

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

This residency program has given me a bunch of new indie hackers to research :)

Going to be fun seeing the new products/projects

[Thomas Sanlis 🥐 @T_Zahil]

From a fresh pasta shop to a SaaS at $2K MRR. Sometimes the path is a bit longer than you'd expect 😅.

We're continuing the resident introductions for the Uneed Residency. Today: @heymattia!

Mattia's journey stands out. Before tech, he worked 4 years at a fresh pasta shop (Yes, he's Italian 😂). Then graphic design. Then 6 years of freelancing. And finally, he went into indie hacking, after procrastinating the dream for 6 more years.

Today, he's a Product Manager by day and co-founder of BlackTwist the rest of the time, alongside Luca (also a resident, introduced a few days ago).

BlackTwist is the tool creators use to build a consistent Threads presence without burning out. Scheduling, analytics, everything you need to show up daily without being glued to your phone.

The numbers: $2K MRR today, versus $600 a year ago. Clear growth. And yet, Mattia is honest: a year ago, he was writing a blog post titled "I'm failing". And the feeling hasn't really changed 😅.
There's something very real about that line for anyone who's ever built solo.

His current challenge: positioning. Threads added native scheduling, new competitors showed up, and people need to see BlackTwist as a system for building a presence, not "just another scheduler".
Otherwise, it's a price war.

What he's coming to the residency for: honest conversations with other founders about growth when you're bootstrapped and competing against bigger tools. And simply, the energy of being around people who get it. After almost 2 years heads-down, that's earned.

Bonus fun fact: he got his personal .com domain back after 8 years of waiting. On his birthday 🎂.

More coming soon, we'll introduce all the residents before the residency kicks off 😊.

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

One of my fav things about Indie Lessons is documenting these failed products, especially from prolific creators like Tibo. It’s fascinating seeing how past failures influenced their current products :)

Contemplating turning my failed product case studies into a searchable directory

[Tibo @tibo_maker]

I spent ~$35k across 7 products - 3 even hit $1k mrr

I still killed them all

most founders think that's embarrassing but I think it's the biggest reason I'm winning now

fast failures aren't setbacks - they're data

each product I killed taught me something I couldn't learn any other way

you can't learn what customers actually want by reading books
you can't learn what business model works by watching YouTube

you learn by building something, watching it fail, and asking why

the problem is most founders take 18 months to learn what should take 6 weeks

they build in secret for a year. launch. realize nobody wants it. get sad.
I learned faster

one of my products attracted the wrong customers killed it at $1k mrr

one had good economics at scale but I was too small to make it work - killed it

one was a feature pretending to be a product - killed it at $300 mrr

each death made the next product better

the products that work now, the ones doing $1m mrr combined, only work because I learned what doesn't work first

and I learned that fast

the real shift is:
stop thinking "I failed 7 times"
start thinking "I ran 7 experiments and extracted the data"

failure isn't the opposite of success - it's the tuition you pay for it

the only question is: how much are you paying, and how fast are you learning?

this week's newsletter:

I'm breaking down all 7 products I killed, what made me pull the trigger on each one, and how those lessons compound into what's working now

100% free & no ads

subscribe below 👇

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

I use AI to help with content creation and some marketing tasks. I’m not a developer, and there js no way I’d vibe code a product.

I’d rather pay for something I can trust, that doesn’t have security risks and has good customer support.

Competitors can easily vibe code solutions and that is a huge risk. But even then, I’ll always go with the person I trust to be around for long enough.

AI is awesome but trust is more powerful

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

@tibo_maker @dr For me it helps build trust.

I know it's part of the build in public marketing playbook. But the fact he's continuing to publish newsletters when he's at a point he doesn't need to... makes me confident he'll stick around with his products

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

@BenjaminHouy I’ve done 500 of these profiles so far and it’s a slog. One of the hardest parts is actually finding a clear product description.

Very few product sites have media rooms. I know because I hunt for them. I tend to prioritize those write ups though as it can easily save an hour

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

Write up is here: https://t.co/MFueLCyJip

Getting so close to the juicy curatorial work. When this is done, I can curate all the strategies into pages that have deep dives into how specific techniques work for different founders and products. I'm so looking forward to that part :)

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

Want to make it easier for people to write about your product? Create a good media page.

Just finished the @copycatcafeapp write up and the media page made it easier. Graphics, story angles, founder background. It's something that is overlooked so often with indie hacking

https://t.co/sNXhmNzw2c

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

Very interesting trend shift.

I’m collecting case studies of how build in public is evolving if anyone sees any similar examples

[adriaan.com 📊 Simple Analytics @adriaandotcom]

We’re removing our public page with MRR and other stats.

We’d need to rework it to add value, and we don’t really use it anymore.

It has become legacy, and we don’t need it to build trust anymore.

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

@helloitsolly I don't know if she's making more money, but I'm really enjoying seeing the interesting ways @lkr has been using AI.

It's getting to the point where she's sharing so many good ideas, I don't know how to organize them

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

@FlorinPop17 Australia, on my For You page (I’ve always used lists to get what I want normally)

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

Now I have to update Marc’s directory profile. Again ;)

The beautiful thing is I’m at the point where I can analyse trends across the products. Going to have some fun with that in the coming weeks

[Marc Lou @marclou]

This is my 35th startup.

It made $1K in 4 hours.

For the past 4 years, I’ve only built apps that solve my own problems. I never tried to “build a business.” I just kept making things I wanted to exist.

Most entrepreneurs would disagree and tell me to focus on one startup, but this approach worked well for me. It also made the whole process fun enough that work rarely feels like work.

There’s room for people who create just because they want to create.

Just ship it.

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

I'm Australian. Which means I have to see the local April Fools Day posts on our April Fools Day, then see people in other countries celebrate it the following day.

It's hard work if your project involves curating milestones. I've fallen for a couple of them without realizing!

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

@ThePeterMick @ShortsAI_com I'm Australian and just woke up :P It takes me a minute to remember it's still April Fools in some parts of the world

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

@petersuhm I have no interest in genealogy, but always interested in different ways people use AI for research :) Would definitely be intrigued.

(I'm still a beginner for research; I'm at the point where I mostly use AI for pattern recognition)

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

I'm working on a database of products launched by indie hackers. I've done write ups of 478 products. I have 293 left to go.

I'm bored of the write ups but I need to push through as all the juicy stuff is going to be in the strategy pages. :) Seeing so many patterns already

[Indie Lessons @indielessons]

@FlorinPop17 It took me a minute to get that and I saw it :p