Niall Doherty's Blog, page 20

This 1 Decision Got His Failing Business to $10K MRR

Alexander BelogubovFounder of ReplyGuy $10,000 monthly revenue

Alexander Belogubov tweets…

I was a burned-out technical founder working 60+ hours weekly on my social media auto-reply tool (ReplyGuy). Despite having product-market fit, I was stuck at $300 MRR for 3 months.

Exhausted and ready to quit, I listed my business for $20K.

Instead of buying, a potential purchaser saw the potential and proposed a partnership.

The results?

Month 1: $2,000 MRR (6.6X growth)
Month 6: $10,000 MRR (33X growth)
Final outcome: Six-figure exit

The secret wasn’t just dividing the workload—it was multiplying output through complementary skills:

Me: Product development and engineering
My co-founder: Growth strategy and marketing

This personal experience inspired me to build IndieMerger, a platform connecting founders with complementary skills to create powerful partnerships.

Worth checking out IndieMerger, see if you can come in as a partner on an existing business instead of trying to build something solo

From Broke to $7K Per Month in Only 6 Months

Amber DaughnEvents Specialist $7000 monthly revenue

Amber Daughn describes herself as

an in-person events specialist and business strategy & operations consultant

Her work recently had her visiting places like Chile, Australia, Las Vegas, Switzerland, Tbilisi, Hawaii, Bulgaria and Bosnia in quick succession

Amber started out as a virtual assistant with this free 5 Day VA Challenge (affiliate link)…

I debuted as a remote freelancer to my personal network… I immediately landed one client from that outreach who ended up having two companies that needed my services.

It took a month or so to get started with them and then about 2 months to raise the hours and rates to a fully sustainable point for my lifestyle. So about 3 months after launching I was fully committed in hours and matching my pre-remote work income ($4k/month).

Within 6 months, I had brought on a few more clients and exceeded my previous income by quite a bit ($7k/month)…

[My partner] and I have been able to sustain anywhere from $3k to $17K months over the past 4 years while predominantly only working 20 hour weeks.

Sounds like she’s created an awesome digital nomad lifestyle for herself, and it all started with that free challenge

This Daily Challenge Newsletter Earns $20K Per Month

Derek KolstadFounder of Daily UI $20,000 monthly revenue

From an interview with Derek Kolstad, founder of Daily UI…

Daily UI is a design challenge meant to help designers build their portfolio and get exposure for their work. There are currently over 450,000 subscribers and it’s growing by 10k subscribers per month. Averaging $20k/month in revenue!

It’s essentially a daily newsletter with design challenges, monetized via sponsors.

Got me thinking: what other daily, challenge-style newsletters could you create?

Maybe one for…

Overcoming shynessBuilding strength or flexibilityImproving a skill like copywriting or sketching

Another way to think of it

The tagline for Daily UI…

Become a Better Designer in 100 Days

Fill in the blank for your niche…

Become a Better ________ in 100 Days

Earning $60,000 a Year Doing Absolutely Nothing

Boujee_ItalianFranchisee $60,000 annual profit

Entrepreneur recently announced their top 500 franchises for 2025.

37 of them require an investment of $50K or less, including a few that you can start for only $1-2K…

Dream VacationsCruise PlannersBuildingstarsJazzercise

Key takeaways from Entrepreneur

Part-time franchise models allow new owners to test entrepreneurship while maintaining a full-time job or other commitments.

These top-ranked Franchise 500 brands offer proven systems, low overhead and flexible operations.

Pros and cons of becoming a franchisee in this Reddit thread.

One commenter…

I bought a small franchise and I’m netting roughly $60k a year doing absolutely nothing. Manager does literally everything. It’s nice for some side cash but nothing spectacular. The real money comes from owning multiple franchises.

This Clever Hack Validated His $10M/Year Business

Wesley TianFounder of Aragon.ai $10 Million annual revenue

Wesley Tian is the founder of Aragon, an AI headshot generator.

Launched 3 years ago, it’s now pulling in $10M per year

How Wesley validated the idea…

With $15k-$20k in savings, I started launching apps full time to see what people wanted. I soon had a site with 12 “apps” with waitlists. People liked the apps where you could change your appearance.

So he didn’t actually build out any of those 12 apps initially

Instead, he set up simple landing pages where people could sign up for a waitlist if they liked the sound of the app.

Few signups = nobody wants thisMany signups = shut up and take my money

Use the same approach to test out your own ideas

You could also try offering this as a productized service: build out landing pages for other people’s ideas, drive traffic, collect emails, report back.

He Earned $23 Per Hour Playing Games on This App

Jay JenkenSide Hustler $1310 revenue in 1 month

Jay Jenken posts on Reddit…

Earnings report for March: £1197

Works out to about $1310 USD.

He’s doing lots of small and simple side hustles, reports his earnings every month.

His best earner for March was Freecash (affiliate link), a site/app that pays you for testing apps, games and surveys.

Jay earned £392.40 total profit in 20+ hours, which works out to about $23 USD per hour

He writes…

I did both the puzzles and chaos and the War Path ace commander offers on iOS (iPad)…

For Puzzles and Chaos I spent £120 and gained £208.40 leaving me with £88.40. War Path had an insane offer rewarding me with £672 for getting to 10 million within 30 days (with checkpoints at 1, 2, etc million). I had to spend £368 to get there though so £304 profit.

So he could have kept playing for free and earned less, but chose to spend some money to unlock higher earnings overall.

That can be a slippery slope, so be careful if you try this

Started Taking Facebook Seriously, Now Earns $12K/Month

AntoinetteHair Stylist $12,000 monthly revenue

Video interview with the Florida woman behind Braids by Antoinette (970K followers)…

She makes $12K/Month as a Facebook Creator…

Antoniette was a full-time hair braider, working 6-7 days a week and barely seeing her kids

She started taking social media seriously ~2 years ago, posting about hair braiding multiple times a day on Facebook…

posting multiple times a day, I was able to take off… then once I took off I just never stopped… I was gaining 10,000 followers a week

She makes money via in-stream ads on her Facebook videos, plus paid online classes where she teaches hair braiding.

Average earnings = $12K/month

Copy Antoinette’s approach to build up and monetize your own Facebook page.

Or partner with someone who has a skill that looks good on social media – perhaps another hair stylist – and help them grow and monetize

Copy This Silly Project & Monetize With Affiliate Links

Check out Postal Arbitrage by Riley Walz

A stamp for a letter costs $0.73 in the United States. Amazon Prime sells items for less than that… with free shipping! Why send a postcard when you can send actual stuff?

I found all items under $0.73 with free Prime shipping — screws, cans, pasta, whatever. Add a free gift note. It arrives in 1 or 2 days. Done.

You’re not only saving money. It’s about sending something real. Your friend gets a random can of tomato sauce with your birthday note attached. They laugh. They remember you. They might even use it!

Then there’s a list of products on Amazon, no affiliate links.

Why not build your own version of this site with affiliate links?

Sure, you’ll get tiny commissions on such low-priced items, but you also earn commissions on ALL items someone buys within 24 hours of clicking your link.

Once built, the site could run on autopilot

Over time, develop it into a more comprehensive gift ideas site, like these…

He Built This Site in 8 Hours and Sold it for $2500$1.2 Million Part-Time Affiliate Site

Build This to Help People Find Jobs on LinkedIn

On Reddit…

LinkedIn hacks that improved my job search efficiency

The #1 tip

Find jobs posted on LinkedIn in the past 1 or 2 hours instead of 24 hours

1) Search for your desired job and filter by “Past 24 hours”

2) In the URL, change from 86400 to 3600 or 7200 — 86400 represents 24 hours, 3600 is 1 hour, and 7200 is 2 hours.

It effectively increases the chances of my resume being seen, without any extra effort!

Based on that, Honey Syed would like to see a Chrome extension that shows jobs that have been posted in the last hour on LinkedIn…

Hack to getting a job:

Only apply to jobs that have been posted in the last hour to get in front of the line.

Sounds like a quick and easy extension to build, especially with AI

Recession Brunette, Tahini Lattes, Financial Advice

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt once said…

Find a way to ride the wave and be part of it, rather than trying to create the wave yourself.

With that in mind, it’s worth keeping an eye on Yelp’s monthly Trend Tracker, which highlights emerging trends from hundreds of categories.

Three trends for April

A viral tahini latte is stirring up interest as Yelp users search for local cafés putting their own spin on this savory coffee…

“Recession Brunette” is on the rise, as Yelp users lean toward lower maintenance hair colors… and cut back on frequent salon visits… while more users opt to buy beauty supplies for a DIY alternative…

searches for wealth managers and financial advisors are rising—especially as tax season ends and many consider how to invest their refunds.

More trends and insights from Yelp here.