Niall Doherty's Blog, page 60
July 18, 2024
Business Idea: Help People Create Telegram Bots
James Potter tweets…
I think everyone should have their own Telegram bot.
Mine is called Baldrick. He tells me:
– MRR/ARR and other stats across all of my apps (max once per day, I try to never check them otherwise)
– If error rates for a worker task went above 50%
– Refunds issued by my customer support person
– Weekly app usage metrics
Baldrick runs on a basic Python script with a scheduler that calls Telegram’s API 
Someone replied to James…
Mine sends me the weather every morning and tells me what I should wear based on that. It’s been delivering every day successfully for 5 years now.
I’m thinking somebody could turn this kind of thing into a freelance service 
Set up custom Telegram bots for companies or individuals.
Or perhaps you could build a platform that makes it easy for people to create their own Telegram bots.
Apparently Telegram has almost 1 billion monthly active users 
so plenty of people could use something like this.
Most of his 25 Directory Sites Earn $600/Month Each
John RushSerial Entrepreneur $8000+ monthly revenue from directory sites Published July 19, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty John Rush tweets…
Years ago I bought an apartment for $300k.
Rented out for $600/mo after expenses.
Lots of headache with the tenants & things breaking.
Today, most of my web directories make more than $600/mo.
It took me years to earn the cash for an apartment and it took me one evening to build and launch one directory.
These 20 directories were built using @unicornplatform in few hours.
Unicorn Platform is John’s own website builder that he acquired back in 2022.
He adds…
I came up with the idea by scrolling twitter feed and seeing what’s trending and then testing these ideas for SEO traffic using Google Keyword Planner.
A reply in the comments lists out some of John’s directories along with traffic metrics 
nextjsstarter
How he monetises these directories…
The links on my directories are affiliated links, I get paid for every sign up via my link.
On this one link alone as you can see on Marc screenshot I got $280/mo. Just one link.
I have 1000+ links.
Which reminds me of this tweet by Ayush…
Put more buy buttons on the internet!
In John’s case, those “buy buttons” happen to be affiliate links on directories.
He says he has about 25 directores and most of them make at least $600/month. So likely a total of $8000/month minimum, and it all sounds fairly passive 
Directories are something anyone can build pretty fast with no-code platforms like Unicorn Platform, Softr, WordPress or Webflow.
And you can use tools like Easy Scraper to scrape data 
Like job boards, the trick with directories is probably persisting through that initial stage where you don’t get much traffic.
An idea here: you could build local directories in your country for each state/city for different type of trades and business (plumbers, pet shops, accountants, etc).
Instead of affiliate, you could monetise by charging for top positions in the directory.
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$1 Million Selling Thin Pillows on the Internet
Spencer HawsSerial Entrepreneur $15,000 monthly profit Published July 18, 2024 by Nathaniel LewisReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty 
Spencer Haws recently shared the full story of his $1 million pillow business…
A few years ago, I was sick of not being able to find thin pillows. I LOVE super thin pillows to sleep on.
The thinner the better.
I couldn’t really find anything suitable online (or in stores), so I decided to create my own.
So, I found a manufacturer on Alibaba, got a bunch of samples, and ended up becoming the “thin pillow guy”.
He listed his product on Amazon, optimizing the title, description, and other elements for SEO 
His goal was to be the top result when someone searched for “thin pillow” on Amazon. With minimal competition at the time, he succeeded.
In the first month, Spencer sold $4,399 worth of pillows, all through organic searches on Amazon
He continued to invest in larger order quantities and created a niche website to attract traffic from Google for thin pillow-related keywords and other relevant terms.
He ended up selling over $1 million worth of thin pillows 
primarily via Amazon and Google SEO.
Eventually…
This was always a side project for me, so I decided to sell the business.
I was netting about $15,000/month (after ALL expenses) and sold the business for $425,000 on Empire Flippers.
Takeaway: If a product or service you want doesn’t exist, create it.
There are probably other people who will want it too 
And if so, it could become a nice business.
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Our goal at eBiz Facts is to give you accurate information about online business so you can gain clearer insights, make better decisions, and achieve your own success.
With that in mind, we strive to ensure the accuracy and transparency of the income claims and estimates that you see on this website.
Here’s how:
We treat all income claims we find online with skepticism.We don’t report incomes that seem especially controversial or unrealistic.We cite our sources and/or share our calculations so you can see where the numbers come from.If there are uncertainties about an income claim or estimate, we tell you what those are.If you see an income claim or estimate that seems off, please tell us so we can fix it.
Is this kind of business right for you?Check out our framework to see the 19 types and 6 levels of online business, and discover which is best for you.
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July 15, 2024
Unbundling Zapier for $10K/Month Business Ideas
Pat Walls tweets…
Free business idea for anyone that can code:
Build a tiny saas around a SINGLE Zapier integration.
Hear me out… So Zapier has 6,000 integrations. 6,000!
Find an integration that’s (1) popular and (2) limited in functionalityMake it 10x better, cover edge cases, etc.Turn that into its own “micro saas”ProfitDon’t believe me?
Here is a real world $10K MRR example of this: Sync2Sheets
That app was previously called Notion2Sheets and we profiled it a few months back.
Someone in the comments mentions Whalesync as another example of what Pat’s talking about. That company apparently raised $1.8 million in funding
Zapier actually has 7400+ integrations, so plenty of possibilities there.
In reply to a comment asking how to promote your tool, Pat writes…
Forums/Reddit are a great place to start.
While sharing these Google Search screenshots
Such searches could also be a great way to find a winning idea in the first place.
Another approach: think about the tools you already use and check what kind of integrations Zapier offers for them.
Are they lacking in some way?
Perhaps you could build something better and end up with a $10K/month business.
More, Better, New
We have previously shared Jay Clouse’s story and how he hit $300K a year as a creator
In a recent post, Jay writes…
I heard a simple, three-part framework for getting new customers on TropicalMBA (which they credited to Alex Hormozi):
1. Do more
2. Do it better
3. Do something new
More, better, new for short.
These are three different customer acquisition strategies that you should consider one at a time in this order.
Do more…
Look at how you’re getting customers now – what’s working the best? You can likely do more of that thing.
If 1:1 serve calls have a high close rate, you should do more 1:1 calls. If your ads funnel is profitable and driving new leads, you should run more ads…
Find what’s working and simply do more of it.
This doesn’t require new solutions or new creativity – just discipline to turn up the dial. It’s the fastest, lowest-effort, highest-impact direction to go.
Do it better…
If there’s no obvious answer to the “more” approach, then look at how you can improve your existing systems. What’s getting results but could be working a little bit better? A little bit more efficiently?
Think:
– Sales pages
– Email sequences
– CTAs from your content
Do something new…
Only once you’ve exhausted more and better should you look at new. New means creating new things, such as new products or systems.
This is slow, high effort, and inefficient to start. Everything you could consider in the more and better categories was once new!
Last words from Jay…
Without this framework, my brain would’ve kept pushing me towards new. But with this framework, it becomes obvious that the lowest-hanging fruit opportunities for new customers are always more and then better.
This Viral Video Series Earned His Business $500K+
David ParkFounder of Jenni AI $5 Million annual revenue Published July 15, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty David Park is the founder of Jenni AI, an AI research assistant for academics
He recently shared a value-packed tweet…
How to go from 0 to $5M ARR profitably (step by step) He details 4 growth hacks they used, the first – and most interesting, IMO – being short form video content…
The most important thing to remember in this new age of social media is that follower counts don’t matter at all
I would unironically sponsor a fresh account made this week vs a YouTuber with a million subs if they had similar views and I don’t even think it’s a controversial opinion…
The reason being that new accounts are highly volatile and if you put out a great engaging piece of content then it could easily go viral regardless of how many followers you have.
You don’t need to find and sponsor new accounts in your niche.
Instead, you can create them yourself
You just need to follow this basic format:
1. Find a face for your account
2. Craft a viral video ‘series’
3. Multiply your accounts
Another trick…
find someone who already has an audience of people that you know will convert, then ask them to create a completely new account to post videos about your product…
For example we found a creator named Mengmengduck [Instagram, TikTok] whose entire account at the time was teaching students how to write to employers and we paid him $4000 for 20 videos/mo
In our first month we got 7 million impressions, just as expected the videos on the brand new account were being pushed to the followers on his main account
David says the goal here is to get a video to go viral then create a “series” out of it…
You want a video that you can basically tweak slightly and repost multiple times a week that is still fun for the audience
Once you find a viral series, you can start creating new accounts but this time you don’t need to work with big creators, you can just find charismatic UGC creators because you’ve found content that is engaging and poised to go viral.
Currently, we have about 5 different Jenni AI accounts all posting similar content…
In some cases, the account with 48 followers gets MORE views than our main account with 55k followers…even when posting identical videos
His formula for creating viral videos…
1. Have one account on each platform (TikTok, Instagram, YT shorts) and experiment with a ton of hooks and video ideas
2. Eventually you’ll get a video that goes viral after enough experimentation
3. Experiment and somehow turn that video into a “series”
4. Start tweaking and posting this “series” on multiple accounts
5. Translate and create the same video with creators that speak Chinese, Spanish, etc
6. Take the really mega-viral videos and sponsor other pages to repost them
7. Use the mega-viral content for paid ads
8. Eventually enough copycats will copy your video series and it’ll get played out and you restart at step 1
Our video series “POV: You have an essay due” has probably generated 300 million+ views overall
It was essentially the same video over and over, multiple times a week, yet they consistently went viral
That one video series made us over half a million dollars, and it was one of several video series’ that we were able to cook up
Here’s one such video on TikTok, with 400k views…
Me starting an essay the night before it’s due (I’m so screwed)You could try doing this to boost your own business
Or you could manage this whole process for other businesses, help them go viral.
Or how about building up an audience like Mengmengduck and getting paid $4000 for 20 short videos each month?
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Learn more about income claims and estimates on this website
Our goal at eBiz Facts is to give you accurate information about online business so you can gain clearer insights, make better decisions, and achieve your own success.
With that in mind, we strive to ensure the accuracy and transparency of the income claims and estimates that you see on this website.
Here’s how:
We treat all income claims we find online with skepticism.We don’t report incomes that seem especially controversial or unrealistic.We cite our sources and/or share our calculations so you can see where the numbers come from.If there are uncertainties about an income claim or estimate, we tell you what those are.If you see an income claim or estimate that seems off, please tell us so we can fix it.
Is this kind of business right for you?Check out our framework to see the 19 types and 6 levels of online business, and discover which is best for you.
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$45,000 Selling 2 Simple eBooks on Etsy
ArtificialCreativityEtsy Store $45,000 estimated revenue Published July 15, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty Check out this Etsy store 
ArtificialCreativity
They have 2 ebooks for sale…
Teaching with ChatGPTPassive Income with ChatGPTThose books sell for $11-$15 a pop.
With 3754 sales as of this writing, that adds up to roughly $45,000 in revenue
Judging by the earliest reviews, the store has only been around since April 2023.
So average revenue of $3000/month
Good chance the products themselves were written by AI, which a couple of reviewers allude to…
Honestly, the thing seemed a bit like it was generated from ChatGPT but in general had good advice, and it would take a lot of time to get ChatGPT to answer like that, but it was kind of stuff I already knew, but I’m fairly happy with it.
Etsy isn’t the first place you think of for selling ebooks, but clearly it’s worth considering, especially if you can quickly produce a decent ebook on a trending topic
After all, Etsy apparently gets 500 million visitors each month.
If you’re into that idea, read this next
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The goal of our Online Money Maker profiles is to show you all the different ways people make money online. We strive to ensure that each profile is realistic – no hype, no scams – so you can see what it really takes to build each type of business.
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Learn more about income claims and estimates on this website
Our goal at eBiz Facts is to give you accurate information about online business so you can gain clearer insights, make better decisions, and achieve your own success.
With that in mind, we strive to ensure the accuracy and transparency of the income claims and estimates that you see on this website.
Here’s how:
We treat all income claims we find online with skepticism.We don’t report incomes that seem especially controversial or unrealistic.We cite our sources and/or share our calculations so you can see where the numbers come from.If there are uncertainties about an income claim or estimate, we tell you what those are.If you see an income claim or estimate that seems off, please tell us so we can fix it.
Is this kind of business right for you?Check out our framework to see the 19 types and 6 levels of online business, and discover which is best for you.
Other ways to make money onlineThere are many other ways to make money online, to work from home or anywhere in the world.
Full list of ways to make money onlineMore profiles of online money makers Subscribe to eBiz Insider Every Tuesday and Friday we email 23,440 people like you with top tips, insights and opportunities to build your online business. No hype, no scams, no fake gurus. Sign up below to get the next one.
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July 11, 2024
$10k Per Month From A Demonetized YouTube Channel
PoliceActivityYouTube Channel $10,000 estimated monthly revenue Published July 11, 2024 by Nathaniel LewisReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty PoliceActivity is a YT channel with 5.9 million subscribers and about 50M views per month 
And get this: all their videos are uploads of public record bodycam footage they don’t own!
Started nearly 8 years ago posting police interactions, the channel has since uploaded 1.9k videos of mostly raw footage with minimal editing.
Unfortunately, at some point they got demonetized, so no ad revenue 
Rather than give up, the channel shifted focus to monetizing the audience with Patreon and Amazon affiliate links.
By my math they’re earning around $4K/month from Patreon
Estimating their Amazon affiliate earnings…
50m monthly viewsClick-through-rate of 0.1%Conversion rate of 1%Average price point of the dashcams the channel suggests (~$300)4% commissionThat’s an additional $6000/month
So about $10,000 per month overall, and those are pretty conservative estimates.
Just goes to show there are alternative methods to make money with YouTube.
Some other examples of channels getting lots of views with footage they don’t own
What other freely available footage could you compile into a channel on YouTube, TikTok or elsewhere?
Maybe add your commentary/voiceover to give it something extra.
First time seeing our Online Money Maker profiles? Click here for a quick intro.
The goal of our Online Money Maker profiles is to show you all the different ways people make money online. We strive to ensure that each profile is realistic – no hype, no scams – so you can see what it really takes to build each type of business.
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Learn more about income claims and estimates on this website
Our goal at eBiz Facts is to give you accurate information about online business so you can gain clearer insights, make better decisions, and achieve your own success.
With that in mind, we strive to ensure the accuracy and transparency of the income claims and estimates that you see on this website.
Here’s how:
We treat all income claims we find online with skepticism.We don’t report incomes that seem especially controversial or unrealistic.We cite our sources and/or share our calculations so you can see where the numbers come from.If there are uncertainties about an income claim or estimate, we tell you what those are.If you see an income claim or estimate that seems off, please tell us so we can fix it.
Is this kind of business right for you?Check out our framework to see the 19 types and 6 levels of online business, and discover which is best for you.
Other ways to make money onlineThere are many other ways to make money online, to work from home or anywhere in the world.
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The Mental Equivalent of Sweating
Andrej Karpathy was a founding member of OpenAI and the Director of AI at Tesla
A recent tweet sharing his advice on becoming an expert…
There are a lot of videos on YouTube/TikTok etc. that give the appearance of education, but if you look closely they are really just entertainment.
This is very convenient for everyone involved: the people watching enjoy thinking they are learning (but actually they are just having fun).
Learning is not supposed to be fun. The primary feeling should be that of effort.
It should look a lot less like that “10 minute full body” workout from your local digital media creator and a lot more like a serious session at the gym.
You want the mental equivalent of sweating.
Love that last part 
Andrej continues…
I find it helpful to explicitly declare your intent up front as a sharp, binary variable in your mind.
If you are consuming content: are you trying to be entertained or are you trying to learn?
And if you are creating content: are you trying to entertain or are you trying to teach?
You’ll go down a different path in each case.
Attempts to seek the stuff in between actually clamp to zero.
In another tweet, Andrej spells out how to become an expert at something…
1. Iteratively take on concrete projects and accomplish them depth wise, learning “on demand” (ie don’t learn bottom up breadth wise).
2. Teach/summarize everything you learn in your own words.
3. Only compare yourself to younger you, never to others.
#2 is also a good way to build an audience.
You don’t have to be an expert starting out. You can be a curious beginner, teaching and summarizing everything you learn about a topic
Sold His AI App for $200,000 After 11 Months
Nico JeannenFounder of Talknotes $200,000 sale price Published July 11, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty Remember Talknotes?
It’s an AI app that summarizes your voice notes
We covered it last November…
His Unoriginal App: 13 Weeks to $2000/Month“Unoriginal” because it was very similar to another app that earned $15,000 in its first month
As noted back in November, the success of Talknotes showed that the market is often big enough to support multiple businesses doing pretty much the same thing.
Anyway, Nico Jeannen, the founder of Talknotes recently tweeted…
I just sold my startup Talknotes for $200,000 on @acquiredotcom
I launched it last August when I was looking for an idea I could grow with paid ads, and made a MVP in one week.
I took it from $0 to $7500 MRR in just 11 months.
Nico mainly grew it with Facebook ads and his MRR doubled in 2 months.
But…
In May, I had a bad burnout
Multiple bugs slipped into the app, and I had to spend 2 days fixing everything in an emergency while revenues plummeted.
This completely fucked me up mentally and had a hard time working on the app after that
So he decided to sell, and got his $200,000 pay day.
However
all this might sound like an overnight success.
It is not
This is the result of 7 years of failure and working like a madman.
I launched over 40 projects in those 7 years, and most of them failed. But a few took off, and that’s all I needed
All those weeks working 15h/day without weekends and vacation feels soul-sucking when you don’t see the end, but this is what took me there
You only need to win once to snowball everything. Work hard, focus, fail a lot and keep shipping fast.
First time seeing our Online Money Maker profiles? Click here for a quick intro.
The goal of our Online Money Maker profiles is to show you all the different ways people make money online. We strive to ensure that each profile is realistic – no hype, no scams – so you can see what it really takes to build each type of business.
If you'd like to hear when we publish new profiles, subscribe to our free newsletter below. Each edition is packed with tips, insights and opportunities to build your online business. We send it out every Tuesday and Friday to 23,375 legendary subscribers.
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See our latest profiles of Online Money Makers
Learn more about income claims and estimates on this website
Our goal at eBiz Facts is to give you accurate information about online business so you can gain clearer insights, make better decisions, and achieve your own success.
With that in mind, we strive to ensure the accuracy and transparency of the income claims and estimates that you see on this website.
Here’s how:
We treat all income claims we find online with skepticism.We don’t report incomes that seem especially controversial or unrealistic.We cite our sources and/or share our calculations so you can see where the numbers come from.If there are uncertainties about an income claim or estimate, we tell you what those are.If you see an income claim or estimate that seems off, please tell us so we can fix it.
Is this kind of business right for you?Check out our framework to see the 19 types and 6 levels of online business, and discover which is best for you.
Other ways to make money onlineThere are many other ways to make money online, to work from home or anywhere in the world.
Full list of ways to make money onlineMore profiles of online money makers Subscribe to eBiz Insider Every Tuesday and Friday we email 23,375 people like you with top tips, insights and opportunities to build your online business. No hype, no scams, no fake gurus. Sign up below to get the next one.
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