Niall Doherty's Blog, page 73
March 18, 2024
His Dumpster Website Makes $2.1 Million a Year
Ian HechtFounder of Dumpster Rental Enterprises $2.1 million annual revenue Published March 18, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty At the 27-minute mark of a recent episode of the My First Million podcast, Sam Parr talks about a business called Dumpster Rental Enterprises 
…
Founder Ian Hecht apparently learned a bit about search engine optimization (SEO) and web design from building a few websites, none of which really took off.
Then, as Sam explains…
Ian was trying to rent a dumpster and he started looking up the best vendors to find in order to bring a dumpster to his house…
He meets this guy and the guy’s like, “Dude, I don’t know how to do any of this SEO stuff, but I know all these vendors that are similar to me.”
Ian is like, “Well, can I have the vendors? Maybe we can work out a deal where I’ll pay you for giving me this vendor list.”
So he does that, and after two years, he builds this website called dumpsterenterprises.com
Looks like the site launched in 2021 
On the podcast, Sam revealed some of the numbers that Ian shared with him…
In year two of the business, he did $2.1 million in revenue…
It looks like he only spent $26,000 in advertising and marketing, so he’s not spending that much money on ads, but some money on ads.
Pretty much all Ian’s traffic is coming via SEO…
You type in which area code or zip code you need a dumpster in, and then [Ian] forwards that lead to a handful of vendors or dumpster providers that he has vetted.
They pay him, let’s say, $100 for that lead. He’s able to profit $50 because that’s how much it costs him to get the leads.
Sam quoting Ian…
This is a business that didn’t take me a long time to set up…
I work a few hours a day and I travel a lot. It’s kind of a business that’s been on cruise control a little bit.
The business might not have taken long for Ian to set up, but I’m guessing he worked his ass off for the first couple of years 
before he was able to put it on cruise control.
Also, this reminds me of the Miao Rios story we shared recently…
Ranking & Renting Simple Websites For $1000/MonthShe took a more diversified approach, doing lead generation for different industries via multiple sites.
But the idea is essentially the same 
Sounds like Ian found a nice shortcut by buying a list of vendors and a warm introduction, so he didn’t have to spend lots of time doing cold outreach and convincing people to work with him.
There’s that saying: it’s not WHAT you know, but WHO you know.
But really it’s both, knowledge + connections = 
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March 14, 2024
He Started Charging For His Free Tool, Now Earns $6,000/Month
Andris ReinmanFounder of EmailEngine $6000 monthly revenue Published March 14, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty Andris Reinman is the founder of EmailEngine, a self-hosted email automation platform 
A recent article he wrote: How I turned my open-source project into a business
It begins…
When I started writing and publishing open-source software about 15 years ago, I was pretty radical about it… Getting another A-category company to use my open-source libraries like Nodemailer was a badge of honor…
I even went so far that when a founder of a major transactional email service sent me an email regarding Nodemailer and offered to make a donation to promote my efforts, I rejected it.
But then…
A startup using Nodemailer was acquired for half a billion dollars.
I was financially not in a good place back then, and when I saw the news, I started to wonder – what did I get out of this?
Sending email notifications was a huge part of that service, and they probably sent millions of email notifications a day using Nodemailer.
At the very least, I saved them tons of developer hours by providing a free and solid library for sending these emails.
So even though Andris’ work was used, he didn’t make any $$ as he gave it away for free.
Then came EmailEngine.
That was also open source initially, but with a paid option…
The subscription fee was 250€ per year…
Well, it turns out my business plan was bonkers. I only gained a few paying subscribers…
After a year and a half and 750€ in total revenue, I decided to jump ship — enough of providing free stuff.
He pivoted…
I re-designed the UI of the app to look more professional and implemented a license key system [for paying subscribers]… I also changed the license… to a commercial license.
That worked a lot better…
I kept the price the same, 250€ per year, and during the first month, I sold 1750€ worth of subscriptions.
That’s like twice the amount I made in the previous year and a half, and it sealed the fate of the project.
Next, I started to increase the pricing; 250€ became 495€, then 695€ and 795€, and finally 895€.
Nowadays, Andris finally has a profitable project…
The current MRR for EmailEngine is 6100€ [$6,622] and grows steadily, which in Estonia, where I live, allows me to pay myself a decent salary so that I can work on my project full-time.
The only regret I have is that I did not start selling my software earlier and only published free, open-source software…
Selling to business customers is definitely more reliable and predictable than depending on the goodwill of random people.
I can relate to what he’s saying here.
I started out way too idealistic with my business as well, and suffered because of it.
One way to check if you’re being too idealistic: study what established players are doing, see if any are thriving with an approach similar to what you have in mind.
Or can you at least find someone doing it successfully in another industry? 
If not, it’s probably not a good path to go down.
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Impossible To Find A Job? Try This…
NgelAndrs writes on Reddit that it’s impossible to find a job…
I have been searching for a job as a Freelance Copywriter for a month now. I’ve reached out to over 300 companies of all types and sizes. Only five have responded, and it was just to politely decline my services.
I worked as a B2B Writer for two years at a small company and have some knowledge in copywriting due to some small copywriting tasks. My goal is to make a career as a Freelancer in this field, but it’s proving to be quite challenging.
What’s the problem here? 
Could be a number of things, but a lot of people in the comments believe AI is the culprit.
One response…
I think you haven’t found a job as a copywriter because LLMs like Co-Pilot, Bard, and ChatGPT make it very easy for everyone to write something that’s good enough.
Another commenter suggests that bulk pitching is the answer…
I recommend you check out how to send bulk cold emails. I tried sending 1500 cold emails a week and landed 2 clients.
Sounds quite spammy to me, but hey, whatever works.
My advice to NgelAndrs would be to read this article by Jakob Greenfeld
In the past year I’ve worked with 100+ b2b companies and one of the main lessons was that selling generic offers is incredibly hard.
“We do FB ads”
“We do SEO”
Or even worse:
“We do SEO, Google Ads, Landing Pages, Recruitment,… really anything you’re willing to give us money for.”
There are a gazillion agencies offering the exact same thing…
Not a fun game to play.
But…
when you start coining your own unique mechanism, you start playing a completely different game.
“Our ‘Growth Amplifier Matrix’ supercharges e-commerce brands to break 7-figure revenue ceilings.”
“Through our ‘Impact Velocity Method’, we drive exponential user engagement for mobile apps.”
No one else is offering this.
Suddenly you’re operating in a category of one.
Prospects will actually want to learn more.
Humans and curious by nature.
When they hear a new phrase they feel a pull to understand it.
If you’re struggling to stand out, give this a try yourself…
All it takes is taking your existing offer, writing down every single tiny piece that makes it unique, and then coming up with a cool sounding name.
I’d say the final piece is to be hyper-targeted with your outreach 
Spend some time finding businesses you believe to be a great fit for your services, and let them know why when you pitch them.
But hey, that’s just one approach.
There are endless others.
The main thing is to keep trying until you hit on something that works.
Only the persistent survive
$50,000 in 5 Months Thanks to His Crazy Offer
Manoj AhirwarFounder of UniqueSide $50,000 revenue in 5 months Published March 14, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty Manoj Ahirwar tweets…
I can’t believe it
$50K in 5 months.
After leaving my Job, I started UniqueSide. My expectations were low but I went all in.
UniqueSide is Manoj’s Minimum Viable Product (MVP) studio where he works with founders to bring their product to life in 15 days.
Pricing starts at $6K per project 
Manoj adds…
In the last 5 months, I have worked with 8 awesome founders around the world and got their products come to life.
Elsewhere he mentions how it all started…
You just need one person to have faith in you!
In August, When I was just starting UniqueSide, I was failing to get any customers and that’s when I decided to do something crazy.
I posted a tweet that I will build an MVP in 7 days. Yes, you read it right.
Many people start sh*tting in the comments but the founder of one company was interested and that’s when it all started.
Here’s his original tweet – Manoj only had about 2000 followers at the time – and the founder who took a chance on him.
Apart from building for founders, Manoj builds a lot of his own products, all listed here 
Back to his first tweet…
I built it in 7 days (It was an Android app with a Python backend)
Sometimes you just have to do crazy things to get you started if nothing is working out.
2 things you need for a successful business…
A valuable product or serviceA good way to promote that product or serviceManoj sharpened his skills by building lots of projects for himself over the years.
Then he came up with an eye-catching offer that got lots of attention on Twitter… 15k views on that tweet 
All he needed was one person to take that offer, then he worked his ass off to deliver and leveraged that success to land more clients.
Five months later, and he’s earned $50,000
What “crazy thing” could you do to promote your business?
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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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Clever Affiliate Site On Track For $200,000 in Year 1
Hamza J AlamtabFounder of Routines.club $200,000 Year 1 projected revenue Published March 14, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty Check out Routines.club, a simple site that lists out the daily routines of highly influential people like Bryan Johnson, Andrew Huberman, James Clear, etc.
Here’s an example of James Clear’s routine throughout the day along with affiliate links to purchase the products he’s using
(Nice touch with the custom images as well, likely generated by AI.)
The site only has 13 pages indexed on Google, but founder Hamza J Alamtab tweeted back in December
I launched Routines.club 6 months ago. It’s mostly been on auto-pilot and is on track for $200K in EBITDA. Will do at least 3-5X that much in its second year.
Getting some acquisition requests (NOT SELLING).
(EBITDA = earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization)
Asked if it’s all affiliate revenue, Hamza replied…
Yes sir – currently we’re getting roughly ~40,000 unique visitors per month. Highly motivated audience direct partnerships with brands for higher % = awesome revenue.
Hamza doesn’t have a big following, so it sounds like all that traffic is via SEO
I reckon there could be a site like this in many niches.
With increasing skepticism of product reviews on Google and YouTube, consumers seem to be turning to industry leaders for recommendations.
Hamza isn’t an industry leader himself, but he does a good job of collecting and presenting their recommendations 
Might be worth doing some research for a niche you’re interested in, see how many people are searching for recommendations and what sites are currently serving them.
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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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March 11, 2024
The Limits of Hard Work
From the book The Ultimate Sales Machine by Chet Holmes…
At seminars and lectures, I’ve asked my audience, “How many people in this room would like to grow their company or department 10 times larger than it is right now?”
Typically, 99 percent of the audience raises their hands.
Then I say, “Leave your hands up if you can work 10 times more hours or 10 times harder than you’re working now.”
All the hands go down.
The point is that there are companies and departments that are 10 times bigger than yours, and you know they aren’t working 10 times harder than you are.
They’re just working smarter.
16 Companies Dominate Google Search (But You Can Still Beat Them)
An epic report from SEO pro Glen Allsopp…
He writes…
The 16 companies in this report are behind at least 588 individual brands.
Combined, Semrush estimates they pick up around 3.5 billion clicks from Google each month. An average of 5.9 million monthly clicks per site.
If you’re searching Google for a general topic, there’s a good chance you’ll land on one of their sites.
Such as
Glen shares lots of specifics on how these brands operate, how they do SEO, branding, design, affiliate marketing and more.
They operate in niches like Tech, Health, News & Media, Food, Finance, Business, Gaming
Glen writes…
If it’s not a broad top-level niche category like Sports or Tech, they don’t seem to have as much interest in building out a site to cover it.
So there are still opportunities there for small sites focused on a subcategory of a particular niche
At the end of Glen’s report, he notes the kind of niches the big boys aren’t dominating…
There are countless specific sports, industries and hobbies they don’t cover all that well.
Fishing. Fish keeping. Motorbike riding. Tennis. Sewing. Audiophiles (far beyond the ‘best headphones’ kind of query). Snowboarding. RC racing. Board games. Off-roading. Books. Coffee. Survival equipment. Horse riding. Hiking. Beard care.
There are lots more, but I think you get the idea.
That said…
If you want to go and compete with the digital goliaths in Google then please don’t let this report stop you. If you want to create the next big tech / sports / health site and you have a real passion for that, then you have my full backing.
I know it’s meta to say this but I proudly write about topics (link building, keyword research, etc) where hugely profitable companies, who have teams of writers and designers, are covering the same thing.
In other words, Glen himself proves that it’s possible for a small independent site to compete with industry giants
Last words…
These 16 companies, and those like them, don’t rank in every niche. Don’t always grow their sites. Don’t always take over the top results.
There will always be opportunities available if a bigger slice of the pie is your aim.
And if it’s your goal, who knows…you might be the next independent site they look to acquire.
New Golf Course App Already Earning $3000/Month
Matt RobinsonCo-founder or Live Tourney $36,000 annual revenue Published March 11, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty Matt Robinson is the guy behind Live Tourney.
It’s basically an app that lets golf courses organize tournaments 
The app costs $2000 per year, per course.
In a recent interview, Matt reveals…
We launched in early 2023 and are doing around $3k in MRR but growing quickly – we did just over $18k in revenue in January 2024 alone!
Matt loves playing golf and got the idea for the app when…
I started playing in tournaments at my home course and wished that I could see how I was doing during the event instead of having to wait until it was over.
I knew about the industry standard, Golf Genius [starting at $4200/year for public courses].
After talking with the head pro at the course, I learned that they didn’t use it because the product was incredibly expensive and difficult to use.
Other players at the course shared that they had tried using Google Sheets as a live leaderboard in the past, needless to say, that wasn’t a great solution.
Good to keep in mind: whenever you see someone using a spreadsheet as a make-shift solution, you may be looking at a business opportunity.
Maybe you’re using a spreadsheet in this way yourself?
Matt started building his app in April 2022…
The first time Live Tourney was tested for a real round of golf was on June 7th, 2022.
He then brought in his friend Henry Face, a salesperson, as co-founder and…
Our first paying customer came in January of 2023… The first few months after “launch” were spent fixing bugs and urgently responding to requests…
We’ve been profitable since Day 1 since it doesn’t cost much to run the business. Outside of one-time fees to start the LLC, our expenses are around $100 per month!
Convincing courses to use the product has been tough…
Regardless of what software (or no software) a course uses, making a change is a big deal and requires a bit of upfront work for them to get everybody on board.
It’s our job to convince them that the experience is better in the long term since we have a better product that is also much more affordable.
And…
Our most successful method for finding new customers is through cold calls and cold emails.
It continues to surprise me how many courses respond positively and take a demo with us.
This doesn’t scale all that quickly, but we’re happy to continue to do things that don’t scale at this stage and grow sustainably.
The app is apparently doing $36K/year in revenue now, so, they likely have 18 courses on board.
One thing I noticed is that you can sign up and try Matt’s software directly whereas competitor Golf Genius requires you to contact them for a demo/quote.
That’s a nice differentiator 
(Also, Golf Genius say they have 10K+ customers. At $4200 a pop, they could be doing $40+ million in annual revenue! Lots of potential for a competitor to come in and shake things up.)
The moment Matt knew he was onto something…
The biggest surprise fan of the product was an 80-year-old man. His wife was the fan because, for the first time, she was able to follow her husband’s round and track his progress on her phone at home.
Matt’s advice for aspiring entrepreneurs…
Just start. Start by doing the first thing you can think of to move the needle on your idea. Pulling that string will unveil what the next few things are and after you continue doing this for days, weeks, months, and years, it’s pretty incredible what can happen.
Figure out the things you need to do to make that first dollar, because that feeling is electric.
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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 21,655 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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$75,000 Per Month Creating Animated Explainer Videos
Joel YoungFounder of JumpStart Video $75,000 approximate monthly revenue Published March 11, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty Joel Young is a voiceover artist and founder of JumpStart Video, an agency for animated explainer videos that sell for $600 to $1200 a pop.
We interviewed Joel a few years ago when he was earning $60K/month
In a recent interview, he reveals…
The business currently generates about $750,000-$1,000,000 annually, with expenses coming in around 20-30% of that.
$1 million per year = $83,000 per month
Origin story…
I started doing voice overs as a side-hustle to get out of debt.
After a few months of growth, I noticed that many of my customers were pairing my services with video.
So, I decided to begin teaching myself to create videos as well. This way, I could pair this service with my voiceover business.
I started out on a platform called Fiverr 12 years ago, and have grown to become one of the top 5 sellers all-time on the platform.
In our previous interview, Joel revealed…
In just 18 months, we had paid off $50,000 in debt, and were finally free!
And…
Unlike most businesses, since I started on a crowd-sourcing platform [Fiverr], I didn’t have to worry about marketing. In fact, it was 7 years before I spent a dime on marketing my business.
All I had to do was serve my clients well, put out quality work, and make sure my pages were optimized.
Check out Joel’s Fiverr profile, which has a whopping 10K five-star reviews 
Most of his clients come from Fiverr and referrals…
Our greatest source of new business is client referral. We currently spend very little on outside marketing…
Our business is very visual. So, when we create a video and do a great job, others will see that video and ask, “Who created that for you?” That natural evolution is what typically brings us referrals.
Because I’ve maintained good reviews over the years and have increased the quality of my services, Fiverr continues to bring new clients to me through the algorithms they’ve developed to connect quality buyers and quality sellers.
Doing great work really is the best form of marketing
I also like how Joel learned how to make animated videos and combined that with his existing voiceover talents.
That boosted his offering and helped him stand out among competitors.
Is there another valuable skill you could learn that would complement what you already do?
For example, instead of just offering copywriting services, you could learn how to create high-converting landing pages as well.
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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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March 7, 2024
$10K+ From a Product “Nobody Would Buy”
Philipp KellerFounder of SEO Kickstarter $10,000+ revenue Published March 7, 2024 by Fardeen KhanReviewed and edited by Niall Doherty Last June, Philipp Keller posted on X about a “Backlink Harvester Tool” he was building, to see if anyone was interested 
He had about 2000 followers at the time.
Philipp recently revealed what happened next
Lots of people wrote to me: Yes they’d use this product…
Two months later I had an MVP [Minimum Viable Product] ready. I released it at a 10$/month price point, but only allowed 10 customers to use it (because it was still too much MVP).
The tool lets you do email outreach to get more backlinks.
Then…
Though I was thrilled that I found 10 customers (and had a lot more customers in the waiting list) I saw that they struggled with the outreach tool
Basically, the tool still required you to send emails asking other site owners to link to you.
That got Philipp thinking…
I was looking for an easier way to get first backlinks for solopreneurs who had no prior knowledge of the subject.
While developing the SaaS solution I stumbled over lots of great places to post your startup, where you don’t need to send an email but instead can register on the website directly…
There were already MANY lists out there which promised you “100 great places to list your startups”. I had a look at some of them and found the quality lacking at best.
So…
I investigated 200 startups [websites, directories, businesses], using 4 different SEO tools (Ahrefs, Semrush, MOZ and Majestic) investigating backlink those 200 startups had in common and organized them by backlink strength, achievability and categories.
After spending a couple of months building this…
I wrapped up my research and at Xmas sent emails to around 15 people asking them to review my resource… nobody seemed interested.
Philipp was devastated, but decided he’d give it one more shot by tweeting out a 4-minute video explaining the product, which he called SEO Kickstarter for Startups.
He didn’t expect much 
But…
over the course of the next 48 hours I made 134 sales (I raised the price two times, in the end it was 2.5x the original price). In total around $6000.
I gained 2000 additional followers on Twitter.
Over the course of the next 30 days I made more revenue than at my day job
(context: I’m having a well paying salary in Switzerland).
Given Philipp’s resume, he’s likely earning $10K/month from his day job, so it’s safe to assume he earned more than $10,000 from his product in those 30 days
His takeaway from all of this…
I needed to do a landing page and launch with a video with the proper pitch before my product was credible. Sending a person a link with “hey, can you have a look” is not validation.
Philipp’s story also illustrates the winding nature of the path to success.
He spent 2 months building a tool that didn’t really work. But that led him to creating SEO Kickstarter… which flopped a couple of times until he figured out a better way to market it
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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 21,635 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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