A milestone
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Mladen Jankovic wrote:
Enjoy your first million
I wish! The amount that trickles down to me is just enough to make house payments, buy groceries and slowly get out of credit card debt. It's picking up though.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
It reminds me on one very popular sentence in my country.
Just don't ask me about the first million, everything else is legal!
Mostly, when you see programmers, they aren't doing anything. One of the attractive things about programmers is that you cannot tell whether or not they are working simply by looking at them. Very often they're sitting there seemingly drinking coffee and gossiping, or just staring into space. What the programmer is trying to do is get a handle on all the individual and unrelated ideas that are scampering around in his head. (Charles M Strauss)
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
That is just about the coolest thing I've heard in a while. Thanks for the chear up. I kind of needed something like that. Congratulations!!!:rose:
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
Much congratulations John. This is truly an inspiration. I run my own company too and I still remember the first sale. Can you shed some light on your experience running the business without outside capital ? Did you take any credit from banks ? How about overdraft as a temporary source of financing ? It would be quite safe if you had committed customers, wouldnt it ? We are struggling with this issue ourselves. I tried the consulting route, but the consequences were bad. The gig sucked too much time out of the main product, and before we knew it three months had passed without much action on the product. Unfortunately, financing is hard in India due to lack of overdraft support from banks and lukewarm interest from VCs towards non-social-networking startups.
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
Congratulations!
Scott. —In just two days, tomorrow will be yesterday. —Hey, hey, hey. Don't be mean. We don't have to be mean because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are. - Buckaroo Banzai
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Much congratulations John. This is truly an inspiration. I run my own company too and I still remember the first sale. Can you shed some light on your experience running the business without outside capital ? Did you take any credit from banks ? How about overdraft as a temporary source of financing ? It would be quite safe if you had committed customers, wouldnt it ? We are struggling with this issue ourselves. I tried the consulting route, but the consequences were bad. The gig sucked too much time out of the main product, and before we knew it three months had passed without much action on the product. Unfortunately, financing is hard in India due to lack of overdraft support from banks and lukewarm interest from VCs towards non-social-networking startups.
We've always had a smallish overdraft for unexpected circumstances and to get us through the odd slow month here and there. We never took out an actual loan or any direct business financing. We worked doing networking support for a variety of businesses and I got tired of it and started doing contract programming for different businesses in the town we were in at the time. It was very stressful dealing with so many different people all the time all who had wildly different sets of expectations and wanted everything on extremely short notice. Mostly I got tired of starting from scratch over and over on new projects. I was getting paid to write software from nothing over and over again but I never really had total control over it and the stuff people would ask for or the way they wanted it done often didn't make a lot of sense but they insisted. I did learn a *lot* though about usability in dealing directly with the end users onsite often having to redo elements of an interface at the job site while the people (often the office ladies) all stood around and threw their 2 cents in. I had made some software years before that we used for our own network and computer support business to track service because there was nothing remotely affordable at the time and it occurred to me one day that rather than doing all the contract programming I had a good product already that just needed some tweaks to get it into a saleable version we could sell over the internet. The idea of writing software how *I* wanted it to be and writing it once but selling it over and over again just made all kinds of sense. So I dropped as much of the contract programming as I could while everyone else continued doing the network support, we had some pretty big clients in the oil and gas industry as well as the local hospital, some law firms etc which freed me up to work at it almost full time. There's no way I could have worked on the software product and did anything else at the same time. It was just way too much time required. I'd program for 14 hours straight as it was while also doing tech support by email, writing the manual and marketing and website and everything pretty much other than the bookkeeping. We decided early on that we would spend no more money on the software business than it could raise on it's own after the initial investment of my time and a small amount of money for the website and the initial marketing. Initially I released with very few features but at a very rock bottom price. As time wen
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
Way to go!! :rose:
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
You know: After having decided your own salary and making not much hours at work, and deciding which projects to get and which ones to refuse and sleeping as much as your body wants and buying the latest technology to work (sorry play the minesweeper)... This is the least you can get. Now being serious: Congratulations! This is great.
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
Awesome! Way to go John! :D Congratulations and Mabrook (Arabic for congratulations :) )
"Every time Lotus Notes starts up, somewhere a puppy, a kitten, a lamb, and a baby seal are killed. Lotus Notes is a conspiracy by the forces of Satan to drive us over the brink into madness. The CRC-32 for each file in the installation includes the numbers 666." Gary Wheeler "The secret to a long and healthy life is simple. Don't get ill and don't die." Pete O'Hanlon, courtesy of Rama "I realised that all of my best anecdotes started with "So there we were, pissed". Pete O'Hanlon
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It reminds me on one very popular sentence in my country.
Just don't ask me about the first million, everything else is legal!
Mostly, when you see programmers, they aren't doing anything. One of the attractive things about programmers is that you cannot tell whether or not they are working simply by looking at them. Very often they're sitting there seemingly drinking coffee and gossiping, or just staring into space. What the programmer is trying to do is get a handle on all the individual and unrelated ideas that are scampering around in his head. (Charles M Strauss)
Mladen Jankovic wrote:
Just don't ask me about the first million, everything else is legal!
:laugh: There is one in Arabic that's pretty similar. Amazing how so many things are cross cultural :)
"Every time Lotus Notes starts up, somewhere a puppy, a kitten, a lamb, and a baby seal are killed. Lotus Notes is a conspiracy by the forces of Satan to drive us over the brink into madness. The CRC-32 for each file in the installation includes the numbers 666." Gary Wheeler "The secret to a long and healthy life is simple. Don't get ill and don't die." Pete O'Hanlon, courtesy of Rama "I realised that all of my best anecdotes started with "So there we were, pissed". Pete O'Hanlon
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We've always had a smallish overdraft for unexpected circumstances and to get us through the odd slow month here and there. We never took out an actual loan or any direct business financing. We worked doing networking support for a variety of businesses and I got tired of it and started doing contract programming for different businesses in the town we were in at the time. It was very stressful dealing with so many different people all the time all who had wildly different sets of expectations and wanted everything on extremely short notice. Mostly I got tired of starting from scratch over and over on new projects. I was getting paid to write software from nothing over and over again but I never really had total control over it and the stuff people would ask for or the way they wanted it done often didn't make a lot of sense but they insisted. I did learn a *lot* though about usability in dealing directly with the end users onsite often having to redo elements of an interface at the job site while the people (often the office ladies) all stood around and threw their 2 cents in. I had made some software years before that we used for our own network and computer support business to track service because there was nothing remotely affordable at the time and it occurred to me one day that rather than doing all the contract programming I had a good product already that just needed some tweaks to get it into a saleable version we could sell over the internet. The idea of writing software how *I* wanted it to be and writing it once but selling it over and over again just made all kinds of sense. So I dropped as much of the contract programming as I could while everyone else continued doing the network support, we had some pretty big clients in the oil and gas industry as well as the local hospital, some law firms etc which freed me up to work at it almost full time. There's no way I could have worked on the software product and did anything else at the same time. It was just way too much time required. I'd program for 14 hours straight as it was while also doing tech support by email, writing the manual and marketing and website and everything pretty much other than the bookkeeping. We decided early on that we would spend no more money on the software business than it could raise on it's own after the initial investment of my time and a small amount of money for the website and the initial marketing. Initially I released with very few features but at a very rock bottom price. As time wen
I just learned some from all of what you just wrote. Interestingly, I'm working on this sort of business model. No financing, working on things from the start so that I'm in control (financially) of everything and I don't owe anyone anything. I've done 2 small jobs since I went solo and I'm hoping to land bigger and better things, but all in good time. Thanks John, seeing success stories like yourself and Pete O'Hanlon really makes me feel like I've made the right choice. May you continuously prosper :)
"Every time Lotus Notes starts up, somewhere a puppy, a kitten, a lamb, and a baby seal are killed. Lotus Notes is a conspiracy by the forces of Satan to drive us over the brink into madness. The CRC-32 for each file in the installation includes the numbers 666." Gary Wheeler "The secret to a long and healthy life is simple. Don't get ill and don't die." Pete O'Hanlon, courtesy of Rama "I realised that all of my best anecdotes started with "So there we were, pissed". Pete O'Hanlon
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
Very nice story!! Way to go Rendez le paquebot!
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
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Our little company just passed the million dollar mark in total gross sales of our software over the years since our very first sale of our commercial software. There were a few lean years, (our first month was 53.00 in sales, I still have a copy of the check on the wall framed :) ) to start and a couple in between but we've been ramping up quite abruptly the last few years; it's pretty cool thinking back on all the times I was wondering if we had made the right decision going into the software business on our own with limited experience. We could have been much higher but our attitude was to slowly grow a solid business within our own means and not get any financing, no outside capital at all and in return be beholden to no one and it's worked out very well in the long term. We started it as a side business to our networking and computer tech support contracting business, then I slowly moved to full time programming and support and about 2 years later no one was doing contracting work any more as it was all software related work.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
Well done John! It sounds like you have much the same philosophy we have (we're entirely self funded too). So far, it's going rather well. :cool:
Anna :rose: Linting the day away :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "If mushy peas are the food of the devil, the stotty cake is the frisbee of God"
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Much congratulations John. This is truly an inspiration. I run my own company too and I still remember the first sale. Can you shed some light on your experience running the business without outside capital ? Did you take any credit from banks ? How about overdraft as a temporary source of financing ? It would be quite safe if you had committed customers, wouldnt it ? We are struggling with this issue ourselves. I tried the consulting route, but the consequences were bad. The gig sucked too much time out of the main product, and before we knew it three months had passed without much action on the product. Unfortunately, financing is hard in India due to lack of overdraft support from banks and lukewarm interest from VCs towards non-social-networking startups.
Hi Vivek, You may want to try nosing around the Business of Software Forum[^], as there are a lot of experienced ISV people there, too. FWIW we're self funded as well, albeit not as far down the line as John's company (we incorporated in July 2004, and made our first sale in December 2005). Good luck with your venture. :rose:
Anna :rose: Linting the day away :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "If mushy peas are the food of the devil, the stotty cake is the frisbee of God"
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Well done John! It sounds like you have much the same philosophy we have (we're entirely self funded too). So far, it's going rather well. :cool:
Anna :rose: Linting the day away :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "If mushy peas are the food of the devil, the stotty cake is the frisbee of God"
Anna-Jayne Metcalfe wrote:
It sounds like you have much the same philosophy we have (we're entirely self funded too). So far, it's going rather well.
Yeah, definitely the way to go. Watch out, soon you guys will be approached by the VC people trying to invest in your business. Make sure you sock away extra money as much as possible, we call it "fuck you money" in that when you have it it's much easier to say "fuck you" to someone coming along trying to get something out of you or pressure you or the lean months that always come around no matter how sucessful you get. :) I'm quite content to make a solid living doing what I like to do, traditional business people and investment people will try to feed you some line about "if you're not growing by" [insert astronomically high percentage here] " a year then you're standing still". To them it's all about fast growth at all costs. I don't buy that for a second. It's a sure way to end up with a crappy product, a crappy company giving crap support and a lot of pissed off annoyed customers. Those people are scum, always remain fiercely independant and you'll never go wrong.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
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Anna-Jayne Metcalfe wrote:
It sounds like you have much the same philosophy we have (we're entirely self funded too). So far, it's going rather well.
Yeah, definitely the way to go. Watch out, soon you guys will be approached by the VC people trying to invest in your business. Make sure you sock away extra money as much as possible, we call it "fuck you money" in that when you have it it's much easier to say "fuck you" to someone coming along trying to get something out of you or pressure you or the lean months that always come around no matter how sucessful you get. :) I'm quite content to make a solid living doing what I like to do, traditional business people and investment people will try to feed you some line about "if you're not growing by" [insert astronomically high percentage here] " a year then you're standing still". To them it's all about fast growth at all costs. I don't buy that for a second. It's a sure way to end up with a crappy product, a crappy company giving crap support and a lot of pissed off annoyed customers. Those people are scum, always remain fiercely independant and you'll never go wrong.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
Thanks for the advice John. So far the VC people have left us alone, but advertisers and resellers are beginning to become more persistant (which is a good sign I guess). We're not particularly interested in the "build the business fast and sell it on even faster" approach either....the way we see it, we are in this business to serve our customers, not to make a fast buck and bail out. To do that would be to turn our backs on everything we are, really. If we can keep growing to the point where we're still able to provide well respected solutions in the market in 10 years time, I'll be very happy indeed. :)
Anna :rose: Linting the day away :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "If mushy peas are the food of the devil, the stotty cake is the frisbee of God"
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Thanks for the advice John. So far the VC people have left us alone, but advertisers and resellers are beginning to become more persistant (which is a good sign I guess). We're not particularly interested in the "build the business fast and sell it on even faster" approach either....the way we see it, we are in this business to serve our customers, not to make a fast buck and bail out. To do that would be to turn our backs on everything we are, really. If we can keep growing to the point where we're still able to provide well respected solutions in the market in 10 years time, I'll be very happy indeed. :)
Anna :rose: Linting the day away :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "If mushy peas are the food of the devil, the stotty cake is the frisbee of God"
Just don't forget the golden rule: you're in business to make money first happy customers second and software third. :) You're not doing your customers any favors if you go belly up because you didn't cover yourself first.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
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Hi Vivek, You may want to try nosing around the Business of Software Forum[^], as there are a lot of experienced ISV people there, too. FWIW we're self funded as well, albeit not as far down the line as John's company (we incorporated in July 2004, and made our first sale in December 2005). Good luck with your venture. :rose:
Anna :rose: Linting the day away :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "If mushy peas are the food of the devil, the stotty cake is the frisbee of God"
Thanks Anna, I visit Joel on Software on the odd occassion. Its cool.
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We've always had a smallish overdraft for unexpected circumstances and to get us through the odd slow month here and there. We never took out an actual loan or any direct business financing. We worked doing networking support for a variety of businesses and I got tired of it and started doing contract programming for different businesses in the town we were in at the time. It was very stressful dealing with so many different people all the time all who had wildly different sets of expectations and wanted everything on extremely short notice. Mostly I got tired of starting from scratch over and over on new projects. I was getting paid to write software from nothing over and over again but I never really had total control over it and the stuff people would ask for or the way they wanted it done often didn't make a lot of sense but they insisted. I did learn a *lot* though about usability in dealing directly with the end users onsite often having to redo elements of an interface at the job site while the people (often the office ladies) all stood around and threw their 2 cents in. I had made some software years before that we used for our own network and computer support business to track service because there was nothing remotely affordable at the time and it occurred to me one day that rather than doing all the contract programming I had a good product already that just needed some tweaks to get it into a saleable version we could sell over the internet. The idea of writing software how *I* wanted it to be and writing it once but selling it over and over again just made all kinds of sense. So I dropped as much of the contract programming as I could while everyone else continued doing the network support, we had some pretty big clients in the oil and gas industry as well as the local hospital, some law firms etc which freed me up to work at it almost full time. There's no way I could have worked on the software product and did anything else at the same time. It was just way too much time required. I'd program for 14 hours straight as it was while also doing tech support by email, writing the manual and marketing and website and everything pretty much other than the bookkeeping. We decided early on that we would spend no more money on the software business than it could raise on it's own after the initial investment of my time and a small amount of money for the website and the initial marketing. Initially I released with very few features but at a very rock bottom price. As time wen
Thanks John, There is a lot to be learnt from your reply. We are especially guilty of geeking out instead of doing the mundane yet profitable work. It is just great to know that it is possible for a coding geek to also acquire business skills.
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Just don't forget the golden rule: you're in business to make money first happy customers second and software third. :) You're not doing your customers any favors if you go belly up because you didn't cover yourself first.
When everyone is a hero no one is a hero.
I do the books so I doubt I'll ever let our Board forget that! ;)
Anna :rose: Linting the day away :cool: Anna's Place | Tears and Laughter "If mushy peas are the food of the devil, the stotty cake is the frisbee of God"