How I launched a profitable minimally viable product in 3 hours

http://blog.amirkhella.com/2010/09/21/the-story-of-keynotopia-how-i-launched-a-profitable-product-in-3-hours/

by amirkhella • 16 years ago

197 57 16 years ago

blog.amirkhella.com

please• 16 years ago

but did it only last for 30 minutes? Error 500 - Internal server error

An internal server error has occured! Please try again later.

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

Sorry about that - 1and1 is totally unreliable as a host, and is collapsing under the HN effect.

Reload it a couple of times and it should work.

jhuckestein• 16 years ago

If a server cannot handle the "HN effect", you should probably host nothing there. Unless of course it's not only the server's fault ;)

dangrossman• 16 years ago

That's a nice looking site for a $35 template. Any chance you're willing to share where it's from?

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

The theme is called inFocus. I purchased it from ThemeForest.net

rcavezza3• 16 years ago

Can someone post a text summary or the post in its entirety? I found the site url on google, but couldn't cache it from before the site went down.

nopal• 16 years ago

Coral cache is working: http://blog.amirkhella.com.nyud.net/2010/09/21/the-story-of-...

rcavezza3• 16 years ago

Thanks

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

Working on creating a static HTML file for the post

unohoo• 16 years ago

have you tried pricing variations ? You might be leaving money on the table if there's such an incredible demand.

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

That's a very good point. I had some pricing variations in the beginning and the one I have now is at the sweet spot.

One of the most interesting moves was to add a company license (a friend suggested it and it took less than 10 minutes to add it. It sold several copies to date.

I am planning an update that should position the product at the right value/price point.

rcavezza3• 16 years ago

I was really looking forward to learning how the product was built, how the payment processor was set up so quickly, the tools used, and how he was able to build the product so fast.

Most of the post was actually about dealing with the uncertainties of launching a product before you're comfortable with it and being pleasantly surprised by the results.

There's very little information on the process of how Amir launched it in three hours except using paypal and buying a $35 theme from themeforest - I'd like to hear more about this in a feature post.

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

Sure. If enough folks want to dig into this much detail, I'd be happy to put together an in-depth write-up.

palish• 16 years ago

Yes.

patio112• 16 years ago

You'd be surprised how often nuts&bolts issues stop people from starting. I was mildly mystified by "Set up website, collect money, deliver software" prior to starting, too. Turns out it is trivial, but that was not obvious prior to doing it. (Relatedly: taxes, bookkeeping, accounting, and government regulation were all walks in the park. Marketing is hard. Who knew?)

curyous• 16 years ago

Please do a step-by-step write up, it would mean a lot to me to help me get started.

dmitri1981• 16 years ago

Yes, please

rmc• 16 years ago

My guess is that the nuts and bolts problems aren't actually that big. Most people Just Don't Start™.

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

That's exactly right. I really don't think I did anything new or special here. My biggest challenge was to stop thinking about it and do it.

bvi2• 16 years ago

The blog post says nothing about how you launched your product in 3 hours.

Slightly misleading, perhaps?

shazow• 16 years ago

Sounds more like "How I built, refined, and publicized a free trial of my product for months, then released the paid version in 3 hours."

HeyLaughingBoy• 16 years ago

Which is also a pretty effective business model!

kwellman• 16 years ago

You seem to be referring to the web site as the "minimally viable product" not including the actual product that you're selling on the site.

You don't mention how long it took to actually build the templates that you're selling.

Three hours is still impressive and inspiring, but I imagine there was a lot more work leading up to that point.

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

Correct- The product itself has been created over time, as a byproduct of my day job. But it wasn't a product until I put together that MVP website.

sahillavingia2• 16 years ago

How much time was spent working on the project afterwards though? I built an app "in a week" (http://oneweekapp.com/) which went on to generate a decent passive income for me, but since then I've spent far far more than a week on it.

I'd be really curious to know more details, specifically on the payment end (doesn't that take more than 3 hours by itself to set up?).

golgo13• 16 years ago

The app looks cool. Looks like you deserve more than 3 stars (as of 2010-09-21)

sahillavingia2• 16 years ago

Thanks, it's mainly cause it crashes a lot. The update I just submitted should fix a lot of it.

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

OneWeekApp looks pretty cool! I spent a couple of hours a day afterward to do testing, upgrade the templates, and improve copy.

cloudkj• 16 years ago

Looks pretty similar to the Four Hour Work Week muse model touted by Tim Ferris and co. Attractive product page (Wordpress theme), informational product (software templates), outsourced commerce pipeline (e-junkie). Only thing is that he didn't need to use paid ads to drive traffic, since he led with a blog post that led to subscriptions, which meant he already had a customer base. Cool stuff.

curtisspope• 16 years ago

Thanks man, I know what this is like

madridorama• 16 years ago

what plugin are you using to handle ejunkie requests inside of wordpress? does ejunkie manage sales through paypal and google checkout? do they provide good tracking?

I am curious how viable ejunkie + wordpress are as a basic and simple ecommerce platform

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

No plugin. Just their HTML script for each shopping cart item that I embed in product pages.

They manage sales through PP and GC, and they even hold delivery on eCheck payments until they are cleared.

I think eJunkie + Wordpress make a great duo for eCommerce platforms.

danielnicollet• 16 years ago

Are you still growing the product and company, and yes, as shazow says, sounds like you put a lot more than 3 hours into it... Don't take this the wrong way but are you baiting us because your traffic to Keynotopia is falling?

allenp• 16 years ago

Can you comment on the impact the affiliate program has had on your sales?

barfoomoo• 16 years ago

Any quick SEO tips?

amirkhella14• 16 years ago

Help me put together a useful in-depth follow-up post by leaving a reply to this comment with a couple of questions that you'd like me to answer.

Charuru• 16 years ago

I would like to know what a blog post like this does for sales.

paulsingh3• 16 years ago

I'd love to write a blog post about this, but you don't have any contact info on your profile or site. You can contact via me email (it's on my profile) if you're interested.

rada• 16 years ago

You have an error on your link building website:

We never buy links or use links farms. We find relevant, diverse links and build them nauturally.

nauturally -> naturally

How I launched a profitable minimally viable product in 3 hours

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