#19: Selling three no-code side projects for 30K!

2022 has been a great year for us, we launched "The Hustlers" in August, and it's been an amazing experience bringing the story of 18 side hustlers to you. Today, for the last edition of the year 2022, we bring you the story of a hustler who made the most of this year with

🚀Three side project exits

🤑Earning a total of $30K from the acquisitions

🤩Launching his micro-VC studio

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From Analyst to Micro-SaaS Entrepreneur: Domenico's journey of 3 side-project exits in 2022

Domenico Gagliardi is an Economics graduate with a passion for entrepreneurship. He attempted to build a startup right after university but failed twice. The failures were a learning milestone that taught him how to build products and work effectively with people. Currently, Domenico works as a Business Analyst for a Mexican fintech company in Italy while studying international finance as his second degree and running a micro SaaS studio. The failure experience did not deter him. Instead made him want to take smaller steps. But he could not find any way until he became active on Twitter at the end of 2021.

Our inspiration meter is at 100% after coming across this story. Let's see how with the power of social media, challenging himself and no code, Domenico went on to sell three side projects and set up a micro SaaS studio!

Beginning with a challenge to sell a project in 30 days

2022 brought a new opportunity for Domenico. Being active on Twitter paid off, and he came across a Twitter challenge, #BuildSell30. The entrepreneur in him got excited and decided to build one side project every month. He also found a partner, Tanveer, to collaborate with him in this challenge he signed up for.

Domenico and Tanveer had to build and sell something in 30 days. To do so, they had to execute very fast. Domenico had known about the rise of no-code tools. They understood that to build fast, no code was the way. 

The next step was to get an idea. Both had worked at startups and had observed that most pitch decks had similar elements, and the process of creating them could be made faster. They decided to build an automatic pitch deck creator with information like the startup name, market, team, problem, and solution. They built it on Bubble and shipped the website in one week.

The product, Pitch 2.0, reached more than 100 users in a few weeks and had three paid users too. The revenue was little (less than $150), but the joy of building the first side project together was great. Following the challenge rule of building and selling in 30 days, they listed the project on MicroAcquire, and voila- Pitch 2.0 got sold in February for $4000!

Success leads to more success - Journey of building and selling two more products

Domenico realised that 12 projects in a year were not a sustainable challenge for him. Instead, he should focus on building a few good projects. Tanveer and Domenico loved the experience of building Pitch 2.0 together, so they decided to build another product.

As a business analyst, Domenico spent most of his day with numbers and excel. He wanted something that could translate text into formulas. They decided to build it with GPT-3. The MVP for OneTap (now Lumelixr) was built in a day. They shared the MVP with a niche audience of excel users, got feedback and improved the product before launching. In just two months, OneTap reached more than 500 users and generated a revenue of $5K. After the initial revenue, OneTap was listed on Microacquire and was sold for $23000 by the end of June.

The third product built by Domenico and Tanveer was yourcoverletter.com. The duo came across the insight that cover letters are still important, but candidates are unable to write a good cover letter because you need one for every job they apply for. By now, Domenico and Tanveer were power users of GPT-3 and decided to build a tool to generate cover letters according to the job description using AI. Post-launch, Yourcoverletter was able to garner 300 users and revenue of around $300 initially.

All the products built by the hustler duo were built with no code in a minimal time. The marketing efforts were also all organic, mainly focused on Reddits, niche communities and social media. 

After selling two products, the duo realised that acquisition was not just a game of revenue. The product's idea and future possibilities mattered a lot too. This is why you see many pre-revenue projects on Microacquire too. While Tanveer and Domenico's partnership was going great, Domenico wanted to move in a different direction and sold his stake in Yourcoverletter to Tanveer for $3500.

Setting up a micro-Saas studio

The journey of building three side projects introduced Domenico to a world where micro-Saas was thriving.

Learnings of our Hustler: Micro SaaS as a side hustle

With unique, actionable insights into the world of Micro SaaS, Domenico launched a micro-startup studio called Omega in August 2022. Omega started with a vision of building, scaling and selling micro-saas from scratch. And the first product launch was AI Alfred, an AI tool that can summarise web articles using the article’s URL. With a soft launch, AI Alfred has 100 users. Domenico is perfecting the model before monetizing AI Alfred.

In a year, Domenico has earned around $30000 from his three side project exits and is working on a new vision for Omega to turn it into a Micro-VC concept, focused on the acquisitions of micro-saas, and creating a monthly positive cash flow.

Hustlers Insights of the Week

Collaborate: Building side projects is not easy, and most of the time, we lose motivation and cannot follow through with our plans. In a tough journey, having a partner helps immensely. The two of you have accountability for each other, and even the task can be easily divided and managed. All three side projects built by Domenico have been in collaboration, which helped him ship fast and efficiently.

Challenge yourself: A challenge brings our intrinsic motivation to do something, and we are more likely to achieve the goal. Domenico was aware of the no-code tools for a while, but only after he participated in the Twitter challenge did he use it to build something. Challenging yourself is an amazing driving force to start with your side project. 

Experiment and find what works best: Every hustler has a different way of assessing their success and what ways work best for them. Building and selling in quick succession worked great for Domenico because he liked to work on a new problem every 2-3 months. But his partner wanted to focus on a project for longer, and they decided to follow their paths. You need to experiment and find what works best for you.

Like the story?

Share your learnings on Twitter and let more people know how they can build a micro-SaaS.

You can also share it with a friend to increase the surface area of knowledge so that more people can know how to make money.

Also, know anyone (who is making money from their side hustle while having a full-time job) we should feature? Let us know by replying, and we will get chatting!

Side Hustle Stack of the week

A new section to give you an overview of the tools & resources our Hustlers used to build their side hustle.

1. Bubble: Bubble is a low-code platform that allows users to quickly create fully-functional web and mobile applications without needing to write any code. With Bubble, users can use a drag-and-drop interface to create entire applications with an extensive library of plugins and integrations. Bubble Apps are cloud-hosted and range from simple websites to complex platforms.

2. OpenAI: OpenAI is the company behind AI models like GPT-3 & Dall-E. They have APIs that can be integrated with Bubble or through code to get AI capabilities in any application.

3. SCRUM Planning: Time management for side projects is critical. Domenico dedicated at least one hour every day to the side projects and used SCRUM Planning to manage his time.

Resources of the week

We are introducing a new section where we will recommend a newsletter or resource you should check out to start your side hustle journey.

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It's been great to have shared these stories with you. As we close the year, we would love to know what have your learnings been from 2022. Just reply and let us know.

From the team at Hustlers, we wish you Happy Holidays and a very Happy New Year! We will be back with the story of another Hustler in January 2023.