Last August, I was looking for a startup idea I could grow and made a MVP in a week then launched it. I received the $200,000 wire from the buyer a couple of days ago

I found tons of useful info online for free, so I hope this can be my way of giving back :)

Here is some background:

Idea

I got the idea when trying to write a tweet using Google Doc's transcription tool, which was terrible. I was pretty sure I wasn't the only one too lazy to type, I made my own solution using AI to transcribe and reformat voice notes into any kind of content. I called it Talknotes, mainly because it was the only domain available lol

Validation:

My rule is to only reinvest what the project generates. After listing on startup directories and posting on Twitter, I generated $700 in 10 days. It wasn't much, but enough to show interest and keep me motivated.

I added user-requested features, but the launch effect wore off, and daily revenues dropped to $0 after a few weeks. I almost gave up, but friends encouraged me to continue.

In October, I launched on ProductHunt and it blew up. It became Product of the Day and reached $1500 MRR thanks to media coverage.

I initially built everything using vanilla JS/CSS/HTML + Node for backend. But it's pretty limited for apps with lots of interactivity so, I rebuilt the app using Nuxt.js to make it easier to ship new features.

Then, I launched ads on Facebook and I implemented a feedback loop:

1. Get new users
2. Learn about them through onboarding
3. Make more ads based on onboarding data

This doubled MRR in about 2 months.

Burnout and Sale: In May, I had a bad burnout after emergency bug fixes. This made it hard to work on the app after. At this point MRR was around $7000 and total revenues around $70,0000

I listed it on Acquire.com for $200,000, a very good price for the buyer considering revenues and growth. I could've gotten $300,000 with buyer financing or earn-outs, but I wanted cash, $200,000 today is better than $300,000 in a year.

Everything was smooth until we tried using Escrow, which almost fucked up the deal (details here). Long story short, had to threaten them to make a sponsored post on Twitter explaining what they did + legal action. They sent the refund the very next day, and we completed the transfer directly.

Now, this isn't an overnight success. It's the result of 7 years of grind. I launched over 40 projects since I started, and most of them failed. I often worked 100 hours per week, and I rarely go out or meet many people. It's not for everyone, but I'm fine with it

With the profit from the app + sale, and other projects, I have close to 1/3 of a million dollar. I could retire in Asia if I wanted

Just mind blowing to think I wrote funny characters in a code editor and sold it for the price of a house lol

Edit 1:

A few people got confused. I said it's 7 years of grind and most of my projects failed, not that I was not making money. I also said I OFTEN worked 100h/week, not every week :)

Since I learned to code 2 years ago I've made close to $400k from my app's profit + exit (this one + another one for $65k last year). And before that I was making money as a marketing freelancer.

Also, I dropped after high-school, so, I had to learn everything from scratch, it takes time!

Edit 2:

Lots of people asked how/where I learned to code in 2 months. I wrote a blog/journal about it back then with links to resources, you can find it here if you're interested