Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 23/05/2025Since reaching DR70, I get ~40 backlink requests in my inbox every day (they go to a special super spam). Many of them inquire about my rates for inserting a backlink. This would be dumb to do, but if I converted 25% of these for $25 (cheaper end). 20 BL x 30d x $25 = $15k MRR 220
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 03/03/2025Good way to find out what *not* to build is taking a quick glance at acquire.com and checking what the majority of low-revenue listings are about. Used to be – web3 crypto apps, "chat to a PDF", LLM chat UIs. Now: writing assistants, video + image generators, . ..acquire.comBuy & Sell Profitable Online Businesses | Acquire.comBuy or sell a profitable online business in as little as 90 days. 500k+ qualified buyers, 1,000s of vetted listings. M&A advisory, legal help, escrow, & more. 190
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 05/02/2025A year ago, a founder reached out to recruit me as CTO for their competing app. They had just raised $7M and she had over 250k followers on LinkedIn + lots of HR contacts. In her words, they were going to "crush me in 18 months" if I didn't join. Checked their website today 🤭 1150
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 31/01/2025Meh, I'd be surprised if failure rates in marketplaces and SaaS wouldn't be eerily similar. Someone that's engulfed in the surfing community and has contacts at major surfing shops makes a decision to run a surfboard rental marketplace vs. a B2B surf shop management SaaS. Who wins? Even odds imo 020
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 31/01/2025It's the common super recycled advice, but honestly in 2025 I see fewer people make money with half-baked boilerplate-course-microSaaS combos than I do with a proper marketplace... One of my mentees who runs a surfing marketplace just broke $1M ARR 020
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 31/01/2025I'm assuming there must be 1000s of these, but is there an API that lets me make a call to any of the leading AI APIs with the same syntax + pick the model based on a flag / per best availability / cheapest etc? 230
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 31/01/2025This is coming from someone who built a B2C talent marketplace, simply because he didn't know any better. 020
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 31/01/2025While I love the indie startup scene, I'm not keen on building "easy build, hard grow" startups. Founders outside of the bubble try their luck at marketplaces, ecommerce and hardware – and stumble on $$$ doing so. They don't know what is deemed "too hard" so they just try it. 290
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 27/01/2025What's the easiest way to get a small batch of books printed (or print-on-demand)? I bring text and images, their tool lays it out well (or lets me lay it out). High-quality binding and paper choice. 240
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 16/01/2025Current obsession: Designing in the digital world, and bringing those creations into the physical world. i.e. 3D printing, working with CNC shops, PCBs etc. 140
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 13/01/2025Small tweaks I've been doing at MentorCruise over the past few months to make it better: - Small core team, with pro consultants (currently 50/50) - Focus on very few things, but nail them - I'm the only dev (only project dev hires as needed) - Delete (almost) every backlog 040
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 11/01/2025Thinking daily of the guy who installed our ceiling lamps. - Ranks #1 for "install lamps" - Calendly scheduling - Stripe pre-payment - $75 per lamp (all inclusive) - Only works in a 30km radius - Solo biz He told me he does 5-6 of these / day. 5 x ~4 lamps on average x $75 x 20 days = $30k/mo 5221
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 02/01/2025Hey, I'm getting DDOSed 👋 This happens every few days, large influx of requests from China from thousands of different IPs. They go until the site goes down or I go into Cloudflare's "Under attack mode". Anyone know the @Cloudflare setting to prevent this automatically? 3122
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 01/01/2025Crucial to find what type of creating suits you: inventing, tinkering, selling, designing, writing, filming. The easiest path to burning out is being pre-occupied with one type of creating, when another one suits you better. E.g. a tinkerer having to monetize and sell. 080
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 01/01/2025Indie startups make for horrible places to work for (no moonshot stocks, HR dept., or promotions & training) Most tend to attract pretty mediocre talent that burns them. Even more important as founders to make the offer sweet – great pay, bonuses, time off, flexibility & give responsibility early 170
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 30/12/2024PSA – Postmark's click tracking domain has been up and down the past few days. I reported it but got no response for a week (holidays, fair). Turn off click tracking or your users will see this... 140
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 20/12/2024Stripe is fine. We registered with VAT MOSS and use Taxjar to monitor the US. 010
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 20/12/2024- aggressive marketing towards small startups to reach compliance (who don't need it) - struggling with proper compliance themselves - charging 3x processing fees - bad mouthing all other solutions without nuance - paying / giving priority support to industry influencers to spread the word 120
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 20/12/2024The market is going up in flames, I don't care about the specific players. 100
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 20/12/2024Seeing the predatory MoR industry go up in flames when they've had shady business practises and have done more damage to small indie businesses than anyone else 💯 210
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 16/12/2024I was in the same boat a couple of years ago. It was when monicalent.com suggested that a small bootstrapped startup can "only afford A players" or will go down in flames. I totally agree now. Hire the best, or don't hire at all. 020
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 16/12/2024Whenever folks are frustrated about hiring for their startup, I'm looking at their team and they pick the $5/h outsourced freelancer on Upwork every single time. Folks, an investment in your team is an investment in yourself and your product. Hire THE BEST people you can. 3110
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 11/12/2024The "mature SaaS" effect is when you increase pricing and all metrics just keep looking better with every increase. 010
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 10/12/2024It's 2024, you make money by being early or doing something nobody else wants to. Sounds like an amazing idea, actually. The incumbent looks like ass and charges ~$200/mo minimum. www.dockmaster.comdockmaster.comMarina Management Software | Marina Software | DockMasterDiscover the power of marine management system by DockMaster. Simplify reservations, billing, and customer management. Explore our solution! 330
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 10/12/2024MentorCruise v1 was built on Django 1.11 and I just completed our 4.2.17 (LTS) upgrade. Fairly painless all around! Sign of a great ecosystem, imo 1110
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 09/12/2024It's all in the prompt – I can get it to essentially build fully self-contained features when giving it proper requirements. Same as you would to a mid-level freelancer. 120
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 09/12/2024Yeah, a bit shaky for my huge Django codebase, but an absolute game changer for a small Laravel site I'm building (haven't touched PHP/Laravel ever) 120
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 09/12/2024Yeah, currently at that stage with the VS Code / Cursor debugger. How tf is that thing supposed to work? 110
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 09/12/2024Finally fully switched to Cursor after 10yrs of Jetbrains / Pycharm. A lot of unlearning to do but I think I'm finally there. 7110
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 06/12/2024@switzerland invite me i wanna hang in osaka with the boys :( 110
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 06/12/2024Comparative, because I did ~18 months of in-person internships prior to this, and then my first "real" job remotely. It just wasn't as much of a disconnect as most people assume it to be. 010
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 05/12/2024Meh. My first real job was remote. I was able to learn the same if not more. You lose the sporadic in-person support and gain a ton of written documented knowledge. 140
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 03/12/2024Every day I'm praying on this clothing brand's downfall so I can nab their domain. 2140
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 01/12/2024I have a "best friends" / "met IRL" / "want to meet IRL" list on X that I use to engage religiously, but don't really want in the open. Seems like no option to do the same (have a private feed / private list) here on Bluesky? It's the #1 thing that keeps me from engaging more 050
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 01/12/2024MentorCruise revenue in Nov/Dec: 📉 Revenue -5% 📈 Pre-paid credit purchases +400% Everyone gearing up and locking in for 2025 I suppose. 040
Dominic Monn @dmonn.com · 01/12/2024December is either the best or worst month for SaaS, entirely depending on the industry you're in. 140
