limedaring

Author of Hello Web App here — thanks for recommending! I actually moved the entire tutorial online recently, you can read it for free here: https://hellowebbooks.com/tutorial/

It's written in a way to help you build something unique, which might help your issue, OP. Basically I walk through building a "collection of things," which you can alter to create something like a Twitter clone, a directory, a blog, a store, etc.

Happy to help, send me an email tracy@hellowebbooks.com anytime. :)

Could you try to build up confidence by speaking at smaller/tiny groups that are on your side (peers, friends) and work your way upwards? Counteract the terrible feedback from those managers (ugh, sorry that happened to you) with more positive and welcoming feedback from friends before you move onto strangers.

For https://hellowebapp.com, it was running Kickstarter campaigns to promote the books. It's a really effective way to do a "pre-order" campaign for the book, start a lot of conversations, and start building my email list (not to mention getting a chunk of money that replaced a traditional advance a publisher could give.)

For https://weddinglovely.com, I work with small businesses and running the weddings blog has been our biggest marketing win. Our businesses send us content, which we publish, getting traffic and also cementing our relationship with the submitting business. We've also started getting significant affiliate revenue ($2k+ mo) from past articles we've written.

I'm the author of Hello Web App (http://hellowebapp.com) and I'm currently in the middle of writing Hello Web Design (http://hellowebdesignbook.com), which I just finished a Kickstarter campaign for last month.

Non-fiction books, self-published (I do the design for them as well).

Justin Jackson — https://devmarketing.xyz/ and https://tinymarketingwins.com/

Here's hoping! Travel wise it might be hard — all my sessions were denied this year so it's a lot harder to attend. But still might happen. :)

Nice to see this here! I'm the author, happy to answer any questions anyone has.

Some amazing non-male developers:

— Jen Simmons: http://labs.jensimmons.com/

— Julia Evans: https://jvns.ca/

— Lea Verou: http://lea.verou.me/

— Mina Markham: http://mina.codes/

— Sara Soueidan: https://sarasoueidan.com/articles/

— Sarah Mei: http://www.sarahmei.com/blog/

— Ana Tudor: https://thebabydino.github.io/

— Anna Debenham: http://www.maban.co.uk/

I think you'll like Hello Web Design then, since my number one push is for shortcuts and easy guidelines to remember, then teach a bit about the theory and fundamentals (usually taught the opposite way and shortcuts are usually not taught at all).

Check out my article, which gives a little preview of the content: https://medium.com/@limedaring/design-for-non-designers-part...

Aw yay! Super proud of that talk, it's my favorite. :)

I'm the author of the article, happy to answer any questions anyone has!

I'm the author, happy to answer any questions anyone has!

Also, here's the presentation I gave at View Source Berlin, which is a pretty good start to the information I will be going over in the book: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsPrhA_m6ss

I have an Art & Design degree with a graphic design concentration, and nowadays I'm a designer/developer/entrepreneur/bit of everything.

I wrote a post quite a bit ago about my process learning how to code: https://limedaring.com/articles/im-a-designer-who-learned-dj...

I'm using PrintNinja (http://printninja.com) - they also do the printing for me, and they've been phenomenal. Great quality, reasonable prices, absolutely stellar customer service. The fulfillment is relatively new, and they're still working out the kinks, but I really like working with them so it's nice having only one company for both aspects.

So the year they were wrote (first book came out May 2015, second book in Dec 2015), I made $15k profit. Mainly because I did two Kickstarters for the books + the launch campaigns. Of course, 2015 (and a bit of 2014) was when I was spending time writing/designing/editing/publishing the books, so "profit" would be lower if you include my time.

This year, other than answering questions on my book's discussion forum as well as running a couple workshops for PyCon and DjangoCon, has been largely writing-free so it would truly be 13k in profit. :)

Thanks for the compliment!

Through the Django and Python community, primarily -- they've been super supportive. The second book was aimed at folks who've completed the DjangoGirl's tutorial.

I wrote Hello Web App and Hello Web App: Intermediate Concepts (http://hellowebapp.com, they're learn-to-build-a-web-app books using Django) and self-published both in 2015.

Just checked and this year I've made about $13,000 in profit. It's mostly passive — this year I started using a fulfillment company so the majority of my work is sending them orders (and answering questions about the book.)

Hoping to continue the trend next year by launching a book on teaching design for engineers (http://hellowebdesignbook.com).

I'm biased (this is my husband's website) but I like the conciseness of https://shazow.net/ a lot.

Immediately after the Kickstarter ends, so early October. :)

Yay! Thanks a ton. Really looking forward to getting the second book out.

I released a book teaching beginner Django web app development: http://hellowebapp.com

Sure, it was quite a bit of work beforehand, but I've made around $25,000 from it so far, around $13,000 if you don't count the Kickstarter campaign.

The first book working so well is one of the reasons why I'm writing a followup book (which is fundraising on Kickstarter now: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1868398473/hello-web-ap...)

FYI: The best thing I did when releasing a book was to a have a super-tier with screencasts and videos. That one tier provides ~60% of the revenue from the sales of the book.

Oh, apologies - I got good feedback on the last Show HN and I wasn't aware of these rules!

This chapter will appear in the new Hello Web App: Intermediate Concepts book: https://hellowebapp.com/news/tutorial-setting-up-a-contact-f...

I also have a sample of the first book here: http://hellowebapp.com/sample

Sorry I missed those guidelines! Hopefully the above helps out.

I'm really happy to hear that! The 12 month delay really made me feel terrible, and I got a lot of (justified) emails asking me what was up and why I hadn't delivered yet. I'm actually considering a Kickstarter campaign for the next book (not announced yet, shh) but this time I'm not running the campaign until the first draft is actually completed, so I can actually have reasonable launch dates. :) Thanks for being a backer!

Another personal datapoint — I wrote a book and funded it on Kickstarter as well (similarly named: Hello Web App) and mine was 12 months delayed. Producing a book was definitely way harder than I anticipated, esp. as I am used to the fast-turnaround times of producing something for the web. Additionally, printing alone took two months which was surprising.

I'm lucky in that wedding vendors primarily work online, so they're always on email. Other businesses in other verticals, probably not. This vertical was a good fit for me because I would do anything to avoid making a phone call (too introverted for that.)

I honestly don't remember my success rate as it's been a long while, but I want to say it was at least 25%. Keep in mind I was pitching a free product that vendors are already used to (there are TONS of wedding vendor directories.)

As for scaling, no idea. Some CRMs allow you to mass-send email but I worry about those - feels scummy, though maybe I should just get over that feeling and try it out.

Good luck!

Thanks!

Yeah — not in awhile though! About four years ago I wrote a few articles about looking for a cofounder and then about learning how to code and launching the site myself that got popular here. Good memory.

Happy to answer any questions anyone has about bootstrapping, running a marketplace, trying and failing to raise money, etc.!

Happy to answer any questions anyone has about editorial design or self-publishing! I posted my pre-order/launch revenue numbers earlier here, some great discussions and questions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9847965