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singer

411 karma · joined July 15, 2009

Mike@SingersCreations.com

My work: http://HackersDaily.com http://SnappyCheckout.com http://SingersCreations.com

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singer··on Ask HN: What to work on?
30x500 teaches two things: 1) How to uncover real problems that people are wiling to pay you to resolve 2) How to speak to those people in words they can understand (like 30x500.com speaks to people who don't know what to build).

The classes are live, but are basically just a series of pre-recorded videos that you watch along with your classmates and have limited time to discuss afterwards. Nearly everything done outside of that class (if you choose to pay extra) is an automated series of emails that you work on alone.

The teachers (Amy & Alex) are night and day. Amy is the ringleader. She is very pig-headed and will not tolerate ideas that do not fall inline with hers. She is quick to belittle people in front of the entire class and has zero patience. Alex is very helpful, easy-going, and open to exploring all ideas. Both seem to be extremely busy outside of the 30x500 world (with other businesses, vacations, and/or personal activities), so don't expect much interaction with them outside of the live classes. They are quick to respond up until the point where you've paid. But, their interest drops off pretty steeply after that point.

Is this a scam? No. But, it's not a silver bullet either. It does teach a few important concepts that are probably not so obvious to many people. The real trick is figuring out how to apply them yourself.

I think this class would be best delivered as an eBook -- since the teachers seem to want to fully automate most of it anyhow. I'm guessing live classes have more money-making potential though.

Note: I took this class in February. Amy kicked me out mid-course for no apparent reason (she would not respond to me, so I really don't know). I had to contact my credit card company to dispute the charge and get a refund. The little bit of knowledge that I did gain was surely not worth the time, money, or hassle involved. Buyer beware.

singer··on Product Hunt Is in Current Y Combinator Batch
Ever try emailing founders instead? I wonder if you'd get a better and/or faster response.

Perhaps you could require your product submitters to insert the contact email for the products they are submitting. Then, you could auto email the founder as soon as their product is posted on Product Hunt.

singer··on Product Hunt Is in Current Y Combinator Batch
I don't know that this is true for Show HN posts (since it's a comparable product). It seems most Show HN's are posted by the creators. And Product Hunt is the other way around because most creators are not allowed to post there.
singer··on Show HN: Hackers Daily – Get all Show HN posts emailed to you daily
I don't have any long term plans right now, but I'm always open to investigating all business opportunities. I'm not working on any new features at the moment. Those will most likely come about as people start making suggestions.
singer··on Show HN: Hackers Daily – Get all Show HN posts emailed to you daily
I often don't have time to check out Show HN posts in real-time. So, I built this app to email myself a daily list of yesterday's Show HN posts. It's ordered by points, easy to read via email, and links directly back to HN for easy access to the posts I want to learn more about.
singer··on Ask HN: Which service do you use to sell downloads?
Snappy Checkout has an icon to mark an item as shipped. Check it out here:

https://www.snappycheckout.com/images/itemshipped.png

singer··on Ask HN: Which service do you use to sell downloads?
People use a second service because PayPal does not offer such a feature.
singer··on Ask HN: Which service do you use to sell downloads?
The page (at the above link) with the various pricing options is the only page that is using Snappy Checkout. Inside of the Snappy Checkout admin, I added four products -- so each could have a separate price. And there is a buy button linked to each product.

Pricing for Snappy Checkout is the same no matter how many tiers your item has. It's 2.9% plus $0.30 (for Stripe/PayPal) and 2% or $0.50 (whichever is less) for Snappy Checkout's fee.

If I did not answer your question, then please email me at Mike@SnappyCheckout.com with some more details.

singer··on Ask HN: Which service do you use to sell downloads?
Pricing appears on the main page twice -- "You only pay the standard credit card processing fee — plus either 2% or 50¢ per sale". I tried to make it as easy as possible, but it gets a little complicated if you're using Stripe and PayPal -- due to the way the Snappy Checkout fee is charged.
singer··on Ask HN: Which service do you use to sell downloads?
You can do that in Snappy Checkout by creating separate products. Here's an example of where I do that with one of my products:

https://www.SingersCreations.com/WeatherWatcherLive/Pricing

singer··on Ask HN: Which service do you use to sell downloads?
https://SnappyCheckout.com allows you to accept Stripe and/or PayPal.
singer··on Ask HN: Which service do you use to sell downloads?
My service (https://snappycheckout.com) offers a Stripe Checkout like experience and allows you to sell files from Dropbox. It costs 2% or $0.50 (whichever is less) per sale (plus the usual Stripe/PayPal fees).
singer··on Show HN: Add Stripe Checkout to your website in 5 minutes (without programming)
I created an easy way for people to add a Stripe Checkout payment form to their website. It works like this:

* Connect your Stripe account via Stripe Connect

* Build the checkout by filling in a form

* Add a single line of JavaScript to your website to show the Stripe Checkout payment button

This is more geared toward those people who do not know how to program -- or those who do not want to spend time developing their own solution.

Here are some things it can do:

* Allow you to build a Stripe Checkout payment form using all available options

* See a preview of your checkout as you're building it

* Collect payments in any currency supported by Stripe

* Subscribe customers to your Stripe subscription plan

* Show a message and/or redirect your customers to another URL upon purchase

The cost is 25¢ per sale. This fee is automatically taken out of your Stripe earnings before you receive them.

See more details here: https://www.snappycheckout.com/stripecheckout

singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
I'm working on it. Please send me an email if you need help with anything in the meantime.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
Every other payment processor charges a percentage -- agreed. So, it seems people have no choice right now. They are going to pay a percentage no matter where they go.

I'm open to pricing suggestions. I was just trying to do what I thought was reasonable.

If you (or anyone else) want to work out some kind of X% for less expensive transactions, then send me an email and we can work something out. I'm willing to discuss matching whatever Gumroad or anyone offering similar checkout products is charging.

singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
It seems someone loses either way. Charge a flat fee and small transactions are more expensive. Charge a percentage and large transactions are more expensive. I suppose you could do some combination of both, but that would make the pricing more complicated to understand.

I don't know about everyone else, but I would care if I was being charged X% to sell a $200 item -- even more so if there were options to pay a flat fee.

singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
Always be shipping :)
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
Thanks for the suggestion! I'll look into it.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
I'm not concerned about it... if this was directed toward me. I guess it could become a problem if I release a product named Snappy Support though.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
After adding a product in the "Products" section of the admin, click the link icon to the right of your product to see the available linking options. You can add a link to your website or link your customers to your checkout at snappycheckout.com.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
I would think anyone who has an online store would want their checkout to work in all web browsers. IE just happens to have a pretty plain looking window that works best for screenshots where the window is not important :)
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
Thanks... and noted. Custom checkout fields are on my to-do list.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
You can use Stripe only, PayPal only, or Stripe + PayPal. When using PayPal only, you cannot collect subscription payments -- due to the limitations of the way I'm using PayPal.

Snappy Checkout shows prices in USD no matter which of the 3 above pricing options you choose. So, it is currently limited in that way.

singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
And it's more convenient than trying to use Stripe & PayPal separately. There are also features (like fraud detection, digital delivery, etc.) that Stripe & PayPal do not offer -- and probably never will.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
Right! And for those people who do not want to spend the time coding/maintaining their own system.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
Makes sense. I'm all for making things easier. There is no reason why I could not charge the 50 cents for Stripe charges immediately. And, then come back and charge 50 cents for any PayPal transactions (if any) at the end of the month.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
That would be possible. Just link the Facebook image to the link that points to the checkout at snappycheckout.com.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
- I have no plans to host downloads. Dropbox, S3, etc. live and breathe that stuff. I think Dropbox is easier for the average person to setup, so I chose to go with them.

- Hosted checkout pages -- like a form directly in your website?

- The dunning emails cannot be edited right now. It's on my to-do list. I'd be happy to email anyone a sample of the format I'm using right now.

- There are no API docs right now. I'm working on it. If anyone is interested, please let me know and I will send you a full list of calls available.

- Snappy Checkout is surely new, but I've been writing software on the Internet for quite some time now. If you want to stalk me, try Googling things like "Singer's Creations", "Weather Watcher", or "Mike Singer".

singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
Are you referring to selling digital photos? If so, you can sell any kind of file with Snappy Checkout.
singer··on Show HN: Snappy Checkout – Stripe Checkout with full-featured dashboard, admin
Isn't Shopify mostly targeting people who want to sell multiple items via a shopping cart and/or host their product website at Shopify?
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