招募中创始书business / entrepreneurship
Indie SaaS, from $0
Solo founders on how they got their first paying customers.
Solo founders on how they got their first paying customers.
Problem to Solve
The honest version of "how I got my first paying customers" is hard to find. What's online is mostly polished success stories or courses for sale. The parts that would actually help, the real numbers, the months nothing moved, the things that went wrong, usually stay private.
Unique Value
This is a collection of first-person accounts from people who did it themselves: built a small software product on their own and got it to its first paying customers. Each chapter is one founder, in their own words, with the numbers most write-ups leave out. No theory, no "10 steps to $10k MRR."
What You'll Gain
An honest look at what reaching first revenue actually takes, from the inside: what they built, what they charged, what worked, what didn't, and what they'd do differently. Not a formula to copy, but real accounts to learn from and measure yourself against.
People post these honest little write-ups all the time: how they got their first customers, what it really cost, what they'd do differently. Then the post scrolls away. We think a handful of them, side by side, would make a book worth keeping. If you've been through it, we'd like your chapter.
Most startup books are one author looking back. This is a group of founders, each telling their own first-revenue story, numbers and all.
This is an open anthology, so the outline stays light on purpose. We start the book; the contributors write it. Each chapter is one founder's own story, shaped and written by them, not by us. The slots below fill in as contributors join, and every chapter follows the same short shape: who you are, where you started, what you did, the numbers, what went wrong, and what you'd tell someone starting out.
You built a small software product and got real paying customers, not just signups or a launch page. It can be a micro-SaaS, plugin, automation, paid tool, or side project that became a product. Bring the first-revenue story: what you built, who paid, how you found them, what you charged, what failed, what the numbers looked like, and what you would do differently.
You shape the book as a real anthology, not a stack of launch posts. You decide which first-revenue stories belong, set the chapter order, push contributors for prices, channels, conversion, failed experiments, support work, and real numbers, and keep each chapter useful without turning it into a growth thread. You copyedit, proofread, ask follow-ups, and protect each founder's voice.
You help a founder turn a messy early-revenue story into a chapter people can follow. You interview, read notes or product pages when needed, ask for the missing dates, prices, traffic, first customers, failed channels, costs, churn, refunds, and support details, then draft in the founder's voice. You revise with them until the chapter feels accurate, not polished into a startup myth.
This book is initiated by ThePeopleBook, a platform for collaborative nonfiction. Our role is to organize the book and bring its contributors together; the writing is theirs. We do not present ourselves as founders or experts in this field; that experience belongs to the people who built these products. We are starting this book to gather, in one place, first-hand accounts of reaching first revenue, written by those who did it. This book is currently seeking a lead. As the team forms, the role, along with full authority over the book, will be transferred to a suitable contributor. Those interested may write to [email protected].
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