Hit $400K as a solo founder (DesignJoy Update)

3 years ago DesignJoy was born with no money and no business plan, and of course - no team. Fast forward to today, only one of those things have changed - I now have 💰. Over the weekend, DesignJoy reached $400k in revenue. Here are some updates:

1. I recently put DesignJoy up for sale on MicroAquire, but quickly realized that DesignJoy was in no position to be aquired, though to date I've received well over 50 inquiries, with about 10 being semi-serious. Afterall, DesignJoy remains a solo-business. Once you remove me from the equation, the business ceases to operate. I'm in the process of removing DesignJoy from such platforms and focusing on running it as usual.

2. I finally took the time to update my "sample work" section on the website. Just about every prospect I spoke to prior to signing up requested additional work samples, and I had neglected that portion of my site for far too long. I still have more work to do in terms of uploading more samples but you can see my progress here: https://www.designjoy.co/our-work. I strongly believe this is the biggest selling point to DesignJoy, so I'm not sure why it has taken me this long to get this up.

3. I've streamlined my plan options. Previously, I had a lower priced plan that excluded such requests like branding and web design. Then, I had a higher priced plan that included all types of design requests. I have recently combined these into one plan as 99% of customers were choosing the higher priced plan anyway, which is good because there is far more margin there. It also simplifies the decision for a customer. In addition, I've added a Design + Webflow plan for those looking for both development + design. This is now double the price of my previously most expensive plan, and as it turns out, it's the new favorite. 🎉

4. I'm in the process of rebranding DesignJoy away from being an "unlimited design service". From my experience now working and speaking with hundreds of customers, it's apparent that clients are simply looking for a more affordable and accessible way of aquiring high quality design rather than an "unlimited" model. If anything, the term "unlimited" is confusing and lends itself to a lot of questions.

5. I'm in the process of cutting Memberstack at out the equation when it comes to payments. Because I use Webflow, I have integrated Memberstack to handle the subscription portion of DesignJoy. But this means I get hit with twice the fees, since Memberstack integrates with Stripe. Recently, however, Stripe has revamped their checkout experience and I finally figured out how to easily integrete it with Webflow. This will save me almost $300/m. 🎉

6. I've began offering power-ups 💪, something I've wanted to do for quite sometime. So far I only have one, which is real-time Slack communication. But more are on the way!

In terms of traffic to DesignJoy.co, IndieHacker remains my largest referral (thanks guys), but as of recently, another site is closing in tighly. That site is called landingfolio.com. DesignJoy is often featured on landing page inspiration sites, and this new one must be popular. I believe it launched on Product Hunt not log ago, but it continues to send a ton of traffic to DesignJoy. Webflow also featured DesignJoy in a blog article regarding great pricing page examples, and that also sent a fair amount of traffic. Aside from these two sources, a side project of mine (Scribbbles.design) which was built in just 24 hours pushes a lot of traffic over to DesignJoy, and Scribbbles continues to go viral now with over 20,000 downloads.

Anyways, nothing "huge" here I know, but I like to be as transparent as possible, even with the things that seem small. If nothing else, I hope my story here inspires you in your own journey. Feel free to reach out in the comments if you have any questions about my experience thus far. Go crush it today. 💪