Growing a productized service to the coveted milestone of $10k MRR

Chris Poka couldn't break $3k/mo with his agency. Then he started fresh and built a productized service called Designpulse. Now he's nearly at the coveted $10k MRR milestone.

Here's Chris on how he did it. 👇

Taking a new path

I come from a very small village in Hungary, but we moved a lot, from bad places to worse. My family didn’t have much money, and they couldn’t help me in any way — financially or emotionally.

After finishing my studies, I took the first job I could find. I worked at a factory where I tested and assembled automatic transmissions. It was a 1.5-hour bus ride to and from work, and I earned the minimum wage.

It was really bad for my health. After about a year, I realized I didn’t want to live my life that way. I was 19 at the time and I decided to give indie hacking everything I had.

Stepping into the world of freelance

I started watching YouTube videos about successful entrepreneurs and their lifestyles, and that’s when I realized it was all possible.

Then, I started learning e-commerce and dropshipping. I had one idea that ended up making a few million dollars in sales on Amazon, so I felt pretty good about that. But otherwise, I didn't have much success. I didn't have enough capital.

After that, I tried to find something else, and that’s when I discovered Bubble. I couldn’t code, and this made building easy. Within six months, I gained enough knowledge to start freelancing.

I earned a bit on Upwork and Fiver, but I wanted to create something bigger. So I started a Bubble agency. I got leads through Bubble , so all I had to do was close.

Along the way, I noticed that most Bubble agencies didn’t pay much attention to UI/UX design, so I started learning UI design and how to use Figma. I really enjoyed it. Combining Bubble and design was the perfect combo for me. I did this for about three years, and at my peak, I was making $3k per month.

Productized services

Eventually, the leads dried up, and I had to come up with something new. That’s when I found a new business model on Twitter. I think Brett from DesignJoy was the first to try it — it involved offering design services on a subscription basis, marketed as “unlimited” design.

I liked it because it put me in a better position for cash flow and recurring revenue, so I started fresh.

I started Designpulse in April 2023. We help businesses build custom software to make their work easier and improve user experiences using low-code tools.

I had about $1.5k in my bank account and I needed to pay my bills and rent, so I had to work hard. I worked around 16 hours a day, learning how to grow this business model, doing cold emailing, posting on Twitter, and building something on the side to get more attention for Designpulse.

My first two clients came from Twitter and they're still with me. The rest came through LinkedIn. Today, I'm making $9,840 a month. My highest monthly revenue was $12k.

Building a system

It took me a few days to build the MVP of the DesignPulse Internal Software, which I used for managing clients, tasks, and communication. Clients could create tasks, leave comments, and get email updates about task status changes — it was simple, but it worked.

As I gained more clients, I started updating the software, and now it does much more. I added an onboarding system so new users can subscribe to a plan and create their projects and tasks right away.

Building in public

Marketing has always been hard for me — I didn't even know what a funnel was when I got started. So I made a lot of mistakes and poor decisions along the way.

I tried cold emails,  forum posts, landing pages, social media, newsletters, and PR. For me, DMs on Twitter and LinkedIn have worked best. That, and posting about my work.

Posting what you're up to and how you're doing it builds trust, and in business, trust is the most important thing. If you have trust, you have everything you need.

Post every day. If you don’t have clients, build your own projects to create a portfolio. Designers could even redesign live websites and post the redesigns.

Don't give up. You need to keep working and posting to get eyeballs. Every day, for months and years.

And if you can, record videos. Post them on Linkedin, Twitter, and Tiktok.

Do these things

Build good habits. Going to the gym, eating healthy food, and using blue light-blocking glasses have all made a big difference for me. They really help!

Work every day. I was lazy when I started. You need to work every day, grow every day, and learn every day if you want to be successful.

And read. One name I have to mention is Alex Hormozi. His books, like $100M Leads and $100M Offers, were a huge help.

Lastly, after you hit a certain point — somewhere around $8k/mo — the free information on the internet won't teach you what you need to know. This is where you'll plateau. You have to get a mentor or a bigger course. You have to find out what people aren't sharing.

What's next?

I’m planning to start a podcast and a YouTube channel to grow my personal brand. That should make it easier to grow any future businesses I start.

My revenue goal for 2025 is $20k/month. And my personal goal is to travel to at least six countries next year.

If you're interested in learning more, check me out on Twitter and LinkedIn. And take a look at designpulse.co.