The secrets behind a $20k/mo startup

Hosting is one of the web's most competitive markets, but that hasn't slowed down Elston Baretto. Through a rugged work ethic and creative marketing strategies, Elston has scaled his hosting business, Tiny Host, to over $20,000 in MRR.

I sat down with him to learn how he did it:

1. What’s a mistake you often see new indie hackers make?

I know everyone says this, but spending too much time developing and not enough time marketing and shipping.

I see too many new indie hackers waiting until something is perfect before they release it, but that’s the worst thing you can do. You have to get the word out there as you’re building it. 

2. How do you find ideas for products?

I like to focus on validated ideas, and I have two strategies for finding such ideas. 

The first method is to pick a validated product and try to either improve it or adapt it for a different audience. So, if you look at Tiny Host, it’s not like hosting is a novel idea. But what we did well is reposition it for a non-technical audience by making it simpler. 

The second strategy is to build things that people are searching for. That means using keyword analysis tools and then building a product for the best keyword opportunities. If you do that right, then you’ll have a product with proven demand and really easy distribution if you’re able to rank for the keywords.

3. How do you make products that stand out?

The best way I’ve found is to find negative reviews of your competitor and then improve on that. It might be pricing, it might be a lack of features, or it might be poor UX. It doesn’t really matter; what matters is that you build a better version than theirs.

Then there’s also market positioning. Niching down is very, very powerful early on.  People really appreciate when you build an app that’s meant for them. For example, instead of building a social media management app, build a social media management app for people in the hospitality industry. Not saying that’s a valid idea, but there are tons of niche communities out there that you can build for.

4. How do you know you’re on the right path, besides just MRR?

Early on, I think the most important thing is the feedback and engagement from your users. So Tiny didn’t have serious MRR for a year, but the people who were constantly using it were also constantly praising it, which kept me motivated despite the lack of revenue. 

You’re probably not going to be an overnight success. The best thing you can do is pick a product, distribute it to as many people as possible, and then continuously tweak it based on their feedback. 

5. What are your favorite marketing strategies?

My go to is SEO. I genuinely think it’s among the most powerful marketing strategies for indie hackers, but most people give up too early. SEO is all about being patient. You will need to spend months targeting the right keywords, writing content, and collecting backlinks. But if you do it right, then it’s a super scalable strategy that can get you thousands of users for free.

If you want to speed the process up a bit, then two of my favorite tricks are YouTube videos and building related side projects. 

Videos rank as well, and you don’t even need to show your face if you’re uncomfortable with doing so. You can just do a screen recording and a narration. We’ve done some videos like this, and they’ve racked up thousands of views and rank on Google, which is super cool because it’s also a super powerful way to build trust with potential customers. 

Indie hackers are already familiar with building side projects, so I won’t talk too much about it. But just make sure that you’re building side projects related to your main project and that they’re targeting keywords that people are searching for. 

At the end of the day, SEO isn’t rocket science. It’s just a bit of a grind. So, the earlier you start, the better off you’ll be. 

6. How do you market on Reddit?

Reddit is the best way to engage with users early on, but it’s definitely tricky. If you push your product the same way that you do on Twitter or Facebook, you’ll inevitably get banned.

So, the key is to find the right subs and just be super honest about your intentions. Be transparent and say that you built this product, tell the story of why you built it, and ask for feedback. If you’re able to do that at the top of a weekly feedback thread, then you can easily pick up dozens or hundreds of early users.

The other key is to try to give something back. Think of Reddit users as your friends. You wouldn't just go up to a friend and say, “hey, download this app”. So, when I launched an app on Reddit years ago, I included a little offer code as a thank you, and I found that people really appreciated that. 

7. Why do you use a free plan?

Free plans aren’t useful for every product, but for us, something we really wanted to promote was viral loops. Every website hosted on Tiny was essentially an advertising board for us. So, making a free plan really helped compound our traffic.

It also helped that we don’t have a lot of support requests, which is one of the main downsides of having a free plan. And then finally, I think we have enough of an incentive to upgrade that having the free tier for marketing purposes is still worth it. If people were just using the free plan and not upgrading, then obviously it wouldn’t make sense to have the free plan. 

8. How’d you decide your pricing?

Pricing is always very difficult. When I first launched, our prices were basically the same as they are now. However, I then lowered it and lowered it and lowered it until I started to get sales, and then I slowly increased it back up to where it is now.

So, if you're launching a product for the first time, charge a bit lower than the industry standard, and then slowly increase it as you build out more features. 

It’s also good to err on the side of charging more because it’s good for your brand. People won’t take you seriously if your price is too low. They'll look at you and think that you're not a well-built product. 

I think, as a general rule, if people aren’t complaining about your prices, then you aren’t charging enough. So don’t be afraid to charge more. 

9. Do you think everyone should learn how to code?

That’s a tough question. I think it depends on your end goal. There are tons of indie businesses that exist that don’t require coding expertise, especially now that there are no-code tools and AI. As long as you have the idea, the strategy, and the distribution, you can build a profitable business. 

No-code tools and AI will only get you so far. If you want to build something that’s never been done before and make a really unique product, then you’re going to l need to learn how to code. 

So, it all depends on what your goals are.

10. How do you think indie hacking will be different in five years?

I think AI is going to unlock a whole different market in the same way that YouTube unlocked media and Instagram unlocked influencers. If AI makes it so that anyone can build a product, then that’s a whole new ballgame. 

My hope is that indie hackers will use these new powers to solve more unique problems. But, I’m worried that instead people will use them to quickly build copycats of successful products. 

If the latter happens, then indie hacking will really become a game of skill. If anyone can build products, then instead of coding skills, the differentiator will be ideation, distribution, and salesmanship.

In any case, it’s going to be very interesting. 

11. Final piece of advice?

Code less, market more, be a little lazy (Tiny still doesn’t have a password log in!), try to find a mentor who’s slightly ahead of you and can grow with you, and don’t ignore the power of a strong community. There’s no chance I’d be where I am today without the indie hacker community. 

And, if you’re looking for someone to bounce ideas off of, I’m always happy to answer any more questions on X/Twitter.