Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Ever wondered how to handle the competitive world of AI products and copycats while running a global business? Well, you're in luck. This episode of The Bootstrapped Founder features a heart-to-heart with indie hacker and global entrepreneur, Danny Postma. Danny takes us behind the scenes of his entrepreneurial journey, sharing priceless insights on transitioning from a solopreneur to a team leader, cleverly leveraging SEO, and the fascinating world of domain acquisitions.
Picture this: You're living the digital nomad lifestyle, working across time zones while experiencing new cultures. How do you make it all work? Danny Postma gives us a peek into his life as a digital nomad, the cultural differences that affect his way of work, and how he deals with the 12-hour time difference with grace. Tune in for a thought-provoking discussion on the value of a good domain name and how it can be a game-changer for any business. Join us on this exciting journey and tap into the world of a successful global entrepreneur.
Danny on Twitter: https://twitter.com/dannypostmaa/
The blog post: https://thebootstrappedfounder.com/danny-postma-an-indie-hackers-business-evolution/
Picture this: You're living the digital nomad lifestyle, working across time zones while experiencing new cultures. How do you make it all work? Danny Postma gives us a peek into his life as a digital nomad, the cultural differences that affect his way of work, and how he deals with the 12-hour time difference with grace. Tune in for a thought-provoking discussion on the value of a good domain name and how it can be a game-changer for any business. Join us on this exciting journey and tap into the world of a successful global entrepreneur.
Danny on Twitter: https://twitter.com/dannypostmaa/
The blog post: https://thebootstrappedfounder.com/danny-postma-an-indie-hackers-business-evolution/
The podcast episode: https://share.transistor.fm/s/1fbba06a
You'll find my weekly article on my blog: https://thebootstrappedfounder.com
Newsletter: https://thebootstrappedfounder.com/newsletter
My book Zero to Sold: https://zerotosold.com/
My book The Embedded Entrepreneur: https://embeddedentrepreneur.com/
My course Find Your Following: https://findyourfollowing.com
This episode is sponsored by Acquire.com
- (00:00) - Successful Global Business Building
- (10:05) - Solopreneur to Team Building Transition
- (17:09) - Dealing With Copycats in Business
- (25:10) - Competition and Evolution of AI Products
- (35:09) - Discovery of B2C and Acquisition Strategies
- (38:59) - Importance of SEO for Indie Hackers
- (50:12) - Building a Network, Avoiding Fame
- (56:10) - Digital Life, Remote Work, Cultural Differences
Creators & Guests
Host
What is The Bootstrapped Founder?
Arvid Kahl talks about starting and bootstrapping businesses, how to build an audience, and how to build in public.
Arvid Kahl: Welcome to The
Bootstrapped Founder. Today, I'm
talking to Danny Postma, one of
the most prolific and publicly
active indie hackers in our
entrepreneurial community. I
talk to Danny about running a
business with a global customer
base, how to deal with copycats
and clones, and why SEO plays
such a big role in building a
successful indie business. Danny
shares his thoughts about
outgrowing the solopreneurial
life or being at that point,
what being a digital nomad means
for the stability of your
personal and professional life,
and how he deals with being a
pretty big deal on Twitter.
Danny is an amazingly humble and
insightful person. You will have
a blast learning all about him
and his journey. And before we
dive into our chat, a quick
thank you to our sponsor,
acquire.com. More on that later.
Here's Danny.
Thanks for being on the show,
Danny. Now we're recording this
with a 12 hour time difference
here and you're in the Kuala
Lumpur timezone, if I'm correct
and I'm in Eastern Canada,
that's like directly on the
other side of the world. And I
think a majority of your
customers probably are located
in North America too, right? Or
somewhere in this time zone
here. So yeah, has this quite
substantial time difference
affected how you built your
businesses or your products and
how you engage with customers?
How does that work for you?
Danny Postma: I think it makes
me more productive because most
of the time when all my
customers are sleeping, I am
awake, right? It's like, I think
it's 9pm at your place now. And
it's 9 am at my location. Yeah.
So I get to especially because
all my friends are in Europe, I
get to work until 3pm without
anyone messaging me what's
happening me blah, blah, blah.
Social media is super quiet. So
I get quite a lot of
productivity. The downside to it
is that if something happens,
most of the times, it's at
night, I get a lot of messages.
Partners I work with, they
missed me at night. So the
nights are a little bit less
calm than I like, but it's like,
yeah, it's a payback. So yeah.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, I guess you
just shifted around, right? You
shifted by half a day. So do you
do anything about this? Because
I certainly remember having a
lot of customer service stuff,
you know, happen to random times
during the day. But if all of
this happens in the middle of
the night, how do you deal with
I don't know outages or customer
service messages with like, high
priority? What do you do? Do you
just wait?
Danny Postma: So when I launched
HeadshotPro, like for the first
few weeks, for the first week, I
think all the servers went
offline while I was sleeping. So
my subconsciousness would wake
me up all the time at night
checking the servers and then at
3am, the server would be down.
But I think it's now robust
enough that it's out of scales,
customer support can wait to be
honest, like my wife does the
customer support when she wakes
up in the morning and then we
just basically ignore it for 16
hours until the next morning.
Because I have one mantra, I
don't build tools and software
that really rely on me always
been there that need to be
offline like like email tools or
anything like this. I don't want
to build it like a lot of
respect for anyone who does
those things. Like I want to
make tools where I could be gone
for a week. And if I do ignore
customer support, it's not that
much of a biggie. So yeah, it
doesn't live in media at all, to
be honest.
Arvid Kahl: So it's about not
building critical tools, but
building tools that are so good
that people treat them just the
same way when it comes to
budget. You know, because most
of the time we say like critical
things are the things that
people have budget for. But you
have built like successful
businesses from apparently non
critical things. So how did you
do that? Like how did you
instead of criticality focus on
something else, what is that
other thing that makes your
businesses so interesting to people?
Danny Postma: I think what I'm
focusing more on now is before I
Arvid Kahl: That makes a lot of
sense, I guess. Do you still
used to make software right like
headline, which was a
copywriter, a corporate
generator. I think a more going
into the B2C B2B one off
payments, like it's not the
software anymore. It's just a
one time purchase, like the
headshell AI headset generation.
You purchase it once you upload
it and you get your product
back, right? So it's like a one
off product. We've automated the
complete refunds customer
support and everything. So when
I went on holiday with my wife
to Holland for two weeks, I just
turned on the auto refunds so
anyone that had an issue, they
could request a refund. So we
just all get out automatically
done. I just love to make robots
like I want to completely
automate anything. Yeah, that's
the mantra. Yeah.
consider yourself like a
solopreneur at this point? I
mean, you say your wife is
involved but that is from a
technical perspective. Are you
still the only person doing this
at least?
Danny Postma: So she helps two
to three hours a day. I'm still
a solopreneur but I'm actually I
posted my first job post
yesterday to looking for a
machine learning engineer.
Arvid Kahl: Saw that
Danny Postma: Yeah, I'm making a
rough, there's two reasons that
led me to get there. So number
one is I'm pretty sure I've add.
So it's six months into
HeadshotPro now and I'm like
mentally unable to build any
more features because I've been
there, I've done it. And I'm so
like it doesn't like stimulate
me to work on those features
anymore. And then my brain just
doesn't want to do it anymore.
So I haven't built anything for
three weeks. That brings me back
to getting anxiety because I
know there's a lot of
competitors coming that way. So
it makes me really stressed. And
I'm like, HeadshotPro makes a
lot of revenue right now. So I
was like, yeah, it's quite dumb
if I don't use that to build
maybe like a little
synchronically team that's
remotes, find some like senior
people that can help me out,
focus on what I'm not good in.
So yeah, you might see me moving
from a solopreneur to more of a
small team support this way. I'm
trying to like figure out how
it's going to look like because
I don't want to build a team in
the sense that I don't want, you
have a lot of companies that
have discovered the culture.
You're always online chatting
with each other and stuff like
that, like, that's not how I get
work done. So I would love to
have a team that they can self
manage themselves. You give them
some bigger tasks and they come
back in a week with the solution
you have like maybe some chats
via Discord or whatever. I still
want to keep that solo founder
monitoring side of it even
though I tried to build a team.
Arvid Kahl: I guess the easiest
way would just be to hire
somebody on the other side of
the planet. So there's no chance
that you ever get to chat,
right? It's probably gonna do a
trick.
Danny Postma: But that's an
issue because I tried it out
once with a friend of mine and
he's in Europe and then he would
wake up and he would start the
day at 10am, which means it will
be 5pm for me. It doesn't work
because I'm tired. I've worked
nine hours. I don't want to just
dive into work anymore. And if
he has questions, for example,
we'll be like 8pm. So your
complete downtime where you are
supposed to rest as an
entrepreneur like it's gone. So
I'm really trying to hire for
Asia now. Like America will be
impossible for me. Europe isn't
ready, kinda. And no good, to be
honest. So I'd like to keep
everything in the same time
zone.
Arvid Kahl: So you wanted to be
in the same time zone, but you
still wanted to be remote. Am I
getting this right?
Danny Postma: Yep, correct. Yep.
Arvid Kahl: Okay, yeah, I saw
not only the tweet with your a
higher, that you're looking
into. But I also saw this tweet
about you trying to shadow a
remote team to learn how to
manage it, which is a really,
really cool idea. Can you expand
on this, like, why you're doing
this? And what do you think
you're gonna get from that? And
also, has anybody allowed you to
join the teams just yet?
Danny Postma: Yep. So I learned
from doing, right? That's the
way I'm doing. But good luck
learning how to build a team
process task manager because I
haven't worked in a team. I
worked in the team as a
freelancer, but it's like a
different thing. So I don't know
how to process is of a remote
team. So I could try to figure
it out myself, which, like, I
don't know where to start. So I
was like, hey, maybe some crazy
person is going to allow me to
just be a fly on the wall, sit
in the discord and the Task
Manager, see how that team goes.
I actually got a lot of replies
like Sahil from GumRoad's and a
meet to his notion. And it's
like yesterday, so I've been
taking notes all day, how they
work. And it's so interesting.
So based on that, I've actually
put some processes. I'm being
like, seeing how I'm gonna put
in my notion how the task
manager is going to be. So I've
learned a lot from it. Like, I
think more people should try to
do things like this, like just
shadow someone. Yeah, that's
interesting. It's cool that
people are me. And tomorrow
might be joining someone else.
It just needs to sign an NDA
because it's a lot of like,
sensitive information, right?
That you get access to. So yeah,
we learning a lot. It's dope.
Arvid Kahl: It's really cool.
I'm really surprised and in a
really good way that this
actually works, you know, like
that somebody is actually
letting you see their internal
stuff. I think this kind of
culture that people allow others
to see the internal stuff, their
business is effectively building
in public, like through you as a
proxy, right? That's kind of
what this is. That's so cool. I
feel would have never happened
like 20 years ago, like nobody
would have allowed like a random
stranger from the internet in
their business communication,
right?
Danny Postma: Well, I think this
is because I've never met them
in real life, right? But because
I'm building in public, I think
already for the last five years
like people see my personality.
They get to trust me, I guess,
like they see what my, yeah, I'm
working. Because how did you for
your company that you sold a few
years ago? How did you know to
scale it? Did you work in a team
before or just trial and error?
Arvid Kahl: Well, here's the
thing. We didn't scale it
personal wise. I was afraid to
hire. I'm probably at the point.
I'm probably a month behind
where you are right now because
I would have had to force myself
to do it, but I didn't. I just
thought ah, I can deal with
this. You know how it is, right?
We build something and then you
spent a lot of time and you wish
you would have had more time but
it's not enough to hire somebody
for because it's just, you know,
a couple hours for the project
or whatever. And I had that all
the time, like we had five and a
half 1000 recurring customers
like that was not just one off
payments. That was SaaS
subscriptions, most of which we
automated away. I am like you, a
big fan of automation. And we
had a lot of automation. That
was pre AI times pretty much. It
was like, at least before any
kind of GPT existed. And
intercom, we were using that at
the time for our customer
service stuff. They already had
AI tooling. I don't know they
had some machine learning in the
background, I guess, that looked
through your knowledge base and
then suggested like word
matching kind of substitution
matching. I don't know what they
did. But they brought the
articles that were the best
potential articles right into
the first reply. So people most
of the time found the things
that we had written and solve
their own issues. But it got
complicated. And I think most,
the biggest reason that I had
burnout at the end of Feedback
Panda when we sold it, was this
reason. I did not know how to
hire, which is why I'm so
impressed by you actually doing
this, like going out and saying
and I think it's an identity
thing, too. And I was going to
ask you because that's kind of
why I asked, are you still a
solopreneur? Because the moment
you choose to build a team,
you're not a solopreneur
anymore, right? It's a different
mindset. Like, I wonder, what
are you goals now that you're
building an actual business,
like not just a business in a
formal sense, but like a team of
people building something
together? Did that shift the
goals that you had for whatever
you're doing?
Danny Postma: First of all, I'm
completely winging it and I have
no clue what I'm bringing. It
scares so much. It's right to
do. So I sold the Headlime,
three years back two years back,
yeah, two years back because I
had three options. I could get
VC funding into hyper scaling or
talking about unreasonable
rates. I could have bootstrapped
it and build a team or I could
have sold it because I had two
people interested in buying it.
And I was like, I don't want a
team. I'm scared. I don't know
how to do it. And now two and a
half years later, I'm running
into the same position with
HeadshotPro where I cannot do it
alone anymore. The only option
would be either to sell it again
or to build a team. And I've
been starting to realize like,
yeah, look, I'm 29. I'm gonna
run into this issue a lot of
times in my life again. I'm
financially stable now. If I
ruin it, revenue wise and
whatever, like, I do have the
backup like, this is the moment
where I could learn to do it and
ever fuck up. And if I don't
like it, I'm trying to set
standards with anyone I'm
interviewing. I'm telling them
like, this is my first time. I
don't know how it's going to go.
If you're going to quit your job
for it, don't. You're not the
good. This is what I'm trying to
start like as with contracts,
like maybe like part time.
People that already have another
client, like straight to start
it in like, more of a safety
area in that sense. Yeah, I need
to. Yeah, it's also I need that
identity, right? Because I built
my whole solopreneur stuff
around it on Twitter. Yeah, I
think it's time to stop doing it
by myself because I'm gonna run
into another burnout.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, if you keep
going like this and have nobody
to help you, you're gonna have a
little trouble and it becomes a
lot of little troubles. And then
they just set up. The thing that
I find so interesting is that
there are two ways here, right?
You could either do the same
thing over again. You could sell
it, build another one. Sell it,
build another one, right? That's
kind of how platforms like
acquire or all these other
things, you just exist for this.
You get it to a certain point,
that's the point where you can
Peter Principle where you stop
being good at, right? Where
instead of going to hiring
yourself into the next biggest
position where you don't have
the skill, so you stay where you
are and kind of sell the thing,
but you chose to go beyond that.
That is cool. But it also means
a lot of change for you, right?
Because now you're a manager,
congratulations. It's gonna be
very different from indie
hacker, indie manager, maybe
that's gonna be a new thing. I'm
just excited for you to take
this step because not only is
this something that I would
personally be very afraid of to
do myself, but I know that
you're a person that shares a
lot of your journey on Twitter
and in the build in public
community. So everybody's going
to benefit from this and this is
really cool. So thanks for
taking the step. This is awesome
and doing it in public at the
same time. That's really cool.
Danny Postma: I'm happy, other
people get some something out of
it. Thank you so much. Yeah, and
I'm planning to go share it like
I'll be public about it. I'll
share how it's gonna go, it's
how I learn. I can scroll back
later a year back in Twitter,
see what I learned, what went
well and stuff like that. So
yeah, I'm gonna see. I'm really
nervous.
Arvid Kahl: I bet and I think
that's okay. I guess like, you
know, entrepreneurship everyday
is another mystery, another
challenge that we have no clue
how to deal with and we try to,
you know, grasp at straws and
try to figure out how things
work. That's just what it is.
What I'm happy about in
particular is that you're honest
with the people that you're
hiring, that this is an
experiment, right? That's really
cool. I mean, that's just shows
what kind of business
perspective you have, you're
going to try it out, you're
going to learn to get better,
right?
Danny Postma: Yeah. And I think
this is the issue. Like, if I
have the mindset that I like to
ship products really fast and
kill them really fast, they
don't work out. But if you're
going to ship a team really fast
and kill that, you cannot
because people their families
are, like, it's a whole
different mindset. You cannot do
it because people depend on it.
Their salary, like emotions are
involved with it instead of
like, just a bunch of code. So
like,
Arvid Kahl: Yeah
Danny Postma: This is what I
think that's the most scary
part. Like I can try it out. But
it's going to hurt people if it
doesn't work out. Yeah. Being
upfront about it, contractor
only. Yeah
Arvid Kahl: Well, that's a good
point because if I look at your
website, the postcrafts.com with
all your projects that you have,
which are I don't know what 16,
17, almost 20 projects that
you've done in the past. Like
the moment you go full on one
project, that kind of precludes
you from building other things,
right? Because that
responsibility you just
mentioned, now all of a sudden,
you have to pay these people and
their families, maybe their
mortgage depends on you keeping
running this project. That is a
big step to take. I don't want
to scare you any further. I'm
just trying to say like for an
indie hacker, this is a pretty
sizable move to make. And I
don't see many people make this
move because they get scared and
you are scared, but you're still
doing it, which is really nice.
I quite appreciate that.
Danny Postma: Thank you so much.
Arvid Kahl: Well, yeah, it's
cool to see this happening. I
think this being a lesson and a
learning experience at the same
time because you learn it and
you teach it as you go. That's
just something that is such a
indie hacker community thing,
right? Like, where would you be
without people like you who are
sharing their experiences here?
We would never even try. So
that's really cool. But on the
other side and we talked about a
lot of your build in public
stuff that you've been doing and
you've been sharing a lot over
the last year, it's just how you
built these businesses, the
ideas you had and how they came
to be. What I wanted to talk to
you about this kind of the
reason why I contacted you in
the first place. There was a day
where there was this copycat
thing happening on Twitter. And
that was kind of when I reached
out to you. I don't know if you
remember this, but you probably
do. Because it was a pretty
weird day, right? Somebody just
cloned your full product
completely, like down to the
copy and then posted some weird,
like, kind of rich bait tweet
about telling you not to be mad
at them, right? Can you give me
like, do you want to talk about
this? Or does this feel
traumatic to you?
Danny Postma: I've grown a thick
skin over it. So we can
definitely dive into this. So
it's such an odd thing.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, wasn't that
weird? How did that feel to you?
Because I remember you kind of
engaged with it. And then at
some point, you just deleted all
your tweets that you did to this
person. So what happened there?
And how do you deal with these
things? Because that's probably
a fear that many indie hackers
have, that somebody just clones
the whole thing and then tells
them not to worry, right?
Danny Postma: Yeah, so with
Headlime back two years, this
happens a lot like people carbon
copying, so there's a difference
between copycats and
inspiration, right? Like
inspiration is you, you, you. I
don't care if people take the
same product as me because I
also get inspired by other
people like it's fine. But once
you take someone's whole landing
page, copy, branding, colors,
and everything and all their
like, everything is the same.
That's a copycat. So let's just
stay like set that down because
a lot of people argue with me
because it's a bad thing.
Because people gonna think they
are your, like the competitor is
you, so people gonna get
confused. That's like the
biggest issue. So we'd Headlime
for like, two months, I was just
busy fighting them being
negative on Twitter about
everyone copying me and people
got so fed up with me, like
telling me like, shut up, stop
being so negative. And like, it
really got me down at that time
two years ago, but that fueled
me to actually build the version
2 of Headlime that got acquired
differently because I was like,
fuck, my product is so easy.
Everyone's copying it. I think I
need to take three months and
just build it into a bigger
thing. So I'm ahead of the curve
again. So what happened so many
times now two years later, like
it happens a lot. I don't care
that much about it because 99%
of them, they don't go anywhere.
This one just rage baited me so
badly by just like calling it
out that he copied me on
purpose, making a tweet about
it. That was 10pm and I was
about to go to sleep, so I was
already so tired. I was like,
what the fuck is this? You gotta
find this tweet. And like, I
know he deleted it, right? I
think he deleted it. Like, he
just rage baited me and I sent
it to Pieter and Pieter Levels
is like, dude, you're just
feeding the trolls. He's gonna
get engagement clicks out of it,
delete it. I was like, yeah,
you're right. I shouldn't spend
time on this. I DM him. I was
like, dude, there's something
called DMCA, which is the
Millennium Copyright Act. I can
mail Cloudflare right now.
They're gonna take you down
tomorrow, like, you better just
turn it into something else. So
he actually listened. He changed
the copy. So it's still the same
product, which is 100% fine.
Like, that's competition. But
now he has his own landing page
with his own images and his own
copy. So yeah, you grow a thick
skin after a while. It stays
annoying. This is why I'm
blocking everyone. Everyone
that's competing with me, I
blocked them on Twitter. I just
don't want to see what they're
doing.
Arvid Kahl: Right
Danny Postma: It's like, as a
mindset for myself. I don't want
to see what you're doing. I
actually unblocked the founder
Arvid Kahl: Interesting. Yeah. I
mean, it's a good mix of don't
feed the trolls and also kind of
protect yourself from just their
stuff, right? The influence that
they might have. And I guess by
blocking them, I mean, if you
block somebody, all they need is
a second account and they can
still read your tweets, but at
least on the main account,
they're not gonna see your
of Copy AI two weeks ago, after
blocking him for two and a half
stuff, right? Which is
algorithmically, probably
interesting because it's not
gonna get pulled in that much
into their feeds either. So you
don't see them. They don't see
you. Everybody is at peace. So
that's great. Yeah, it's very
interesting. I'm absolutely 100%
behind you on this, just don't
years just because I don't want
to see what Copy AI was doing.
feed the trolls thing. I also
did not reply to this or retweet
it because I did not want our
community to either grew up a
shitstorm because I don't want
negativity like this either.
It's bad enough, they copied
you. They don't need to have
their lives ruined by a couple,
you know, a couple of 1000
Keeps you sane, to be honest.
nerds. Now you don't need the
nerd brigades to come in and
destroy their lives. And also,
any like, any retweet is kind of
validation for them, right? That
was the rage bait. Let's see
what we can do with this, right?
That was their idea.
Danny Postma: If you have 80,000
followers, it will pop up in a
Arvid Kahl: That is right.
lot of people. Twitter promotes
rage bait and engagement, people
commenting. So I think everybody
in 15 minutes it got 10, 20,
Danny Postma: That is dumb
Arvid Kahl: Right
Danny Postma: So dumb
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, it is really
destructive. I agree with you.
30,000 fuses like yes, it's not
a good thing. What I don't
understand, like just slipping
into this, like, the whole
And if you look at this, like if
in a less emotional level, it
building in public is like, five
years ago, I couldn't dream I'm
really is a highly destructive
behavior because the only thing
interacting with you, other
people, Sahil, founder of
Gumroad, and any other like, big
guys on Twitter. Like building
you have when you're building in
public or when you're in the
in public is, the best thing
about is you get to meet people
you've been inspired by your
whole life. You learn from them.
And by making a carbon copy cat
of someone else's product, you
indie hacker community is your
reputation as a good community
just destroy your name and any
chance to. I'm gonna get fed up
already. But they're building in
public. They're building in
public so their whole purpose of
it is to go there, I guess. And
you destroyed it by just doing
one thing because no one is
going to trust you anymore.
member. So by doing anything
that destroys that reputation,
you burn any potential future
opportunity. Like those people,
I'm not sure if I even followed
them or if I blocked them out of
spite, just at the same moment,
right? As it happened to you. I
was like, I don't want to
interact with people who do this
kind of stuff to Danny. I like
Danny. I don't want Danny to
suffer. I'm not gonna talk to
them ever again, which, I mean,
it's probably fine with them.
But it's still in this community
where reputation is everything,
like these acts are really short
sighted. That's the thing,
right? It's super short sighted
to just copy and hope to make a
couple of sales and then not
turn it into something better,
just like try to stay a copy of
something. It's really, really
like a short term when that
turns out to be a long term
loss. It's unfortunate. That's
what it is. I do wonder now that
you are very active in the
visual AI space. If I look at
your postcrafts like I'm just
going to drop your domain a
couple times here because it's
really cool to see your
projects. If I look at like the
top 7 or 8, 9, 10 projects that
all AI based and most of them
are like visual AI, right? You
have HairstyleAI, you have
Photoshed, you have HeadshotPro
and Deep Agency all of these are
really about, you know, physical
visuals of people. I don't know
mean morph is gone but you know,
this model does not exist and
Profile Picture AI all of this
is AI. How much competition do
you have there? And I'm not just
saying indie hacker stupid clone
competition. I mean, like actual
meaningful competition from I
mean, Pieter, always competitor
of yours. I know that but you
know, the much bigger pockets
like how much competition do you
have within this field right
now?
Danny Postma: I think this
should be focused on
HeadshotPro, I think there's
five big competitors. I see on
my AdWords, one VC funded
company who actually stole also
all my landing page and tries to
steal my marketing agency and
all the things which I think is
very odd for fizzy HD. So I
think there's five competitors
in that sense. Profile picture
when it came out had like
hundreds of competitors. Lensa,
obviously, everyone knows Lensa.
I think it was the biggest
competitor. I love it when I get
a highly popular competitor
because then they do marketing
for me and earn the money. Like
last week, Remini is going
viral, which now does AI
headshots on iOS and my sales
have been tripled since that day
because everyone's googling for
AI headshots and I'm ranking
number one on AI headshots. So I
just get all that traffic and I
confer them. So perfect!
Arvid Kahl: Awesome
Danny Postma: The hairstyle has
like a one competitor, I think.
No one is doing hairstyles yet.
That's the one I acquired. Not
that much but most all these
products are basically pivots of
each other Stock AI or Tattoos
AI turns into Stock AI. Stock AI
turned into Profile Picture.
Profile Picture turns into
headshots. That's why I have so
many products in them. It's just
like an evolution of them. And I
just keep them online. Yeah, so.
Arvid Kahl: That's really cool.
That's a smart move. I guess
like the underlying, like models
might be different. But
everything the chrome, the UI,
everything you put on top of it
probably is very similar. So
you're reusing your own
templates. That's an interesting
move. Not a surprising one
because obviously, you're kind
of niching down into every
single field. How did you you
pick this honestly? Like visual
AI, there is a lot of stuff
going on. There was a lot of NFT
things going on in the past. How
did you go into like headshots
and professional headshots too?
That agency thing, that stock
thing?
Danny Postma: So start with
this, generative AI came out in
September 2022, I think, when
stable diffusion launched and I
just decided yet the obvious
point you can do is make a stock
photo website. So I built Stock
AI, but the quality wasn't
there. People weren't willing to
pay for it. I was deathly scared
that I would get a cease and
desist from getty images or
whatever because they have so
many big lawyers. I was like,
I'm not gonna sit on this one.
So then I've worked on yeah,
then I think on Twitter, I saw
dream move launching. So Austria
did AI. They made, yeah, they
made a you could turn your face
into styles. And Pieter sent me
a DM on telegram. He's like,
dude, check this thing. And he
was building something. I was
like, you're fucking kidding me.
I'm also building it. So we
basically just shipped it in 30
hours. He shipped without a back
ends and database because he
knew I was going to ship faster
than him. So he launched on
Friday night. I was, fuck. So I
launched on Saturday morning,
absolutely exploded on Twitter.
I think I got like, six figures
in sales in a week because it's
such a shareable product, right?
And it was super new at a time.
I was lucky to rank on Profile
Picture. And there's a lot of
searches on Profile Picture,
like lots and lots of lots. But
then Lensa came out. I got like
a boost of revenue. And then it
started to go really, really
down like these days. It's
barely any revenue. And I was
pivoting. So I was working with
a friend of mine, a developer
and we split up. I was going to
do Deep Agency which was
basically folded to the AI as an
editor. David was going to use
the model I built in Python,
like I made a special pose. We
can use photos of someone. You
can get the pose out of it so
you can make headshot with it.
You could do anything with it.
So that was building the
headshots direction, both
launched them at the same time.
Deep Agency got a lot of press
coverage, but no sales and
HeadshotPro got a lot of sales.
So that's when I decided to dip
down on yeah, on the Headshot
part. This was really just an
evolution of trying things out
and I didn't expect Headshot to
have so much. Yeah. So much
demand for it. So yes, pivoting,
pivoting, pivoting, trying it
out in that sense.
Arvid Kahl: That's a really
smart move. I like that. I'm
just surprised that the stock
thing got press coverage but no
sales. You would think that
something like this being
covered would be some kind of
lead generator, but it was just
a novelty that made the press
interested in that. What do you
think?
Danny Postma: So with Deep
Agency, the one where I tweeted
out these models are fake, you
can hire in them. Everyone went
mental like, models are going to
be replaced. The fashion
industry is going to be
destroyed. This is the worst
thing. People are going to lose
their jobs.
Danny Postma: Yeah, it's all my
fault. Like everyone wanted to
Arvid Kahl: Your fault
use a model and put a fashion
products on top of it.
Danny Postma: But that's so hard
to build. And I'm not like I've
Arvid Kahl: Right
managed to build my own deep
learning stuff. But I wasn't
able to put a fashion at the
same time Headshot Pro was easy
to do. So I was like, I'm gonna
just gonna deep down on that.
There's gonna be some other
bigger company who has that
clause in the fashion industry,
they're going to do that. So I
was like, yeah, okay, it's super
popular products. It doesn't
make sense for me to chase. I'm
just going to put it down there
and focus on another one. Maybe
one day we're going to go back
there again. Yeah, impress and
clicks doesn't pay the bills. So
if you have a product that earns
more revenue and has a higher
conversion rate, I think Deep
Agency had a conversion rate of
0.3%. And HeadshotPro had a
conversion rate of 10 times
that. So then, like, you know,
your products
Arvid Kahl: Absolutely. Yeah, I
guess particularly for an indie
hacker that needs to make money
to pay the bills that using the
product or just serving the
images incurs, right? Because
nothing is free on the backend
side. That is an absolutely
smart move.
Danny Postma: Yeah
Arvid Kahl: Well, one thing I do
wonder, particularly because you
already said like with profile
picture that kind of doesn't
have sales anymore. And
HeadshotPro is now in a
different vertical, I guess. But
do you also think that that will
end one day? Like you seem to be
very, like focused on
experimenting and going where
the money goes. Do you have a
kind of time horizon for any
project? Or do you think this
one is going to stick around a
bit longer?
Danny Postma: I think this one's
gonna stick around longer
because you're competing with
like Profile Picture is for
vanity, right? It was a fun
thing for WhatsApp and stuff,
Arvid Kahl: Yeah
Danny Postma: Yeah. And yeah,
it's interesting. Yeah, it's a
but Headshots people actually
into headshots for their CV, for
really interesting industry. But
yeah, it can always go to shit,
their LinkedIn, for their teams,
whatever. Currently, you have to
like a bigger competitor comes
in and whatever. A lot of people
pay $300 if you want to get a
photo shoot. If you can get that
done for $39 and it almost looks
the same. And 9 out of 10
people, it looks really good,
then you're competing with a
more expensive physical
products. They suddenly that
people can only do in one city
with a limited amount of
photographs. And suddenly you
can just build a robot that can
do it worldwide. Yeah, I think
this is a massive market that
no, there is a 5 to 10 billion
market size for portrait
photography worldwide. So if I
can just take 1% of that, I'm
happy. So this is a big market.
Like I see this getting bigger.
And that's why I also want to
build a team to grow it out.
say, yeah, you have to build a
sustainable business. You need
to take revenue overtime. I'm
more of like this get as much
revenue upfront because your
company, especially with AI, it
could go so fast. Like, you
could be obsolete next year. And
they'll just move up to new
products. And then they have a
team to ship even faster to move
to the other product, try out
different things. Yeah, I'm not
that scared about it, to be
honest.
Arvid Kahl: That's an
interesting point, though. I
just understood that the team
you're building is not a
Headshot Pro team. It's kind of
the Danny Postma team. It's like
the postcrafts.
Danny Postma: Yeah, they can
work on 16 products. I just want
to try out new products and
whatever, product market fit,
then I have a team skill that
went out because I love to
iterate. I like to mess around.
I hate many things, scheming
things. So if I can just have a
team that likes to do those
things, then I have the feeling
it's going to be a monster. You
could have a lot of products
using the same technology into
different markets. Yeah.
Arvid Kahl: It's kind of the
studio model, right? You have a
reliable template of tech stack
and you have people who know
what to do, how to execute, how
to deal with spin up a customer
service platform or whatever.
That is really cool. Oh, I'm
excited. So what I hear from you
is that you're still
experimenting with things in
this space, right? You're
finding things that work, you go
into them, you monetize them as
much as possible upfront, which
is also new. You know, it brings
me back to my whole solopreneur
question from earlier because
you know, back a couple years
ago, five years ago if you would
have asked me what is a good
business, I would have told you
my recurring revenue every month
solopreneur living lifestyle
business, bla bla bla bla bla. I
would have counted down a couple
things. But if you asked me now
it's like, well, you want to
monetize as quickly as possible.
Recurring revenue is great, but
it's not required. And if you
need to build a team, then you
need to build a team. So this
seems to be the change that
happened in my life. Does that
happen for you too?Did you just
like, let go of these
preconceived notions?
Danny Postma: So I always
thought B2C is you should never
go into B2C. B2C is horrible.
Don't go into B2C, which is
still horrible, like a lot of
disputes, angry customers, blah,
blah. Yeah, I want to replace my
wife eventually because she also
gets to shit with customer
support. But what I've realized
is that the difference between
B2B and B2C like, it's really
nice to have recurring revenue,
but you need to keep building
features. You need to have a
relationship with your customer.
If you're more in B2C like my
skills are, I'm really good in
conversion optimization. I know
how to build a high converting
landing page. You only have to
get them once to buy. There's no
recurring thing. You don't have
to add features because they
don't pay monthly, they just buy
what they want. It needs to be
good at that moment. You
basically don't have to support
them after because they will not
come back. They just come for
the one product. So you don't
have that much of a support
load. You don't have that much
of a help desk. You can more
scale with SEO on ads. So it's
like this whole different. I
really like it to be honest.
Like, I really like to optimize
traffic coming in converting
them giving them what they want.
And then it's done. Like that's
where the relationship ends.
That's what's cool about B2C.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, definitely is.
It's not something you looked
into when you were like
purchasing businesses because
you recently went a bit on an
acquisition spree, I guess, and
bought a couple things, right?
And is that something you
actively look for like a B2C
product that has a pay once,
used once and then be gone
forever kind of customers?
Danny Postma: So I saw Nick,
Nick at Hesti AI and he's also
in Bali and I saw him listing it
on acquisition.com. And so I sit
down with him. I asked for his
conversion rate and his
conversion rate was really low.
But he got a lot of visitors
from SEO. So I was like, this is
going to be complete an
experiment like I know how to
make the landing page converts 5
to 10 times better. If I can
make the landing page four or
five times better, I earn. Like
if you say okay, now acquisition
price is four times revenue,
right? Yearly revenue four times
profit. If I can optimize a
landing page to have five times
more conversions, I earn back
the acquisition price in 10
months. If I do it 10 times,
it's five months. And I already
have the better AI generation.
So I just copied HeadshotPro,
put it on his domain name. I
think conversion rate is up six
times now. So I earn a back in
nine months. So it was a no
brainer for me to do in that
sense. And then the other
acquisitions are, I bought
profilepicturemaker.com, which
is like a 12 year old domain.
And then that one, like people
want to make a profile picture.
So if someone that wants a
profile picture probably also
might want the new headshots. So
I've put a big banner on it to
link back to HeadshotPro. I'm
trying to like have like all
these acquisition channels to
funnel back to the main product.
It's more like as an engineering
as marketing, I guess, like
making tools, getting traffic,
sending them to the main server.
Arvid Kahl: It's interesting to
see like how you're using the
same kind of technology in so
many different ways. That's
really cool. Also how different
those domains really are. And
domains is something that I want
to talk to you about because you
were talking about domain
leasing a couple weeks ago, I
guess, at this point. Like, that
was something that I've
personally never heard before.
So I'm very grateful that you
introduced me to the idea.
Danny Postma: Yeah
Arvid Kahl: Right. Getting a
domain for a short time. Can you
tell me more about that
experiment like what you did
there with that?
Danny Postma: So I wanted to
have stockyai.com because I
thought that was pretty dope
domain. But the owner wanted 30
to $25,000 for it. If you don't
have like product market fit,
you're not going to pay 30k for
a domain name. But then so
dan.com has the option. You can
pay it in 12 installments, 24
installments or maximum 60
installments, which means they
take a higher commission fee. So
I think I paid 20% commission
over that extra. So I only have
to pay $500 a month, which is
still a lot, right? But if it's
a good domain, it's worth it. So
I had to pay $500 for the
domain. If you don't want it
anymore, you can cancel it. And
if you cancel it before you've
paid it off, the owner of the
domain gets the domain name back
and you can stop paying for it.
So I paid three months of domain
transfer. So I paid $1500. I
didn't get product market fit.
So I just said I'm going to quit
paying for the domain name. So
you can like lease it. Yeah,
lease to own, I guess is the
name for it.
Arvid Kahl: That's really cool.
Danny Postma: You can try out
because I believe domain names
is you need to pick a good
domain name because that's how
you're going to rank in SEO.
Like HeadshotPro basically tells
Google that you should rank
number one for headshot,
HeadshotPro, professional
headshot because it's in your
name like Google gives like a
little bit of a boost to it
because it's in your domain
name. So if you want to make AI
stock photos, like better get
the domain stock AI, so it's
worth paying money for, to be
honest.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, absolutely.
Did you get Headshot Pro? Did
you have to buy that?
Danny Postma: $3,000
Arvid Kahl: That is surprisingly
good for a domain. The most
money I ever spent on a domain
was probably for Zero To Sold.
Like I spent $1,000 on that for
my book. That was really the
zerotosold.com, which was nice.
Like, that was a solid name. And
I'm glad I got it. But I've
never spent more than that. And
it kind of frightens me, like
the expense that a good domain
name can incur on a business,
which is why this whole lease to
own thing is a really
interesting one
Danny Postma: If you've already
picked the name for your book,
Zero, yeah and then you get the
.co domain or .io name like,
we'd have like, I had so many
people typing in Google headlime
com, headlime co, headlime eo.
Like they couldn't find my
website because they had the .io
domain name. Like imagine how
much and I think Damon from
Testimonial made a tweet about
it. He bought the .com. And all
the domain put an affiliate euro
on it. And he basically, I think
he paid 10 or $20,000 for it.
And he earned it back by people
just going through the website.
So imagine having your
competitor buying the domain.
You're gonna lose all your
customers like it's worth, if
you can spare it to buy the
domain, that's good to be
honest, the .com.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, you seem to
have a lot of insight into SEO,
which is something that I don't
really know much about. But
you've been mentioning several
times how well your things rank
and how much work that you put
into SEO for your products.
Danny Postma: I only build
products where there's SEO. So I
don't know that much about SEO,
just to be honest, like, I just
know kind of how it works. Like,
for every product, I do
research. So this is for how
HeadshotPro came out like I was
Googling, like I was trying to
rank for profile picture. And I
saw there was a lot of search,
like you can go to
ahrefs.com/keywordfinder. You
can type in a keyword and it
will show you how many searches
there are for a website. So I
saw there's a lot of search for
headshots and that the keyword
difficulty, which means the
higher the number, the harder it
is to go rank in Google. So the
moment you have like a keyword
difficulty that's under 10 or
20, you're guaranteed to go to
the front page if you have like
a one or two backlinks. So I
only pick product ideas that
have a lot of search and a lot
of keyword difficulty. Why? I
hate marketing. Like I hated
marketing. Now I'm getting a
little bit better at it. I think
it's really like if you're an
indie hacker, the easiest thing
you can do is pick a product
that has a lot of searches with
no competition. You never have
to do marketing because you're
going to rank number one on
Google. Everyone goes through
Google like you have. You don't
have to do marketing for it
because people search for it
already. So that's how often the
IDs and postcrafts.com They're
all based on me searching on
ahrefs for some keywords and
then building a product off it.
Arvid Kahl: Okay, that's the
money code right here.
Danny Postma: Yeah
Arvid Kahl: That's cool. Well, I
was wondering, would you ever
build something where those
numbers would not add up for you
where the difficulty would be
way too low? Would you do that?
Danny Postma: No, no
Arvid Kahl: Even if you had a
marketing team?
Danny Postma: If no one searches
in it for Google, it means you
have to create the market,
right?
Arvid Kahl: Right
Danny Postma: So as an indie
hacker, you're not going to
create the market. Yeah, you
can. But it's going to be super
hard. So if you can just find
something people search for and
no one is building for it. Or
maybe like one or two people
building for it, you could go
number three. If you're not good
at SEO, you could even say okay,
if it has a high enough
acquisition price, you could do
AdWords for it. Because if
people search for it, you can
also bid on it. Yeah, you're
gonna have an easy time. You
know people want to buy it. You
know you can just not do
marketing for it because your
website will rank for it. Yeah.
This is why I try to tell
everyone on Twitter just go SEO
as indie hacker. I might be
biased, though. But
Arvid Kahl: You are because
you're successful with it. I
mean, I think that's a good
reason to be biased if it puts
money into your pocket, right?
Must work in some way. And I
think I personally very much
neglected it in most of my
projects in the past, the
software projects at least
because I thought I'll find ways
to market it and probably do but
it's still, the other way
around, kind of what you're
doing is a demand first business
idea generation. That's what
you're doing. It's kind of what
Justin Jackson always talks
about too, right? Like the
presence of demand is a good
sign, good validation strategy
for an indie hacker. Because if
people are already buying
something like this or searching
for something like this, that's
likely that they will also have
budget for yours. And it's not
just you can have a cool idea
and everybody needs to buy it.
Danny Postma: Yeah, and you can
basically calculate. If you say,
okay, let's say the landing page
conversion rate is 1%. Like, you
can calculate what your monthly
revenue could be if you're
listed on number one. So you can
see hey, is it worth it for me?
Can I do it at that price? Like
it makes so much more certainty
in your decisions. Yeah. Because
how did you do marketing for
when you started out? If you
don't do SEO, like you wouldn't
probably in social media parts,
right?
Arvid Kahl: So in my SaaS
business, it was all word of
mouth. It was all people just
recommending it in the community
because we had a very strong,
interconnected community, online
teachers, like teachers love to
help other people and they love
to help other teachers teach
better. So it was a cool tool
for teachers. So they gave it to
others. But for my own kind of
media business, my media empire
that I'm building, it's also all
community social media stuff,
right? That's really what it is.
I'm building good reputations
with people like you to come on
my show and chat with me. I have
people that sponsor this show,
like acquire.com, that's for
this one, right? And I have good
relationship with Andrew
Gazdecki and he was on the show.
It's all relationship based for
me. So it's a very community
centric and build in public, you
know, it's all about people in
the end. It doesn't really
matter what you're building
Danny Postma: You already have
the followers on Twitter, right?
But I've seen so many indie
hackers starting out who think
building in public is going to
bring them the customers. It
could but it's gonna be such a
smaller chance. It only most of
the times, it only worked. Like
it worked for me, I had 200
followers and I grow to 15k
because I was sharing a new
technology that was novel and
people love to follow you for
it. But if you're building a
product that's not like new,
refreshing, people want to see
how you build, it might be
really hard to start off with
building in public. So better
just focus on like, guaranteed
marketing channel like that.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, building in
public is wonderful. You have
two audiences with building in
public really, right? You have
your other founder peers, the
people around you, the other
indie hackers. And if you build
a product for them, wonderful.
You've solved all your problems.
But if your audience, your
actual customer audience is
somewhere else, then building in
public will not attract them,
unless you build right there for
them in a way that appeals to
them, right? That helps them
that gets them somewhere, either
as a content marketing, whatever
strategy or you have a podcast
in this space and you get other
experts in and they invite their
own audiences and whatever. But
building in public is a thing
that it has to be intersectional
to meet both. And if it doesn't,
if the only audience that you
talk to about your product is
other indie hackers, you still
get something out of it, right?
You still got good advice and
that kind of stuff, but you're
not going to sell. You still
have to get people to actually
look at your product and pay for
it. Yeah, that's right. So with
with that in mind, I do wonder
sometimes because you're now at
80,000 followers, too, right?
Like you have a sizable Twitter
audience. I mean, we're probably
yeah, we're never gonna reach
Pieter because he's gonna just
keep keep moving away from us in
terms of followers, but it's
still bizarre that between the
two of us, it's kind of 200,000
people or something. It's like,
what is this?
Danny Postma: I think Pieter, I
think most of my followers came
through Pieter because he kept
retweeting me, same with Jon
Yongfook from Banner Bear like
I've been, my Twitter account is
built on giants man, like
they've been sharing so much.
Healthy competition with me and
Pieter, like, yeah, I went from
15, now it's 87,000 in like a
span of a few months.
Arvid Kahl: It's so bizarre.
That's like built on the
shoulders of giants, that
describes my whole life at this
point. It's like everybody who
ever talked about their business
on a podcast like 10 years ago,
I got to use what they taught me
and I got to build something
cool. And now I get to share my
story. And same for you. Not
admitting that the giants and
they're still walking right
there. They're still walking and
sharing these people that we
consider giants. They're still
in the community. It's crazy.
And that's the thing. It puts a
lot of attention on them. And
then on you and on me, like we
get a lot of exposure too in
front of a lot of people. Do you
sometimes wish you wouldn't have
that much attention on Twitter?
I was talking earlier about the
copycat thing and the shitstorm
that sometimes happen. Do you
sometimes wish you could just be
an anonymous founder somewhere?
Danny Postma: No, no, because it
brings me so much. There's so
many upsides to it that like the
downsides that it has, yeah,
there's only a few reasons why I
would not want to do it. I'm
quite Twitter addicted so not
having anything would probably
remove that from its away like
have more of a calm life that's
I think that's literally the
only negative thing. Copycats
like you get to learn with it
like you're gonna get
competition yeah but you get so
much back for it like it's so
worth it. Like I basically have
my whole board of directors on
Twitter like I post about
Edwards, people helped me out
like where do you get that? I
get to learn from other people
so much like, the only reason I
can do this alone is because I
cannot ask other people for the
feedback to help me out. Yeah,
and you need to start early to
do it. Like you need to start
years and years ago. It's not
going to be suddenly there.
Yeah, it's 100% worth it. No, I
would not. I don't fit. Yeah, I
don't know if I want to go to
the level of Pieter where he
gets recognized and everything
everywhere. Like it's I think
what we are lucky with though is
like we're like a bit more. He's
more known in like a little
niche. So he's not like, real
life famous. So I guess he like
it gets recognized and
coordinate space and stuff like
that. So that's a nice part. But
I wouldn't never want to be like
a famous, famous. Yeah, yeah
bigger.
Arvid Kahl: Have you ever heard
the article? I think Tim Ferriss
wrote that one.
Danny Postma: Yeah
Arvid Kahl: How it is to be
famous, that is such a scary
piece. I never want to have to
change my name at the airport as
not to be abducted, right?
Danny Postma: He went regular
people famous, right? And then,
like what he said in his
article, 1 out of 10,000 people
is insane. If you have how many
followers does he have? Like,
let's say 2 million, which means
he has like at least 120 to 200
crazy people following
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, and you have
nine or something, you know. You
have 8.7. Do the math on that.
It's already there. That's the
thing. It's in our community.
And I guess there might be a
shift between the psychological
profiles between different
communities. But you know, if
you then have an edgier opinion
and you attract a lot of
negativity or a lot of
criticism. Yeah, I wouldn't want
to travel in that kind of world.
Danny Postma: I already have it
with the deep agency tweets.
Yeah, the deep agency tweet that
went viral, 30 million people. I
got so many death threats in my
inbox, dude. I was like,
Arvid Kahl: Wow, that's crazy.
Danny Postma: What the fuck?
Like, you don't want to go
viral, viral. So I'm, like,
80,000 there's nothing on
Twitter. I'm like sitting nicely
and quiet. I get to interact
with cool people on Twitter. I
think it's nice. That's good.
Arvid Kahl: That is really nice
in our community and that level
of just being connected with
people just makes so many things
possible. I remember, I only had
like 400 followers when we sold
our business back in the day,
but it was already just meeting
the right people and having good
connections just following the
right people and interacting
with them. That was all we
needed to do. I think that's
kind of among other ways. That's
how people found us to even
acquire us and may be my last
question here. And in this
wonderful conversation, it's
really nice that you're on. Now
that you're building a bigger
team and you're still you're
building the studio of all of
that and experimenting more, do
you still have the you know the
dream exit kind of somewhere in
your future? Do you still
consider this as a goal or do
you just want to keep doing what
you're doing until you just drop
dead from, you know, old age?
Danny Postma: So before it's
right before I made the decision
to build the team, right? I was
already thinking like I'm going
to sell HeadshotPro and yeah
till arounds but it was like I
already did with Headlime. I'm
just going to build another
product again. So I'm just going
to be in this fishery loop of
I'm going to hit where I don't
want to scale I have to sell it.
HeadshotPro doesn't have any
strategic acquirers, which means
you're gonna get like a 3x
multiple for it instead of like
an 8 to 10x. It's not worth it,
man. You can automate it away
for three years. Get your money
out. So if you have a team that
supports it, so yeah, for me at
that price it didn't make sense
so I was like okay, yeah, then I
need to go that way. Yeah, what
are you going to do with the
money anyway? I'm probably going
to put it in a house or
investments. I tried sitting on
the beach maybe depressed. I
need to build like yeah, so if I
can build a team, then that's
good. Yeah.
Arvid Kahl: Do you consider
yourself nomadic? Do you still
consider yourself like a digital
nomad at this point?
Danny Postma: Nah, I've been
stuck for four years in the same
spot. So I don't think I'm that
nomadic anymore in that sense.
Arvid Kahl: Nothing wrong with
that, right? Like you can make a
choice to stay in a cool place.
Danny Postma: But it's annoying
like it always has in your mind
if you live in another place
like my family's in Europe. I
live in Indonesia. Like I never
feel that this is the place I'm
going to live forever. So you
always have like this nomadic
lifestyle. I'm going to move
somewhere else. Maybe I want to
be close to my parents. So you
will never have the rest your
mind like, this is where I'm
going to build my life. So
that's always gonna. Yeah, so
that's why I'm like I'm a little
nomadic. I might move to
Portugal one day or to Kuala
Lumpur. I'm not like fixed to
this spot.
Arvid Kahl: Okay, well that's
interesting too, right? You're
absolutely right. I think I move
every, what? 5 or 10 years in my
life, I've always moved around
too. It's not nomadic because I
settled in that location for a
while. But you know, a couple of
years ago, I was in Berlin and
the time before that, I was in
San Francisco or in my hometown
and now I'm in Canada. That's a
kind of, you know, sectional
nomadic life that I do. I just
settle everywhere. I find a
house and I live in it for a
while. So
Danny Postma: Do you have it
after a few years, you get bored
and annoyed, like, so bored for
pleasure? Like, fuck, I need to
just throw it all around. I need
to move to another spot. Is
that why you move or is there
another reason?
Arvid Kahl: For us or for
myself, it was always like that
the circumstances of my life,
partners or jobs, stuff like
that. That's kind of that where
my nomadism came from. My
boredom is mostly with, yeah,
also, just like with you with a
business, like, I don't want to
stagnant things to do. And I can
find things in a place to do
because we're all digitally
connected. So there's a lot of
distraction. If I want to, I
just need to look at Twitter.
I'm like you. I'm highly
addicted to Twitter. That's
obviously the same thing. Like I
spent way too much time there.
But the opportunities that come
from that, they spiced up the
life that I have. So that's the
reason why I also wouldn't have
never want to give it up, same
reason that you have for trying
to, you know, build an audience
and be a presence in the
community. It's just because so
much is coming back. And that is
enough reason for me at least
right now to not care where I am
because doesn't matter where I
am. The thing I'm going to be
doing, it's the same anyway. I'm
going to hang out on Twitter and
I'm going to do things, right?
Maybe warm outside, maybe cold.
I don't care. So that's it for
me. Yeah, how's life in
Indonesia? It feels like I've
never been there. How is that
for a founder? How's the founder
life there?
Danny Postma: I think a large
part of how successful I am now
is contributed to that kind of
life. So in Europe and America,
I cannot talk for America. But
for Europe, it's very normal.
You do everything yourself,
right? Cooking, cleaning,
groceries, this, that, that,
that. Community to work, so
let's say you already and this
might be a highly opinionated,
but I will explain why it's not
in a sense, like, you spent like
four hours I think in Europe,
just like supporting your life
in that sense. Here in Asia, I
wake up, I order my food, gets
delivered to my house, house
gets cleaned. I have a gardener
in that sense. So the things you
don't want to do, you can
outsource to someone else. A lot
of people are going to say yeah,
that's bad. You hire someone
else. But in this, like,
everyone gets a part of the
country. And this is how
everyone lives in Indonesia.
Like my wife, for example. They
also order food like as locals
because why does it happen? You
suddenly have three people have
a job as a cook because there's
no social security here, right?
So everyone needs to have a job.
Everyone, like the whole
economy, I think gets like
stimulated in that sense. And
this is very Asian. Like it's
more of an Asia thing like you
outsource in that sense, right?
Yeah, Mark got canceled once on
Twitter for saying these things.
So I think
Arvid Kahl: I remember that.
That was fun.
Danny Postma: But it's so normal
here like everyone does it. It's
like the way in Asia different
than Europe and Europe I think,
people call it Calvinistic.
Everything needs to be done by
yourself and in Asia they
believe more like everyone gets
a part in the community to do
whatever they're good in. Like
I've read a cook of bucky Nasi
Goreng from someone that loves
to cook that makes a good meal
than me making a garbage Nasi
Goreng. That's how everyone
thinks. That's how everyone
works in this. Like, that's how
it works over here. So I get to
say four hours a day, I think,
in that sense, so I can focus
more on my company instead of
having to cook which I don't
like, having to drive to work,
which I don't like. Like it
makes life a little bit easier
in that sense. And it's also
like, yeah, I think the sun
helps a lot getting to walk out
sides. Good weather.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, not so much
here in Canada. I can tell you
that like there is some sun, but
not much of it.
Danny Postma: I do miss that
though. I miss like hiking
outside. I would love to go to
Canada. I don't know where you
are, British Columbia maybe,
Vancouver
Arvid Kahl: Ontario
Danny Postma: Ontario? Yeah,
Ontario
Arvid Kahl: Toronto, the area.
If you ever come over, feel free
to stop by.
Danny Postma: I've actually been
four times there and my family
lives there. Yeah, I like it.
It's such a nice area.
Arvid Kahl: Yeah, it's a
beautiful place. I like it too,
obviously. Having space is
wonderful because I can just sit
outside and look beyond, right?
And just think, that's really
cool. I used to live in big
cities and cities are great too.
And you have a lot to do. But
there's something about being
like close to nature. For
somebody like us who works in
technology, right? Where it kind
of gives you this sense of,
there are bigger things than the
latest version of JavaScript or
whatever. It's kind of nice.
That is very cool. Thanks for
Danny Postma: Every area has
their own fate like in Asia, in
sharing it.
Arvid Kahl: It's funny, we have
a dog here too, like a year and
Bali, it's harder to go out
because it's really busy with a
car. So we don't go out that
much that far away. I went back
to Europe, we got a car, we
drove around road trips. So
a half old. And that is already
a reason for me not to move
that's really missing those
kinds of things. So everything
has an upside. Everything has a
downside. But while I was
Indonesia, I have a dog here. So
yeah, I'm living life here.
Maybe we move back to Europe.
Maybe we go somewhere else.
anywhere else because she likes
it here. This is her house. The
We'll see what life brings us,
not stuck.
dog owns this house, right? This
is her place. I don't want to go
Arvid Kahl: It's bizarre that
it's so much easier to fly with
anywhere else.
Danny Postma: Trying to move or
fly with a dog like it's not
a child or a group of children
than it is with a dog, right?
going to happen. You're gonna
have to settle down with it.
But this, I guess it's tribal
problems. I guess these are just
things that come with these
choices that we make. I'm glad
you've been making the choices
that you made and also for
talking about them here with me
today. Let's tie this up with a
bow. If people want to follow
your journey and see what you're
building and see just how your
cool idea of hiring people comes
along, where do you want them to
go? Wherever you want them to
follow you?
Danny Postma: Follow me on
Twitter, @dannypostmaa is where
I share all my journeys,
everything I do. I don't share
revenue anymore. Sorry. But all
the other learnings are there on
Twitter. And if you need a new
headshot, go to headshotpro.com.
Arvid Kahl: Good pitch, I like
it. Thanks so much, Danny for
being on the show and sharing
all that stuff with me today.
That was a wonderful discussion.
Thank you so much.
Danny Postma: It's good to me
being here.
Arvid Kahl: Absolutely!
And that's it for today. Now,
Danny mentioned earlier that he
had acquired a business at some
point that was extremely well
aligned with his existing
portfolio from another indie
hacker, really, that's how it
happened. And that's Danny's
perspective here. But this also
means that somewhere out there,
there is now a founder, an indie
hacker just like us, I guess,
who is significantly more
wealthy after having sold their
app to Danny. And that's what
acquire.com, the sponsor of this
episode can do for you. Imagine
this, you're a founder who has
built a solid SaaS product. It
works, you have customers, you
acquired them over a long period
of time and it's generating
consistent monthly recurring
revenue. People are interested
in your product. And the problem
now is that you're not growing
for whatever reason, there may
be a lack of focus or lack of
skill, lack of plain interest or
something. I don't know. You
just feel stuck. What should you
do? Well, the story that you
would like to hear is that you
would buckle down and somehow
reignited the fire. And that's
what it is. You get past
yourself and the cliches and you
start working on the business
instead of just in the business.
You built this audience you
always wanted to build and you
move out of your comfort zone,
do sales and marketing. And half
a year later, you tripled your
revenue. While reality is not
that simple. That's just wishful
thinking. Situations may be
different for every single
founder who's at that particular
point in time. But too many
times the story ends up being
one of inaction and stagnation
until the business becomes less
valuable or even worse,
worthless. If you find yourself
there where your story is likely
headed down a similar road, I
can offer you a third option
here and that's consider selling
your business on acquire.com.
Capitalizing on the value of
your time is a smart move, don't
waste it. Acquire.com is free to
list. They've helped hundreds of
founders already. So go to
try.acquire.com/arvid and see
for yourself if this is the
right option for you at this
point in time.
Thank you so much for listening
to The Bootstrapped founder
today. You can find me on
Twitter @arvidkahl. And you'll
find my books and my Twitter
course there too. If you want to
support me and this show, please
subscribe to my YouTube channel.
Really appreciate that. Get the
podcast in your podcast player
of choice and leave a rating and
a review by going to
(http://ratethispodcast.com/founder).
That's the best way you can help
me in the show. Any of this will
really help the show, just a
good rating, a good review, best
you can do would really
appreciate it. So thank you so
much for listening today. Have a
wonderful day. Bye bye