Make Lemonade

Today we're joined by the formidable Jack Ellis, co-founder of Fathom Analytics, the simple, privacy focused alternative to Google Analytics. While Jack isn't running a successful software company, he spends time teaching people with his courses. He has two, which have made over $250k cumulativelyTimestamps:01:31 - Becoming the face of Fathom10:35 - Google vs Fathom13:22 - What are the alternatives to GA?15:56 - Product Growth Challenges18:27 - How does the Fathom team work?22:30 - Handling growth when questioning growth (at all costs)25:09 - Charging for a product that is usually free28:49 - Why focus on privacy34:24 - Who is Lemon Squeezy's customer?36:00 - Afilliates update37:18 - Making $250k with courses43:10 - Would they ever sell Fathom?45:42 - Jack Outside of workAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr & @jmckinven— brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

Today JR and James joined by Arvid Kahl, who previously built and sold his SaaS, Feedback Panda, for a life changing amount of money. From then Arvid has made it his mission to help other indie founders build a successful bootstrapped business, through his books Zero to Sold and The Embedded Entrepreneur and also his weekly blog, newsletter and podcast, The Bootstrapped Founder.In this episode we talk all about how Arvid motivates himself to show up to write content every week, the economics behind a creator business and why he doesn't just build another SaaS.Timestamps:03:49 Arvid's backstory06:25 Writing Zero to Sold11:54 Life after exiting your company13:23 What's it like writing a book16:41 Thinking in decades19:05 Would Arvid start another SaaS?22:42 Hiring external help24:32 Recording interviews vs solo podcasts28:25 The business side of The Bootstrapped Founder34:55 Finding purpose post-acquisition36:51 Funding vs Bootstrapping43:01 Arvid's thoughts on the Great Gumroad Migration48:19 Arvid's reading listAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr & @jmckinven— brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

Today we're bringing you a Lemonhead episode where JR and James take you behind the scenes of what it takes to build a affiliate feature from scratch and how the team are shaping up for launch. Hope you enjoy this little peek under the surface of how the Lemon Squeezy team operates.Timestamps:00:00 Intro00:42 Is running Lemon Squeezy stressful?01:32 Feeling the pull of Lemon Squeezy momentum06:00 Investing in the podcast for transparency09:43 Affliate Beta Launch12:14 What is different about Lemon Squeezy affiliates13:23 Why go so deep on the affiliate programme features?19:24 Creator Highlight - Cedric MooreAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr & @jmckinven— brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

Today we're joined by Thomas Frank, a YouTube creator with over 2.8m subscribers on his main channel and 138k subscribers on his Notion-focused channel, Thomas Frank Explains. He started out helping ambitious college students study better and pivoted to the self-help/personal development niche. He's a creator in every sense, going from YouTube videos to writing books, making courses and even launching his own platform with creator friends. Now though, a good chunk of his income is coming from selling Notion templates, making over $100k p/m consistently.Timestamps(00:00) Intro(01:07) Thomas' background(09:28) Going full time as a creator(11:35) Consistency and growth(15:17) How to grow on YouTube(19:12) Why Thomas stopped posting on his main channel(22:25) How a $100k p/m creator business works(25:16) How to grow your business 10x with Notion templates(30:28) Can you go too niche?(31:54) Why not continue with the main channel(33:41) Notion and productivity tools(41:05) Building a streaming service - Nebula(45:13) Switching from Gumroad to Lemon Squeezy(51:17) OutroLinksPat Flynn's income reportsThe Motivation Hacker bookImpossible listPinned tweet - 2022 income reviewNotion API courseTaran's editing tutorialThomas' payment threadAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr & @jmckinven— brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

In this episode, JR and James are joined by Brett Williams, the founder of Designjoy, a one-man productized design service that was making $160k p/m at it's peak. People have been asking the question “how does he do it?” and previously you had to rely on meta-analysis to find out. Now Brett is going to tell you EXACTLY how he runs a one-person, $1m a year business with his new course, Productize Yourself. We chat with Brett to find out all about his new course, which in itself has made over $100k in it's pre-sale.Timestamps:01:01 - Brett's background08:34 - Launching Designjoy14:01 - Dealing with Twitter backlash21:35 - Brett's "Productize Yourself" course30:49 - How Brett spends his moneyAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr & @jmckinven— brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

In this episode JR and James discuss some thriving creator businesses and what they've been doing right. Especially some of those that have used YouTube to build a brand, then start course or template companies. Seems there is a lot of people focusing on productivity (and Notion) making lots and lots of money.From student doctors to self proclaimed "productivity geeks", these content creators have leveraged their audiences to make seriously impressive businesses. They aren't all following the same playbook; some are making long form content, others are building their own platforms, but there is lots to learn from each example.Timestamps:00:26 - Lemon Squeezy update03:02 - Ali Abdaal09:46 - Thomas Frank15:01 - Johnny Harris22:12 - Peter Akkies27:28 - Marie Poulin29:55 - OutroAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr & @jmckinven— brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

The Make Lemonade podcast is back with a fresh new format. We're going co-hosted, meaning co-founder J.R. is going to be joined each week by James McKinven (you might have heard his voice on the Indie Bites podcast).Some episodes we'll be riffing on some topics, other times we'll interview some of the best creators and entrepreneurs around and, finally, we'll bring you some juicy behind the scenes content of how we're squeezing those Lemons here at Lemon Squeezy.This episode, we discuss how the Lemon Squeezy team have been capitalising on people looking to switch from Gumroad since made a huge pricing change, the trends creators should consider for 2023 and highlight an impressive course pre-sale.Timestamps:01:06 - The great Gumroad migration11:56 - Merchant of record and taxes18:30 - Lemon Squeezy hires22:26 - Trends for creators36:54 - Creator spotlight: Brett WilliamsAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr & @jmckinven— brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

In today's episode, I sit down with Simon Rohrbach, the Co-Founder & CEO of Plain.com — CS without the BS. Previously, Simon led design at Deliveroo and was the entrepreneur in residence at Index Ventures.There's something to be said about building products within "nonsexy" categories. For example, customer service. When it comes to customer service solutions, not much has changed in the past decade. Plain.com hopes to bring something fresh when it comes to the customer service tools that exist today.In short, Plain is building the Stripe for customer service. The product is a customer service tool but with context. Their focus has been around making it easy for engineering teams easily integrate into their existing workflow.Follow Simon:TwitterPlain.comAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

We're back with another solo Lemonhead session with @jrfarr (JR Farr). Today I wanted to reflect on one year since we launched, 10 years in the making, as we look towards the next phase of growth with our first hires. In this episode, I give you two important pieces of advice on hiring, along with my notes from Simon Sinek's, Leaders Eat Last, on how to continue to evolve as a leader as your team grows.As always, thanks for being a listener of the show.  Hosted by @jrfarr (JR Farr) — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

Yo! We're back with a brand new episode. I decided to do something a little different today. I just sat down and hit record and started talking about what was on my mind as a founder myself. I talked about the current phase of the business journey we're in. This led me to start talking about the idea of building an audience vs. capturing an audience. We'll be back with more interviews, Lemonhead chats, and more of these "behind the scenes" episodes where I share more about our own journey.As always, thanks for being a listener of the show.  Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

Meet Peter, the co-founder of Reform — the modern form builder.  A long-time developer who studied at the Copenhagen Business School.  Over the years, Peter has built and sold several digital products. Peter was also part of the first batch of the TinySeed — an accelerator fund for bootstrappers. Peter is hoping to carve his own niche in the form builder space and so far, he and his team are off to a great start. They recently rolled out a freemium version of Reform. We at Lemon Squeezy use Reform for all of our customer surveys and we're big fans of the product. Links mentioned:Reform — The modern form builderTinySeedBook — TractionBook — The Art of Non-ConformityFollow Peter:TwitterPersonal website=============================Show notes:(0:42) why another form builder?(3:40) raising money with TinySeed(10:10) offering a freemium plan(12:46) focusing on marketing(16:45) what's next for Reform?(21:42) wrapping up=============================As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

Mark is an indie developer from Manchester. He's the Founder of UiPress, a WordPress plugin that provides a white-label admin experience for WordPress. Over the years of using WordPress and its evolution, the admin experience has been a hot topic. But what if you could customize it to your own needs. That's where UiPress comes in.Mark's story of success with UiPress began when he almost gave up on the product idea altogether. Today, Mark is working on UiPress full-time and his story is a good reminder to scratch your own itch.Follow Mark:TwitterUiPress=============================Show notes:(1:49) solving your own problem(4:30) almost giving up(7:30) rebranding / repositioning(13:10) revenue numbers(16:26) what lies ahead for UiPress?(18:33) wrapping up=============================As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

In today's episode, you'll learn from Mike McAlister. Over the past decade, Mike has carved out his works in the WordPress industry. Mike has the unique ability to be a designer, developer, and marketer.  With this formula, he has launched and grown multiple projects from ground zero to over a million dollars in revenue before, ultimately, being acquired by WP Engine.Today, Mike is the Principal Software Engineer at WP Engine. He also recently launched the Liftoff Creator Course. In short, the Liftoff course teaches you step-by-step how to pinpoint your expertise and turn it into digital products like courses, ebooks, memberships, digital goods, podcasts, and templates that earn recurring revenue. Links mentioned:Atomic BlocksWP Engine acquires Array ThemesFollow Mike:TwitterPersonal websiteLiftoff course for digital creators=============================Show notes:(1:30) early beginnings for Mike(4:17) moving from a marketplace to running own business(7:07) leading the charge with Atomic blocks for WordPress(10:28) getting acquired by WP Engine (13:38) a typical day in the life(17:29) the Liftoff course(24:20) Mike's love for astronomy inspires his work(28:05) wrapping up=============================As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

For the past decade, Matt Medeiros has become an expert when it comes to podcasting and building audiences. Within the WordPress eco-system, Matt is a staple in the community where he runs The Matt Report and The WP Minute.Today, Matt is the Director of Podcast Success at Castos where he helps new and existing podcast shows become successful. I can't think of a better role for Matt. If you're lucky enough to get 30 minutes with him — you'll be in good hands.  Links mentioned:Matt's thoughts on the future of WordPressMatt's favorite business podcast — This week in startupsFollow MattTwitterPersonal websiteCastos - Podcast Hosting=============================Show notes:(3:25) typical day for Matt(6:00) what makes a podcast successful?(10:40) how the platforms will influence what's next for podcasting(13:40) what's next for WordPress(18:25) balancing day job and side hustles(21:25) how to get started with podcasting(25:20) wrapping up=============================As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy 

Kacper Staniul is a growth marketer and the founder of Scrapelabs — a web scraping service. His company specializes in web scraping for businesses looking for data analysis, competitive analysis, pricing monitoring, and more. (3:05) going full-time(6:49) tools and software used(8:00) what's next?(8:57) how long does web scraping take?(15:50) wrapping upAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

By day, Michael Riddering (aka @Ridd), is the founding designer for Maven — a cohort-based education platform. By night, he's the founder of Figma.Academy — a design course that teaches advanced design tactics delivered directly inside of Figma.In this episode, Ridd breaks down how he built Figma Academy. We uncover a decision he made early on that helped influence Figma Academy into the success story it is today.Links:Check out Figma, the best design tool. Interested in Figma Academy? Here's a quick video demo of what the course is all about.Also, be sure to check out Ridd's James Bond house.Show notes: (1:29) getting started with design & education(5:17) the beginnings of Figma Academy(10:10) balance work and life(12:07) delivering a course inside of Figma(14:18) what's next for Figma Academy(19:09) Ridd's day to day(22:45) quick Q&A / wrapping upAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

Here's a list of ways to connect with Laura Eddy:Twitter: @typeheistWebsites: Laura Eddy, Typeheist, Haunts.(1:45) favorite type of design(2:58) where does inspiration come from(3:45) how long does it take to design a font(8:11) favorite design tools(9:29) design & development experience(11:40) balancing work and side-hustles(15:52) reading to learn(17:39) getting started in font design(20:15) advice and wrapping upAs always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

There's an old African proverb that goes something like this: If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.This is sometimes easier said than done. Hiring is hard and today I'm going to break down how to make your first 5 hires. Hopefully, this helps you avoid some of the costly mistakes I made.As always, thanks for being a listener of the show. Here's a breakdown of today's Saturday Squeeze.(0:50) my experience hiring(2:19) when to hire(3:40) define values early on(7:50) hire generalists, then specialists(10:45) letting go of control(12:00) keep your org flat as long as you can(14:35) communication is key as you scale(15:20) it's not one-size fits all(1648) recap-----------------Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always, thanks for being a listener of the show. For today's episode, I talk about all things landing pages.(0:20) intro(1:25) all about the headline(4:45) hero elements(5:31) amplify the pain (the problem)(7:06) the big reveal (the solution)(8:07) social proof (if you got it, flaunt it)(8:50) don't just tell, show(9:47) benefits first, features last(10:47) use cases / case studies(11:30) positioning aka "picking a fight"(12:48) pricing(14:02) repeat call to action(15:01) remind me later (unique)(16:28) wrapping up-----------------Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always, thanks for being a listener of the show. For today's episode, I break down when and if you should raise money for your company. The analogy I use is you can either ride the unicorn or chase the unicorn. (1:20) ride the unicorn or chase the unicorn(3:04) types of funding(7:30) convertible notes vs. price rounds(9:45) when to get funding(11:45) what kind of company do you want to build?(14:35) what can you afford to live on?(15:13) how many people do you want to manage?(16:27) how much are you willing to give?(16:56) my experience between bootstrapping and funded(18:55) when should you bootstrap?(20:07) when to raise money?(21:23) be careful, don't get distracted-----------------Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy or follow us on Twitter @lmsqueezy

As always thanks for being a listener of the Make Lemonade show. Hosted by @jrfarr — brought to you by LemonSqueezy.com. If you're looking to sell digital products online, be sure to check out Lemon Squeezy. https://lemonsqueezy.comFollow us on Twitterhttps://twitter.com/lmsqueezy