Noah Kagan shared in a brand new podcast episode how he founded AppSumo, a “Groupon for software,” in a single weekend. Startup costs were $60; AppSumo made $80 million last yr, and Kagan continues to be its CEO.
In 2010, Kagan was 28 years old and had already experienced what it was prefer to be the thirtieth worker at Facebook and the fourth worker on the financial app Mint.
“I think I just felt unsafe in some of these places,” Kagan told fellow entrepreneur Jeff Berman in a June episode of “Master of Scaling” podcasts.
Kagan was fired by Mark Zuckerberg after nine months at Facebook and later at Mint. He realized that devoting his time to his day job was a risk—another person could resolve to fireplace him at any time.
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“I think I wanted to prove that I was smart or that I was successful or that Facebook, when they fired me and then when Mint fired me, [that] “I can do it,” Kagan said.
The idea for AppSumo, a marketplace for software deals for small business owners or solo entrepreneurs, got here about when Kagan thought there was a solution to promote software tools and make cash doing it. He saw that the web site MacHeist was giving discounts on software packages to Apple users and desired to attempt to bring these sorts of discounts to a wider audience.
“My interest was in software development by geniuses and my skills and passion were in advertising,” said Kagain.
The deal was made in about 60 hours. First, Kagan found a software he desired to sell: the image-sharing service Imgur. He contacted Imgur’s founder via email on Reddit and received approval to sell a reduced version in exchange for a share of the revenue.
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The next step was to satisfy with Reddit’s founder and engineer to ask at no cost promoting. And he got it.
The final part was paying a developer to create an internet site with a PayPal button and buying the domain name AppSumo.com.
What was the overall cost of starting the business? $60 and a weekend of his time.
AppSumo made $300,000 in its first yr and $3 million in its second yr, Kagan said on the podcast. Last yr, it brought in $80 million in revenue.
Kagan currently has a net value of 36 million US dollars.
According to Kagan, the important thing a part of the business is investing in the issue and being obsessed with it.
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“I think that’s what people in business are kind of missing out on,” Kagan said. “They’re now chasing AI or wanting to become influencers. I think there are areas [where] You think to yourself, “I don’t know if I’ll ever get tired of this.”
There is one benefit to starting a side job or finding an additional source of income – according to Kagan, you have more control over your future.
“If you may quit just half-hour every week, for those who can quit only one Netflix show every week, for those who can quit one thing every week and keep doing that each week, eventually you may construct this business,” he said.
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