#30: Side Hustler Who Built an App that generates $2K MRR
Going deep into the story of Rishi Mohan, who build Pika and Kizie
Today, we're bringing you the story of an extraordinary side hustler who has built numerous tech side projects while professionally being a designer. His hustles have been instrumental in propelling his career too, and he has built a side project that
💰 Generates $2,000 MRR
🇩🇪 Led his way to join a Berlin-based company
🚀 Helped him build a Twitter audience of 3K+ followers
Career acceleration, money, personal brand: A Side Hustler's Incredible Story
Meet Rishi Mohan, a determined individual with an incredible story. Beginning his career as a UI/UX designer, Rishi's path took him to BigBinary as a UI Engineer before recently relocating to Berlin to work with Borg Collective as a Front-end Engineer. While his career transitions are impressive, Rishi's unwavering dedication to learning and building side projects truly sets him apart. These pursuits have opened doors to fantastic opportunities and transformed his life.
Let’s buckle up and get ready to dive into Rishi's world of passion, perseverance, and remarkable achievements!
Embarking on a Learning Odyssey with Early Side Projects
With a B.Tech degree from an Engineering College in Agra, India Rishi was no stranger to skipping and bunking classes. However, in the last two years of college, his interests shifted towards playing video games and immersing himself in the latest technologies and design trends. This newfound passion led Rishi to launch his first side project, ZINX - a technology and design blog. After penning over 500 articles, ZINX garnered mentions in renowned blogs and magazines like Mashable, SmashingMagazine, and 9to5Mac. More importantly, it helped users worldwide discover new apps and services.
Upon completing a final year project with Instahyre, Rishi joined the company as a UI/UX designer. During his tenure, he honed his software development skills by working on side projects like Qurb, a tool for generating device mockups, and Maazi, a personal diary app he developed to learn React Native. Maazi allowed users to write or record voice diary entries and store them in the cloud.
These skill-building endeavours led Rishi to BigBinary, where he flourished as a UI Engineer for six years. Thanks to BigBinary's remote work culture, Rishi could indulge in his other passions: travelling, photography, reading Quora, writing on his blog (which he started in 2018), and creating side projects.
While he developed numerous side projects during this time, the most influential ones were yet to come.
A side project that became a ticket to Berlin
In 2021, Rishi embarked on an exhilarating quest to master Next.js and TailwindCSS, diving headfirst into uncharted territory. As he became more active on Twitter, an idea struck him like lightning: why not create an analytics app for Twitter? Although he had no experience with Twitter's API or analytics, Rishi's unwavering determination spurred him to forge ahead.
After grappling with the Twitter API and overcoming countless obstacles, Rishi transformed his initial concept into a full-fledged Twitter app, complete with timelines, tweet composing, and all the features he craved in a sleeker, cleaner interface. Thus, Kizie burst onto the scene after three months of tireless development, offering a refreshing, clutter-free experience and presenting Twitter's data more meaningfully. Kizie boasted innovative features like Moodboard, Links Radar, and Reader Mode.
Rishi chose to build Kizie in the public eye, sharing his progress, learnings, and experiments on Twitter. One of his videos showcasing a multi-pane modal experiment went viral, earning a retweet from TailwindCSS. This single tweet connected Rishi with a network of talented developers and designers, amassing hundreds of new followers. The transparent approach to building also opened the floodgates for invaluable feedback, which helped him refine the product.
Kizie's launch generated a buzz, garnering praise and admiration from users. Rishi continued to build and improve the app in the public eye, even in the face of challenges from Twitter. However, by the end of 2022, he made the difficult decision to shut down Kizie after Twitter restricted its API access.
But this was far from the end of the outcome of building Kizie. Kizie had captured the attention of Maciek Laskus, the founder of Hive. A few conversations later, Rishi was offered a position as a front-end engineer, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. In January 2023, Rishi began his new role at Hive and made the thrilling move to Berlin just last month. It's truly astounding what building a side project in public can do – it opened doors to a world of possibilities, taking Rishi on a remarkable journey he could never have anticipated.
Another side project to bring in extra income
As 2021 dawned, Rishi spent countless hours in Figma, meticulously crafting marketing images for his apps. Realizing that the process was both complex and repetitive, Rishi conceived an app to streamline the creation of these images. And so, Pika was born.
Here's how Pika works: Paste your screenshot. Customize it with a background, shadow, and more. Copy the output image or save it as a PNG on your machine. Pika retains your previous settings, making your next design a breeze.
It turned out Rishi wasn't alone in his plight; Pika struck a chord with many. Within just 25 days of launching, the app boasted:
🌠 Over 6.5K screenshots exported
👀 Over 20K page views
⭐️ 120+ stars on GitHub
📰 Numerous features in publications
With Kizie in his rearview mirror, Rishi dedicated his weekends and evenings to developing Pika. Rishi utilized Twitter as his primary acquisition channel, building Pika in public and attracting users through tweets and newsletters. Juggling a side project alongside a full-time job isn't a walk in the park, but the rewards and satisfaction it brings are undeniable.
In just six months, Rishi reached the impressive milestone of $250 in monthly recurring revenue (MRR). As is often the case with successful products, revenue started slow but eventually skyrocketed, much like a hockey stick's curve. Now, Pika generates a remarkable $2,000 MRR.
With a thriving career in Berlin and a lucrative side project, Rishi has truly unlocked the potential of building side projects. He plans to continue growing Pika while exploring new opportunities for creative ventures.
In Rishi's words, "I aspire to be someone who can build products on his own and grow them successfully. I'm unsure if that would be an entrepreneur, indie-hacker, or maybe indie-preneur."
Rishi's journey is a powerful reminder of the impact side projects can have on our lives. Through passion, perseverance, and a willingness to learn, anyone can harness the transformative power of side hustles and pave their path to success.
"Build in public, and choose a technology stack you're confident with. Focus on learning and try to sell features before launch. Remember, end users don't care about the inner workings; they want a functional product with a great user experience. Learn to strike a balance between different aspects of your product – not everything needs to be perfect. Invest in your brand rather than your product's, and experiment as much as possible. Above all, always remember that done is better than perfect."
Rishi’s advice to anyone starting a side hustle
Hustler's Insights of the week
Embrace learning and experimentation: Rishi's story demonstrates that continuous learning and a willingness to experiment are essential for success in side hustles. Throughout his journey, Rishi immersed himself in new technologies, design trends, and tools, transforming his curiosity into innovative side projects like ZINX, Kizie, and Pika. By constantly adapting and evolving his skill set, Rishi was able to develop products that resonated with users and opened up new opportunities for personal and professional growth.
Leverage the power of community and personal branding: Building a side project in public and nurturing a personal brand can significantly impact the project's success. Rishi's decision to share his progress, experiments, and learnings on Twitter helped him connect with talented individuals, gain valuable feedback, and increase his project's visibility. By investing in his brand, Rishi was able to generate interest in his products, which eventually led to impressive growth, as seen in Pika's rapid rise to $2,000 MRR. In addition, building in public helped Rishi attract the attention of Hive's founder, ultimately leading to a life-changing career opportunity in Berlin.
Focus on creating a great user experience and don't get bogged down by perfection: One of the most valuable lessons from Rishi's story is the importance of prioritizing user experience and embracing the mantra "done is better than perfect." By concentrating on developing a functional product with a great user experience, Rishi was able to create apps that resonated with his target audience. For instance, Pika's success stemmed from its ability to streamline the marketing image creation process for users, saving them time and effort. Rather than getting caught up in creating a perfect product, Rishi focused on delivering value to users and iterating based on feedback. This approach allowed him to make significant progress on his side projects, even while juggling a full-time job.
Resources of the Week
Applying Mental Models to Building Digital Products: Brian Bassett shares 15 frameworks to help you build better products and businesses.
Theory of Constraints 101: Theory of Constraints helps you achieve your goals by finding and fixing your bottlenecks.
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Impressive!