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Trevor McKendrick
trevormckendrick.com · Personal blog · on HN since 2012
Trevor McKendrick writes about running small app businesses, including choosing niches, hiring contractors, and selling his Bible app company.
What HN saysHN links his post on selling his Bible app company as a useful example of acquisition due-diligence checklists and an interesting founder story.
22HN people shared it
11linked it in comments
32stories submitted
1.3Kstory points
6 years agolast shared
2012people per year2026
Most-shared posts
- 1How to Choose a Profitable Niche4 people · 261 points · first shared 2013 · 36 comments on HN
- 2How I Sold My Bible App Company3 people · 430 points · first shared 2016 · 130 comments on HN
- 3My First Year in the App Store3 people · 255 points · first shared 2013 · 100 comments on HN
- 4What Everybody Should Know About Contracting Developers2 people · 119 points · first shared 2013 · 87 comments on HN
- 5How to Attend a Conference2 people · 85 points · first shared 2013 · 22 comments on HN
- 6Startups for the 99%2 people · 67 points · first shared 2013 · 22 comments on HN
- 7My 2nd Year in the App Store2 people · 13 points · first shared 2014 · 1 comments on HN
- 8How Long Until We Know If Tim Cook Sucks?2 people · 2 points · first shared 2012 · discussion on HN
- 9How i sold my bible app company b984bdd1f57b2 people · first shared 2016
- 10How to find a profitable App Niche – Part 21 people · 43 points · first shared 2013 · 8 comments on HN
- 11How to Find the Right Designer1 people · 21 points · first shared 2013 · 4 comments on HN
- 12I lost 25 pounds using my Peloton1 people · 12 points · first shared 2021 · 2 comments on HN
- 13Ignore every founder’s story on how they started their company1 people · 10 points · first shared 2020 · discussion on HN
- 14Why is Everyone like Their Parents?1 people · 9 points · first shared 2012 · 5 comments on HN
- 1515 Frequent Tax Mistakes Made by Developers1 people · 3 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
philfrasty · 2013-05-27
Wrote a post on this a week ago: „The Ultimate-Guide to Hiring a Freelancer“ (http://franzisk.us/2013/05/08/the-ultimate-guide-to-hiring-a-freelance… I usually go for oDesk but you better apply some filters to your search or select candidates by hand to apply to your job. I think your main problem is what Trevor McKendrick called “(you) Pay them to Code, not Think“ (http://www.trevormckendrick.com/contracting-developers/). Other great option is Reddit's „for hire“ subreddit. Good luck!
rubinelli · 2013-05-08
To the OP: the table looks really nice, but the article could have more "meat". Maybe you were afraid of retreading the material, but one short paragraph on each of the AARRR metrics and how the SaaS metrics affect them would make this more useful as a reference for the average bootstrapper.
Also think how you can turn this into a series instead of a collection of articles. One obvious choice, since you are writing about churn, is to go over each of those "circles". See one good example of creating a series to build a mailing list here: http://www.trevormckendrick.com/
jkcorrea · 2021-01-02
Asking with some self-interest for a project I'm working on:
Is there anything in particular about the project that's frustrating/time-consuming? Or just the whole thing altogether?
Projecting a bit here, but your dilemma seems to resonate really well with this essay, especially when you mentioned "indulging in the fantasy":
https://www.trevormckendrick.com/essays/future-you-masturbation
Pains me to hear it makes you dislike yourself, means next to nothing from a stranger online, but you're obviously smart, passionate, and care about your (potential) users' experiences, which is pretty admirable by itself. We see so many stories here of epic devs/biz persons moving mountains and executing their visions, but I'd be surprised if the large majority of them didn't go through a rut like what you currently are facing at least once.
mtmail · 2016-10-14
I remember two good due-diligence check lists inside long articles explaining an acquisition.
https://trevormckendrick.com/how-i-sold-my-bible-app-company-b984bdd1f… (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11032480)
http://jacquesmattheij.com/how-to-sell-your-company
krewast · 2016-07-11
I found the story of Trevor McKendrick who sold his bible app company [0] pretty interesting.
There is also an article about him and his startup on Business Insider [1].
[0] https://trevormckendrick.com/how-i-sold-my-bible-app-company-b984bdd1f…
[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/atheist-makes-100000-selling-bibles-201…
chrisan · 2016-02-04
Is "winnings" the right word here?
Seem like he solved a problem people were willing to pay for http://trevormckendrick.com/my-first-year-in-the-app-store/
trevmckendrick · 2016-02-04
Trevor here, creator of the Spanish Bible app.
IkmoIkmo got this spot on in his/her comment.
Biggest two mistakes people are making in this thread:
1. $100k was revenue, not profit.
2. I get capital gains rates on the sale, versus ordinary income rates.
(If you didn't know about #2 you should probably sign up for my accounting and tax course for freelancers and entrepreneurs: http://trevormckendrick.com/accounting-course-for-entrepreneurs-and-fr…
notsony · 2015-02-06
There's a break-down of the sales on the author/atheist/ex-Mormon's blog:
> My 2nd year net revenue increased to $100,134, again after Apple’s cut.
http://www.trevormckendrick.com/My-2nd-Year-in-the-App-Store/
psuter · 2013-12-25
This was on HN some time ago: http://www.trevormckendrick.com/my-first-year-in-the-app-store/
jetti · 2013-05-07
Just a heads up, the link to the part 1 of this series links to the second part. The first part is here: http://www.trevormckendrick.com/how-to-choose-a-profitable-niche/