4 Projects in 4 Months!

Inspired by Peter Levels 12 Startups in 12 Months I decided to do the “4 Projects in 4 Months” challenge. I plan to do a sabbatical and work full-time on my projects for four months. This blog post describes the reasons why and how I am doing this.

Why am I doing this?

There are multiple reasons…

  • Clarity: Pursue multiple ideas and figure out what I enjoy the most. Therefore, one goal is to be able to focus and clarify my next steps to obtain a target direction.
  • Education: Try new things, improve my skills and learn new ones.
  • Execution: Move from dreaming and thinking into doing.
  • Business: Earn my first dollars (or euros) online. Nevertheless, this is not the main focus.
  • Fun: And of course, just to try something new and have some fun.

My constraints

  • Focus only on one project per month
  • Unlike other people, I will not travel during that time.
  • From a finance perspective, I use the sabbatical model for cashflow and 4 months of full time
  • Share progress and post on Twitter with #buildInPublic. Post every month a blog post where I document my progress.

Which topics are planned?

Month 1: Extend einfachcrypto.de

The first month will follow my passion - cryptocurrencies and blockchain! I started a side project last year (einfachcrypto.de) and I have some pending ideas that I want to implement. For example, some content is still missing and I want to add utilities for the crypto research. This means I will split the month into sub-focus areas.

Goal

  • Follow my heart topic, build utilities for myself and collect knowledge. The goal is also to help people and share information about cryptocurrencies.
  • The goal is not to make money with this project but rather to grow an audience within this space.

Update: You can read the results here

Month 2: Helping a friend with marketing and setup of tools

I am already supporting a friend with technical and marketing consulting. He started a health coaching business and we want to scale his business in October 2022. I will update his landing page, find great webinar software and help him build a lead magnet like a free newsletter course.

Goal

  • Increase knowledge in marketing and building a course-based coaching
  • I will get a provision-based monetization, so this project is a potentially passive income stream

Update: You can read the results here

Month 3: Building a Micro SaaS (Micro Software as a Service) business

I subscribed to the Micro SaaS Idea newsletter. The idea is to pick one idea from this newsletter and build it.

Goal

  • Use my skillset to build my own business including earning money.
  • The first approaches fail mostly so the main goal is to start doing and get into building a SaaS. New ideas and insight will come along the way.

Update: You can read about the launch of illostration.com here.

Month 4: Open - no-code or MSaaS

I haven't made a final decision for this month because I want to have the flexibility to decide later. I have two options here. Either I build something with a no-code platform (e.g. bubble) or I start another micro SaaS business from the newsletter. Maybe I can also combine them and do both. ;)

Goal

  • I see a big potential in no-code. This will help me in my carrier and in my own business.

Update: You can read what I did here.

Follow me

I hope you are as curious as I am about how these 4 months will go. You can follow the daily progress on Twitter and my monthly summary here on this blog. I already archived one milestone by writing this article. But it’s still hard for me to write.🤷🏻‍♂️