“There has never been a better time to be a person with technical skills and entrepreneurial drive.”
The Micropreneur Academy is home to developers who launch. The applications below are the first round of products launched by Academy members.
Description: Another WordPress Classifieds Plugin (AWPCP) is the #1 free plugin for adding classified ads to your WordPress site, quickly and easily. AWPCP is better than a theme because you can make it look like your existing site, and cheaper than a full PHP script because add-on modules can be purchased a la carte.
Academy Member: Dave Rodenbaugh
Quote: “The Micropreneur Academy was the push I needed to hone my skillset into a full-fledged business manager, rather than just a skilled developer with some business knowledge. I’ve built businesses before, but the lessons filled many gaps for me and allowed me to bring a new business online within 4 weeks of starting. These are battle-tested, launch-ready suggestions to go from Zero to Hero in online business. Seriously, you could Google for the rest of your life and not find as much valuable information that the Academy packs in the first 8 weeks…”
Description: Bidsketch is web based proposal software for small businesses or freelancers.
Academy Member: Ruben Gamez
Quote: “I was initially doubtful that the Academy would pay for itself every month but I completely reversed my position on that. One of my colleagues is running into major problems trying to tackle these types of issues and I’ve tried to get him to consider the Academy. He really doesn’t realize how much pain he’s putting himself through by not signing up.”
Description: Better Finder.app – a plugin which brings tabs, hotkeys and more to your native Finder.
Academy Member: Antonin Hildebrand
Quote: “The Micropreneur Academy is to entrepreneurial programmers as a Fitness Boot Camp is to active people. It does not make you successful without hard work, but it pushes you a little bit further than you would push yourself alone.”
Description: Bitesize Irish Gaelic teaches you the Irish language, in bitesize lessons. You learn to speak the language at your own pace with our 50+ hand-crafted lessons. Track your progress, learn pronunciation, learn conversation.
Academy Member: Eoin Ó Conchúir
Quote: “The Micropreneur Academy has given me new focus on how to promote a new product. I’ve been a ‘part-time micropreneur’ since 2002, but had overlooked many key points.”
Description: Bidspeed is an opportunity and capture management tool designed for businesses selling to the U.S. government. Bidspeed is integrated with FedBizOpps giving you instant access to all published Federal opportunities. Bidspeed is also a complete CRM system that helps you track due dates, store related documents securely, share information with your team, collaborate on bids, keep connected with contracting officers, and win more government deals.
Academy Member: Ryan Reid
Quote: “The Academy content is helpful; I expect it will more than pay for itself by helping me avoid silly mistakes.”
Description: Book Keeper is a BlackBerry application for managing time, invoices, and clients that integrates with FreshBooks.
Academy Member: Eric Muntz
Quote: “The Academy’s lessons and resources removed every obstacle in my way and took the guess work out of the situation. I can’t recommend it enough.”
Description: BV Commerce is a hosted shopping cart solution that simplifies running an online store.
Academy Member: Marcus McConnell
Quote: “I wish the Academy existed when I started BV Software. It would have saved me several painful lessons in the company’s early years. If you’re thinking about selling software or a service save yourself a lot of time and trouble by subscribing to the Academy.”
Description: CashWaltz is a hosted family expense tracking application. It’s currently in soft-launch.
Academy Member: Ronnie Pitts
Quote: “I would recommend the Academy to a friend, but not to my competition. The materials are very good, and I’ll know next week if one small contract paid for the course many times over.”
Description: ContaxCRM is contact relationship management for Mac OSX and Windows users. ContaxCRM provides accurate, complete and secure contact records and includes iCal, Apple Mail, Apple Script and Twitter integration.
Academy Member: Steve Cholerton
Quote: “Developing a software product and not a member of the academy? You probably also drive without a seatbelt.”
Description: EditMe is an on-demand wiki and web publishing service. An embedded development platform makes it the only wiki-platform-as-a-service available.
Academy Member: Matt Wiseley
Quote: “I came to the Academy with a mature product, and the material here echos most of what I learned the hard way through trial and error. It succinctly communicates many of the finer points of marketing a software product that I would have had trouble putting into words, and has certainly improved my thinking and process around marketing. Most importantly, the Academy provides a private community of like-minded solopreneurs for the exchange of ideas, feedback and support.”
Description: FineOwl allows musicians to build a beautiful website in just 5 minutes, so they can present themselves professionally online with minimal effort.
Academy Member: Andrew Ward
Quote: “I tried the sample lessons before signing up for the Micropreneur Academy and was blown away by the quality of the material. It’s really unusual to find such detailed, actionable advice, and that’s only part of
the Academy’s value. You also have access to member forums populated by a number of like-minded and supportive micropreneurs (plus Rob and Mike) who are always willing to offer advice and feedback.”
Description: Find Items Locally, With Your Friends Help.
Academy Member: Nate Bean
Quote: “The Micropreneur Academy has forever changed the way I think of being an online single founder. This is the best “recipe” of being successful at creating an online business, I have found. You will find great curated content based on the author(s) experiences. The forum is a great place get advice and stay motivated. I only wish I had found the Academy before creating some many other websites.”
Description: We help small and medium sized businesses shop and compare telecommunication products and services from the leading telecommunication companies. We formed the company late last year and just released with our first telecommunications company.
Academy Member: Jerry Tapolcsanyi
Description: Provides ideas for available domain names based on your keywords.
Academy Member: Jorge Monasterio
Quote: “I’ve been a solo software developer and consultant for many years. I thought I knew it all, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised with the content of the Micropreneur academy. Every new lesson has monetizable tips and ideas that I haven’t heard about anywhere else. The Academy is a great resource!”
Description: JobGizmo is tool designed to make a job seeker’s hunt far more efficient, keeping track of all their online applications, professional resumes, contacts, and interviews in an innovative, intuitive way.
Academy Member: Avery Smith
Quote: “I’d wholeheartedly recommend the Micropreneur Academy to a friend or colleague.”
Description: Lapsus is time tracking without timers. It runs in the background and knows what project you’re working on. Find out how long that last project took without the hassle of updating a timer.
Academy Member: John Gallagher
Quote: “I joined the Micropreneur Academy skeptical that it would help me. The fact that it cost money was a real stumbling block for me. However, I took the plunge and I’m really, really glad I did. When I joined I was downhearted and depressed about the lack of progress on my product. I posted to the forums and immediately got loads of constructive criticism and encouragement. It’s still early days for me with the Academy, but it’s already paid for itself in the progress I’ve made since joining. If you’re working on your own to develop a product, you know as well as anyone that it can be a really hard slog. The big value for me is that when I’m feeling low and times are hard I know that there’s a dedicated community that will support me. I get the feeling that when I launch version 1 of Lapsus I’m going to look back and wonder how I could have made it happen without the Academy.”
Description: Light Point Web provides malware protection by turning your current browser into a virtual browser that prevents web content from running locally on your machine. Through the use of the cloud and virtual machines, Light Point Web provides an unmatched level of web security, making your computer invincible to even the newest, most dangerous web attacks. Additionally, Light Point Web gives you data encryption, privacy and anonymity.
Academy Member: Zuly Gonzalez
Quote: “The Micropreneur Academy has been a great investment. The content is top-notch, and full of practical and actionable steps. The best part is the motivation I now have to get things done. Being part of a community of highly motivated and experienced entrepreneurs is very contagious, and it has pushed me to get things done faster.”
Description: Merspi is a social learning hub for students from Australia built on StackExchange.
Academy Member: James Spittal
Quote: “It’s a laugh to think that many of my peers pay thousands of dollars a year in university fees and learn skills and knowledge that are a lot less useful than what they could learn in one month of the Micropreneur Academy.”
Description: mGroomer is Mobile Dog Grooming Software for the PC/Mac, iPhone and Droid Phone. Built with the Mobile Groomer in mind, mGroomer has Appointment Booking, Contact Information and detailed Pet Grooming information all accessible on your PC/Mac and Smart Phone.
Academy Member: Al Rosales
Quote: “I could never have released mGroomer successfully without the Micropreneur Academy. The material on how to market your software is invaluable! No matter how good your software is you, got to know how to get customers.”
Description: MobileTail is an online comparison website for mobile phones, subscriptions and mobile broadband in Sweden. Instead of just listing the deals you fill in your usage (we also tell you how to find this) and then we show the best deal based on your usage.
Our goal is to make you more informed than the salespeople so that you always knows what’s best for you!
Academy Member: Jacob Lonroth
Quote: “Many people focus on pitching, raising money and finding a team. Instead, the Micropreneur Academy focuses on building, earning money and finding yourself. That’s what makes the Academy awesome! ”
Description: PhraseExpander saves time typing texts, filling forms, launching programs, opening websites and automating common tasks by using customized shorts. It also corrects your spelling mistakes. It fully integrates in the system and works in any program
Academy Member: Andrea Nagar
Quote: “The Academy is the place to go to discuss all the issues related to building and growing your business.”
Description: Risk management software aimed at business people who are not risk management specialists.
Academy Member: Martin Howes
Description: SightReadingMastery is online sight reading practice for musicians.
Academy Member: Evan R. Murphy
Quote: “The lessons and forums are both invaluable resources that will skip you a ton of learning things the hard way. I’d recommend the Academy to anyone wanting to launch a software product and increase their chance of success.”
Description: CodeHave is a source code and plain text sharing script developed in PHP and AJAX.
Academy Member: Amgad Suliman
Quote: “The invaluable information in the Academy saved me hundreds of hours and motivated me to work harder because I now know I am heading in the right direction. ”
Description: Orchestrate is a hosted workforce scheduling application – it makes it easy to send a qualified technician to a location to perform a task, then track the outcome and capture their feedback. Clients can be granted read-only access to their data, and all completed tasks are stored online.
Academy Member: Andy Wright
Quote: “I was expecting a lot and the Academy has exceeded my expectations.”
Description: Pins is a Bookmarks Library app for Mac. The main idea is “All your bookmarks in one place” which means a user doesn’t have to struggle to find bookmarks on different browsers/computers as the library can be easily synched. There is also a social side on it because bookmarks can be shared (exported in a simple clickable archive) with other people. This should brings together social bookmarking (based on web applications) and the ease of a beautifully integrated desktop application mac users are used to.
Academy Member: Fabio Russo
Quote: “The wealth of information found in the academy is not easy to get even if you own every single business book out there. Plus it is really focused on the needs of single indie developers desperately wanting to become entrepreneurs in charge of their own lives and products.”
Description: Pinterest Plugins for WordPress will help you attract an insane amount of traffic to your WordPress site from Pinterest by adding an eye-catching “Pin It” button. Features include custom buttons, image hover options, and more.
Academy Member: Phil Derksen
Quote: “Joining the Micropreneur Academy gave me the resources and inspiration to push forward with my own products, all while holding a day job. It helped me transition from a pure software engineer to a product owner and set my focus to running a real business. If you’re a developer wanting to take your product to the next level I highly recommend you check out the Academy.”
Description: QuickReader is a speed reading eBook reader for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Think of it as an eBook reader on steroids. Does this give you an unfair advantage? Perhaps, but we won’t tell anyone.
Academy Member: Patrick Thompson
Quote: “The Academy lessons tell you what you need to do, why you need to do it, and, give a time and cost effective recipe for how to do it. This short-cuts a lot of research you would need to do otherwise. Beyond the Academy lessons, Rob and Mike have been generous in their advice and the forum community has been very supportive. If you are a developer starting on a solo venture, joining the Academy will greatly improve your chances for success.”
Description: The product gathers ad revenue stats from various ad providers and displays aggregate stats and graphics on a dashboard for content publishers that run multiple ad networks. There is no other web-based product available to do this, and it can easily take 30+ minutes every day just to log in to each system and look at the data.
Academy Member: John Lein
Description: RunFatBoy is an exercise and weight loss plan for beginners.
Academy Member: Jim Jones
Quote: “The modules on market research alone are worth price of admission. The Academy does a superb job in guiding you to find a niche with true market demand.”
Description: SAM Contacts is a simple and powerful contact manager with unique features such as mapping and tags.
Academy Member: Mihaela Mihaljevic Jakic
Quote: “I would definitely recommend the Academy for two reasons: First I find the content to be invaluable. The lessons are assemblies of best practices and experience that have saved me a lot of time and a lot of mistakes. The second reason is the forums, in which people with similar ventures and problems meet and help each behind closed doors.”
Description: SAM Reports is Asterisk reporting made simple.
Academy Member: Mihaela Mihaljevic Jakic
Description: SharePoint Gizmos is a small tool set I developed and used myself for SharePoint. The tools have come in very handy for me and others I have shared them with and I haven’t seen anything else like them available. They allow SharePoint Developers and Administrators to find basic information about their SharePoint Implementation quickly and easily.
Academy Member: Chris Yokley
Quote: “Between the freebies you get as a member and the time saving you find from technical resources the academy pays for its self.”
Description: Vetter helps managers get more ideas from their staff – new product ideas, efficiency ideas, event ideas, marketing ideas…
Academy Member: Duncan Murtagh
Quote: “The Academy gave me a broad education on everything I needed to launch a product except writing the actual code. Specific examples of what I learned: 1) what converts well; 2) how to figure out the keywords to target; 3) the value of going niche.”
Description: Viternus is a social legacy network dedicated to privately and securely hosting personal media to be delivered automatically in the future according to your directions. You can schedule time-delayed messages to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries with loved-ones for years to come. You can even deliver your video will or provide the location of important financial information.
Academy Member: Nathan Stuller
Quote: “The Micropreneur Academy is definitely worth the price. The information presented is focused specifically on things I need to know. It cuts through all the fluff and maximizes my time spent learning. I recommend it.”
Description: WedPlanner Pro is wedding planning tool for professional wedding planners to manage their wedding planning business.
Academy Member: Adriaan Putter
Quote: “The academy helped me tremendously by showing me the steps I needed to take to launch a product. It saved me time by forcing me to focus on the right things to do, and saved me money I would’ve wasted on marketing and advertising. The forums makes you feel like you’re part of a big family of entrepreneurs whom all want to see you succeed.”
Description: Game management starts with estimating populations to drive decisions. Whitetail Census makes performing a trail-camera survey easy on time and money. Let us do the grunt work. You upload your photos and receive an email with your population information.
Academy Member: Robert Graham
Quote: “The Academy is a good way to get pro-grade feedback on whatever you’re working on. The focus on practical and actionable advice makes much of the content immediately useful. The price may be steep if you are pre-launch or pre-revenue.”
Description: Winancial is a french online personal finance management service focused on simplicity and automaticity. There are 3 clients : web, desktop & mobile. Free registration!.
Academy Member: Jean-Philippe Dutreve
