From Zero to $200K Exit: The 11-Month Journey of Talknotes
How Nico built, grew, and sold his AI transcription startup for $200,000 and the brutal reality of founder burnout along the way.
$200,000
Exit Price
11 Months
From Launch to Exit
$7,500
Peak Monthly Revenue
40+
Previous Failed Projects
The Problem That Started It All
"I got the idea when I tried to write a tweet using Google Doc's transcription tool, but it was terrible. I was pretty sure I wasn't the only one too lazy to type."
Key Insight:
Talknotes was born from personal frustration a classic founder story. The broad audience (anyone who creates content) made it perfect for Meta ads scaling.
The $700 Validation That Changed Everything
Nico's rule: "Only reinvest what the project generates." No ad spending until organic revenue justified it.
Initial Launch (August):
MVP built in one week using vanilla JavaScript/CSS/HTML + Node.js backend
First 10 Days:
$700 revenue from startup directories and Twitter outreach
The Crash:
"Daily revenues quickly went to $0 after a few weeks. I got depressed and almost gave up..."
Product Hunt: The Rocket Fuel
After encouragement from fellow founders Marc Louvion and Dan Kulkov, Nico launched on Product Hunt in October:
🏆 Product of the Day
Resulted in $1,500 MRR from media coverage and organic traffic
Technical Evolution:
Migrated from vanilla stack to Nuxt.js for better scalability and maintainability
The Meta Ads Engine That Doubled MRR
The Simple Strategy:
"Catch people's attention, and show them how the app can help improve their life. No need to over-complicate."
The Growth Flywheel:
- Acquire new users through targeted Meta ads
- Learn about them via onboarding forms
- Create better ads using collected data
- Repeat and scale
80/20 Rule of Facebook Ads:
"Making good creatives is 80% of the job when doing ads on Facebook. Most of the technical stuff is done by AI now."
The Burnout That Forced the Exit
In May, everything nearly collapsed:
⚠️ The Breaking Point:
The Founder's Realization:
"I had a hard time working on the app after that. So I decided to list it on Acquired dot com."
The $200,000 Acquisition: Smooth Until Escrow
The Listing:
Listed at $200,000 "a pretty low price considering the revenues and fast growth."
"I could have gotten $300,000 if I accepted payment over time, but $200,000 today is better than $300,000 tomorrow for me."
🚨 The Escrow Disaster:
"The process went smoothly until we tried to use Escrow, which almost fucked up the whole deal."
- Week-long delay on refund confirmation
- Required threats to get movement
- Buyer's persistence saved the deal
🎯 Final Transfer:
Assets transferred → Wire received → $200,000 secured
The Founder's Reality: 7 Years of Failure for 11 Months of Success
"This might sound like an overnight success. It is not."
The Real Timeline:
- 7 years of continuous building
- 40+ projects launched (most failed)
- 15-hour days without weekends or vacations
- Mental toll: "Soul-sucking when you don't see the end"
The Snowball Principle:
"You only need to win once to snowball everything. Work hard, focus, fail a lot and keep shipping fast."
Where Is Nico Now?
💰 30% Away from Millionaire Status:
Combined profit from Talknotes, sale proceeds, and other projects
🌏 Geographic Flexibility:
"I can pretty much retire in Asia if I want to."
The Founder's Paradox:
"Surprisingly, doing absolutely nothing is 10x more exhausting than working 15h per day."
The Takeaway for Aspiring Founders
Talknotes' journey demonstrates that startup success isn't about genius ideas or perfect execution it's about persistence through failure, smart validation, scalable acquisition channels, and knowing when to exit. The $200,000 exit wasn't the beginning of Nico's journey; it was the culmination of 7 years of learning what doesn't work to finally find what does.
"Thanks to you for reading until here, and thanks to everyone who supported me." Nico
