ConvertKit Startups

Stacking the Bricks, founded by Alex Hillman and Amy Hoy in 2009, teaches creative people and developers how to build profitable product businesses without venture capital through their flagship 30x500 course. Over 10 years, they evolved from a pre-sold written course ($300-$500) to a sophisticated hybrid self-guided course with 40+ hours of instruction, interactive exercises, and community support that has enrolled thousands of students. Their success comes from authentic community engagement, educational content marketing, and a focus on practical, implementable skills rather than theory.

Joel Runyon built multiple bootstrapped businesses starting from a blog documenting his personal impossibility list in 2010. After struggling to find employment post-college during the 2009 recession, he began freelance marketing work while blogging about fitness challenges and personal experiments. This eventually attracted an audience, and when readers showed strong interest in his paleo diet content around 2012, he created simple information products and recurring meal plan services with minimal technical infrastructure—initially just PDFs and email. The business demonstrated sustainable growth through organic SEO traffic and email marketing, eventually expanding into multiple paleo-related apps and products.

Sue Zimmerman built a multi-million dollar business selling online Instagram marketing courses and coaching services. Her flagship "Insta Results" course priced at $997 generated approximately $67,000 from 67 sales in one year, though total course revenue exceeded $300,000+ when including her lower-priced offerings. Her primary growth channels were speaking engagements, podcast interviews, and strategic email list building (4,900 subscribers from a single strategy guide funnel), focusing on relationship building before conversion.

NP Digital is a nine-figure revenue ad agency founded by Neil Patel that pioneered a product-led growth strategy by acquiring and giving away free software tools (Ubersuggest, Answer the Public) to generate leads. With 40% of agency customers coming from Ubersuggest users and collecting 20,000+ leads monthly, the company demonstrates how free premium software can drive acquisition into higher-margin services, generating eight figures in EBITDA from both the software division and agency services.

Ship 30 for 30 is a writing community and course co-founded by Dickie Bush and Nicholas Cole that transforms writing from a solitary activity into a communal one. The platform leverages Twitter and social media for idea refinement and community building, emphasizing small iterations and immediate feedback. The movement has grown into a structured course with a strong community component, attracting writers seeking to overcome imposter syndrome and build credibility through digital publishing.

Demand Maven, led by CEO Asia Orangio, focuses on customer discovery and go-to-market strategies for early-stage startups. The company emphasizes the importance of customer interviews and provides practical guidance on scaling businesses through evidence-based customer feedback rather than assumptions.