Micropreneurship - what is the best way to achieve?

I'm a software developer with MANY personal ideas. Many of my ideas get implemented by other people throughout the years, which means they are viable.

A life style I learned about is Micropreneurship, which is a 1-man business that develops niche software products and relies extensively on outsourcing.

I want to be a micropreneur without leaving my job. I thought about starting in the weekends.

Do you have a tried and tested way for becoming a successful micropreneur?

Thanks

I'm a software developer with MANY personal ideas. Many of my ideas get implemented by other people throughout the years, which means they are viable.

Nice - sounds like you are traveling the right path for your goals. I would warn that just because your ideas have been implemented by others and have succeeded that this is no guarantee that you could have implemented them yourself. Execution and experience is a huge part of the equation.

That's why you should get to executing asap - the sooner you start working the earlier you will start learning.

I want to be a micropreneur without leaving my job. I thought about starting in the
weekends.

I would recommend this approach over quitting your job first. Micropreneurship is ideal for someone who wants to stay working until they have enough income to cover expenses. This is the safest approach and the path I traveled myself.

Do you have a tried and tested way for becoming a successful micropreneur?

It really depends on how hard you're willing to work and how fast you're able to learn new things (including leaving old habits behind), but there are definitely ways to improve your chances. Having traveled this road and helped others I've definitely come up with strategies and tactics for doing this.

The most important, IMO, is to find a market before you build your product. Don't do what most of us do and start writing code when you have an idea. Instead, figure out if the numbers will work, and then start marketing the app, before you write a line of code.

I'm torn here because I don't want to promote my own stuff, but I've been writing about this for years at www.softwarebyrob.com and I don't want to discount the volume of information that's there. I also have a free 170-page ebook you can get by signing up for the email newsletter; that's a good place to start.

The next step, if you find the ebook helpful, is to check out my more thorough blueprint for becoming a micropreneuer in my book Start Small, Stay Small: A Developer's Guide to Launching a Startup at www.startupbook.net I also +1 all 4 of the links Ryan mentioned above, and would add Patrick McKenzie and Amy Hoy to the list.

Good luck!

Rob Walling is a great introduction to this topic (if nothing else, get his free e-book).

He has lots of paid and free content, including the Micropreneur Academy which is some sort of structured course, so probably fits your "Tried and trusted way" requirement.

(I have no connection with Rob.) For more general software start-up advice I would also recommend reading

• Andy Brice
• Eric Sink
• Bob Walsh
• Joel Spolsky