Founder stories
$10K MRRin 3 years
3 milestones
Growing to 200,000 Users Without Any Marketing: The Invoice Ninja Story
Founder
Shalom Stark
Co-Founders•Technical•USA
Commitment
Side ProjectExperience
ExperiencedProduct
Open-source invoicing, payments, time-tracking and expense tracking platform for freelancers and small businesses.
Type
SaaSIndustry
FinanceModel
FreemiumMarketing Strategy
How Shalom acquired customers
Primary Channel
SEO / Content
Also Used
CommunitiesWord of Mouth
Tech Stack
Tools used to build Invoice Ninja
LaravelFlutterMySQLStripeDocker
The Full Story
TL;DR
Shalom Stark bootstrapped Invoice Ninja to 200,000+ users through open source, SEO, and word of mouth - without spending on marketing.
Shalom Stark is a serial entrepreneur who built Invoice Ninja into one of the most popular open-source invoicing platforms for small businesses.
The Open Source Advantage
Invoice Ninja is fully open source, which provides a unique marketing advantage. Developers discover it, self-host it, and many eventually upgrade to the paid hosted version.
The Growth Strategy
- SEO for invoicing-related terms
- Word of mouth from happy users
- Developer communities discovering the open source version
- Integration partnerships
The Freemium Model
The free self-hosted version drives awareness, while the hosted version with premium features generates revenue. This model works well for developer-focused tools.
Bootstrapped Success
Unlike competitors who raised millions, Invoice Ninja was bootstrapped. This forced focus on profitability and sustainable growth rather than growth at all costs.
Key Features
- Invoicing and payments
- Time tracking
- Expense tracking
- Client portal
- 40+ payment gateways
- Users: 200,000+
- Founded: 2014
- Marketing spend: $0
- Model: Open source + freemium hosted
Key Takeaways
1
Open source can be a powerful marketing channel for developer tools
2
Freemium works well when the free tier drives organic growth
3
Bootstrapping forces discipline and sustainable unit economics
4
SEO and word of mouth can replace paid marketing entirely
Originally published onSaaS Marketing Superstars Podcast
Inspired by Shalom's journey? Generate a business idea in the Finance space using AI and real founder data.
Milestone Journey
Shalom achieved 3 milestones on the path to $10K MRR
First Customer
1 month
February 2014
69% faster
vs avg 3 months+11 months to next milestone
$1K MRR
1 year
January 2015
Avg: 11 months
+2 years to next milestone
$10K MRR
3 years
January 2017
Avg: 1 year
3 years
Total journey time
3
Milestones achieved
Shalom's Path to $10K MRRPremium
The journey, decisions, and context behind this milestone
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