Maintaining steady growth during times of war ($20k MRR)

Oleg Kulyk grew to $19.8k MRR in the midst of war.

I caught up with him to talk about resilience, problem solving, and how he maintained a steady growth in a chaotic environment. Here’s what he had to say. 👇

War and business

Oleg: Right now, Ukraine's in a tough spot. We’re fighting a war. This has turned my focus towards contributing where I can, utilizing my technical skills to aid in our collective fight for sovereignty and peace

Tech is more than a job now; it's about pitching in any way I can.

James: How are you helping?

Oleg: I've been trying to make my cybersecurity and data engineering know-how useful. But I can't talk about details, given the sensitive nature of this work.

James: Can’t be easy building a business at the same time.

Oleg: Running a business amidst the backdrop of an active war presents a unique set of challenges and lessons. It demands unparalleled resilience, adaptability, and strategic foresight.

James: How has it affected ScrapingAnt?

Oleg: We weren’t able to deliver any new features during the first year of the Russian invasion. We just focused on support and relationships with existing clients.

Everything is harder during war. Everything gets destroyed. Businesses, houses, lives…

Lots of new businesses get started too. But more get destroyed.

James: It must be hard on you as a founder. And, of course, just as a human.

Oleg: I'm used to the air radar alerts, explosions, and missile attacks. But I’ll never get used to news of friends and family members being killed.

James: How do you keep building in the face of it all?

Oleg: Unfortunately, the situation won't be resolved soon, and I have to be able to continue performing.

The only way to do it is to rest. I've learned how to rest properly.

James: Easier said than done, I’d guess.

Oleg: We also started hiring more people from Ukraine and I know that by growing this business, I’m helping my country and my people. That motivates me.

James: You mentioned resilience. Sounds like you've got a lot of it.

Oleg: Resilience comes with experience. It’s like having a proven path that you’ve already walked. It serves as a guide. It tells you that you’re going in the right direction, and that you can keep going.

But yeah, I dream of the time when I can chill on the beach and drink a bottle of some fine beer.

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Growing to $20k MRR

James: Amidst all this, you grew ScrapingAnt to $19.8k MRR.

Oleg: We started providing our API using RapidAPI. That allowed us to test the idea of using a web scraping API as a service, and it's how we got our first customer.

Starting on a marketplace gave us visibility with our target audience right away.

James: Smart.

Oleg: Then, we added a landing page to the RapidAPI listing and tried running ads.

This approach failed, as we had no idea how to run ads properly. Running ads for a website you have no control over is not a good idea for beginners.

James: So what did you do?

Oleg: We resorted to classic content marketing. That worked best for us.

We just tried to provide value to our target customer to build trust and ultimately convert them.

James: Have SEO benefits kicked in yet?

Oleg: It has had a big impact, but we don't get a ton of traffic. According to GA it’s about 15k monthly unique visitors.

I’d say that SEO efforts started to pay off after 5 to 8 months.

James: That's actually pretty quick.

Oleg: But more important than optimization is the quality of the content.

James: How quickly are you growing?

Oleg: We've had stable 3-5% growth month over month for three years.

James: Impressive, particularly given everything that’s going on in your country.

Oleg: It’s not explosive by any means, but it’s sustainable.

James: How did you maintain that growth during hard times?

Oleg: In the beginning of the invasion, I think we were just benefiting from work that we had already done, like evergreen content. Other than that, we just kept working while we were looking for shelter.

My cofounder likes to say that we have an asocial business. We don’t spam our customers with emails, for example. So they don't notice if we're around a little less.

That said, without 2-4 blog posts per month, this wouldn't be possible.

James: What are your growth tips for indie hackers?

Oleg:

• Focus on customer support. We always try to go beyond expectations and help our users, whether they’re paid or free.

• Understand the need for marketing. Most people don’t understand that you actually have to invest in it — as much as you invest in production/engineering/R&D.

• Talk with people from the domain you're working in. Just to talk about the market itself, companies, news, and even rumors. It gives you more context and expands your informational bubble.

• Constantly search for different marketing channels. Some channels will perform better than others, and it's all about experimentation.

• Start with the most affordable channels

• Don’t rely on marketing agencies. If you really want to work with one, use it as a learning experience.

James: What channels have you tried?

Oleg: We tried different strategies like paid ads, adding the website to directories, posting at Reddit, HackerNews, etc. But our blog works best.

We also still provide a free plan. It costs us time and money in terms of support, but it’s cheaper than paid ads.

Generalize your problems

James: What skill has been central to your success?

Oleg: I just love solving problems. And I'm good at it.

I also create them, but not as often.

James: What's your framework for solving problems?

Oleg: I like to generalize the problem to a more abstract one, and try to find solutions that exist in the different domains with domain-specific tools.

Whether it's developing a web application, designing an IoT system, optimizing cloud infrastructure, or strategizing for an online business, I’m able to dive deep into new domains, learn the necessary tools, and emerge with solutions that are both efficient and scalable.

James: Handy skill to have.

Oleg: It ensures that I can meet and overcome obstacles with confidence, regardless of the context or industry.

James: How do you learn things in new domains — do you have a process?

Oleg: No. I struggle with educating myself when it’s tons of theory, so I like to get right into real-world practice. I feel way better that way. It allows my brain to reward itself by cracking mysteries.

Prioritize happiness

James: As a successful indie hacker who's building during tough times, what advice do you have for indie hackers?

Oleg: People say you have to forget about work-life balance to make it big. Relentless hard work, minimal sleep, and sacrificing your personal life — none of that makes any sense.

James: No?

Oleg: Experience has taught me that sustainable success is built on resilience, smart work, and the ability to recharge and reflect, not just on endless grinding.

Adopting a more balanced approach not only prevents burnout but also fosters creativity, strategic thinking, and ultimately leads to healthier, more sustainable personal and professional growth.

Dedication and focus are essential, of course, but burning yourself out by grinding 24/7 will only make you grumpy and sick — emotionally and physically.

James: Sounds like you learned this the hard way.

Oleg: Yeah, I didn’t understand it until after I burned out hard. I was totally exhausted, which caused anxiety, depression, and an inability to focus on anything.

James: So what are you doing differently now?

Oleg: I’m prioritizing my personal health by keeping a comfortable pace for the long run. Because it doesn't matter how much money you make if you dread your work.

James: True enough.

Oleg: Entrepreneurship is a journey with its own complexities and drawbacks. It’s great. But don’t do it if you can’t be happy doing it.

James: Where can people find you?

Oleg: I'm on X. You can check out ScrapingAnt, and here's our blog.

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