First Million

The Best of 2025

Learn from startups who successfully hit their first million.

Dec 24, 2025

Origin Stories: Notion

A mission to build Lego for software

Dec 19, 2025

4

Before You Build, Validate

The simple approach that showed Gong had real buyers

Dec 12, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

1

How Tally Forms Hit Their First Million

The underdog story of a boring product that found its place in a competitive market

Dec 5, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

1

November 2025

Hire for the spark, not the resume

How Callum McKeefery built Reviews.io by spotting talent in cafés and bars instead of boardrooms.

Nov 13, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

2

October 2025

PostHog's First Million Story

From five failed ideas to $1 million ARR — the open-source story that clicked.

Oct 15, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

2

September 2025

The Power of Driving to ‘No’

Flodesk’s Counterintuitive Growth Lesson

Sep 3, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

1

1

August 2025

$1M Story: Lovable

Why it wasn’t really a week, but 17 months in the making

Aug 27, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

4

The 1-Year Rule

How one simple rule kept Jotform stable through every market cycle.

Aug 13, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

3

How Fathom Hit Their First $1 Million

By earning trust first, then scaling with a product-led engine

Aug 9, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

1

July 2025

How Founders Think

"Notion is a bus.” – Ivan Zhao

Jul 31, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

4

Reviews.io's First Million Story

How a bootstrapped underdog outperformed giants by turning TrustPilot’s weakness into their growth flywheel

Jul 24, 2025 • Elan Anandhan

1