12 Startup Consulting Business Success Stories [2024]
In a world where entrepreneurial spirit is soaring, startup consulting can be the gateway to turning dreams into reality. At its core, a startup consulting business assists other budding entrepreneurs to navigate the rough waves of launching their own ventures.
As a startup consultant, you'll amass a wealth of strategic ideas, digest complex data, offer sound advice, and form step-by-step action plans that will encourage potential business owners to take their ambitious concepts off the ground. It's not only about nurturing your client's business but also honing your expertise.
This business venture requires adept judgement, a commanding understanding of business dynamics and the ability to embrace constant learning. If you're the kind of person who thrives in a challenging, ever-evolving landscape, and enjoys the satisfaction that comes with mentoring entrepreneurial enthusiasm, a startup consulting business could well be your calling. Unleash your skills in the world of startups where every day is a learning curve. You could be the catalyst for the next big idea.
Here are some real life success stories of starting a startup consulting business:
1. Argona Partners ($120K/year)
Jeremy Imlach, CoFounder and CEO of Argona Partners, came up with the idea for the business while working alongside his brilliant CoFounder, Amadin Agho, and Argona Founder, Richard Anderson III. They noticed a problem in the higher education system, where scientists and engineers struggled to scale their impactful technologies as businesses. They received positive feedback from the market and landed deals with entrepreneurs, leading them to create Argona Partners to help early-stage impact technology companies scale and make a difference.
How much they make: $120K/year
How much did it cost to start: $200
Current team size: 3
Argona Partners, a consulting and startup development firm focused on early-stage impact technology companies, has achieved over 100% YoY revenue growth since its inception in 2017, and has been recognized as a National and Global Top Startup Consulting Firm for its targeted approach to Growth Strategy and Fundraising Readiness in the clean tech industry.
2. Startupily ($18K/year)
Safwan Khan, founder of Startupily, came up with the idea for his blog when he was struggling to find a job and needed to earn an income. Inspired by the trend of blogging for side income, he started interviewing entrepreneurs and publishing their interviews on Startupily. Over time, he expanded the blog by adding business articles, templates, and documents, attracting traffic and positive response from entrepreneurs worldwide.
How much they make: $18K/year
How much did it cost to start: $50
Current team size: 0
Founder Safwan Khan started Startupily, a blog for entrepreneurs seeking business articles and resources, after being inspired by Pat Flynn's podcast and networking app DUST, providing free PR services for small business owners, before expanding into publishing business articles and selling business plan templates and documents, resulting in partnerships with global sites Influencive and Thrive Global.
Learn more about starting a startup consulting business:
Where to start?
-> How much does it cost to start a startup consulting business?
-> Pros and cons of a startup consulting business
Need inspiration?
-> Examples of established startup consulting business
-> Marketing ideas for a startup consulting business
Other resources
3. SupportNinja ($16.8M/year)
Cody started SupportNinja after facing numerous failures and obstacles in his life. He had a passion for building businesses and saw an opportunity to provide outsourcing services specifically targeted towards startups. With a focus on recruitment, training, and quality assurance, SupportNinja quickly grew to generate over $9M in annual recurring revenue and achieve a growth rate of 3,684% in the past 3 years.
How much they make: $16.8M/year
How much did it cost to start: $400K
Current team size: 1021
This case study follows the founder of SupportNinja, a company that specializes in providing back-office and customer support outsourcing for tech companies, which generates over $9M ARR, has over 100 clients, and has seen a growth rate of 3,684% in the past 3 years.
4. No-Code MVP ($72K/year)
Bram had extensive experience working and coaching with early-stage startups, and No-Code MVP became an outlet to let all that knowledge into a product.
How much they make: $72K/year
Current team size: 0
A stay-at-home father created No-Code MVP course, which teaches people the mindset, process, and tools they can use to build and validate their startup and business ideas without any knowledge or learning how to code, generating $8,000 in a pre-sale over 3 weeks and is on track to make $6,000/month.
5. Mylance ($216K/year)
Bradley Jacobs, founder of Mylance, came up with the idea for his business after experiencing the freedom and financial success of working as an independent consultant. He saw a growing market of individuals who wanted to monetize their expertise and work flexibly, so he started Mylance to provide a comprehensive platform for self-employed professionals. Through organic social media marketing and customer word of mouth, Mylance has attracted and retained customers, growing to $40k/month in revenue.
How much they make: $216K/year
How much did it cost to start: $10K
Current team size: 0
Mylance, founded by Bradley Jacobs, is an end-to-end software platform for self-employed individuals and independent consultants, growing to ~$40k/month in revenue with 3 main value-adds: actionable guides, a vetted community, and lead generation software.
6. Byldd ($600K/year)
Ayush, the founder of Byldd, came up with the idea for his business after seeing the struggle that founders, especially non-technical ones, face when building their first product. He wanted to solve this problem by helping founders build revenue-generating minimum viable products (MVPs) that are just good enough to solve a problem and get customers to pay for it. Since starting as a side project in 2019, Byldd has grown to a team of 35 people and is now making over $50K MRR.
How much they make: $600K/year
How much did it cost to start: $10K
Current team size: 35
Byldd is a startup that democratizes software entrepreneurship by making it easier and less capital-intensive for non-technical founders to start software businesses, building very focused revenue-generating MVPs for bootstrapping founders, growing from a side project to a team of 35 people and making over $50K MRR.
7. StartupTalky ($120K/year)
Shubham Kumar, the founder of StartupTalky, came up with the idea for his business after realizing there was a lack of community and resources for entrepreneurs in India. He started a Facebook group and began posting valuable content for aspiring startup founders, which quickly gained traction and grew to over 100K members. To monetize the community, he started a blog featuring stories and challenges faced by founders, which eventually led to a profitable media platform making $10K/month.
How much they make: $120K/year
How much did it cost to start: $99
Current team size: 13
Indian startup founder Shubham Kumar shared his story of how he founded Startuptalky, a community and media platform for entrepreneurs; the platform currently focuses on content and the Indian region, with notable achievements including a Facebook group for entrepreneurs with 100k members, a media company startuptalky.com with over a million page views per month, which also has a Digital PR service, a lead-capturing tool called Seizelead, and profits collectively from blog and the PR agency of $10k per month, serving startups including unicorns from across the globe.
8. WP Engine ($227M/year)
How much they make: $227M/year
Current team size: 1170
Find out how WP Engine became a market leader, with over 85,000 customers and generating more than $227 million in yearly revenue by providing digital solutions for businesses using key takeaways like automation and proper customer support.
9. ZenBusiness PBC ($52M/year)
How much they make: $52M/year
Current team size: 383
ZenBusiness, a guided platform for entrepreneurs, has grown over 400% since March 2020, helped over 300,000 businesses, and became Austin's largest SaaS finance provider in 2022 after receiving a $200M Series C investment.
10. TinySeed ($1M/year)
How much they make: $1M/year
Current team size: 11
TinySeed is a funding and mentoring company, established by Rob Walling and Einar Vollset, that offers between $120,000 and $160,000 to participating companies, after raising a funding round of about $4M dollars.
- 4,818 founder case studies
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- 4,818 founder case studies
- Access to our founder directory
- Live events, courses and recordings
- 8,628 business ideas
- $1M in software savings
- 4,818 founder case studies
- Access to our founder directory
- Live events, courses and recordings
- 8,628 business ideas
- $1M in software savings
- 4,818 founder case studies
- Access to our founder directory
- Live events, courses and recordings
- 8,628 business ideas
- $1M in software savings
- 4,818 founder case studies
- Access to our founder directory
- Live events, courses and recordings
- 8,628 business ideas
- $1M in software savings
- 4,818 founder case studies
- Access to our founder directory
- Live events, courses and recordings
- 8,628 business ideas
- $1M in software savings
- 4,818 founder case studies
- Access to our founder directory
- Live events, courses and recordings
- 8,628 business ideas
- $1M in software savings
- 4,818 founder case studies
- Access to our founder directory
- Live events, courses and recordings
- 8,628 business ideas
- $1M in software savings
