Starter Story · 2026-09-20

This Simple Widget Makes $50K/Month

Tom Holliday and his brother built Avenue, an Australian website widget (also a 'book online' button on Google listings) that lets customers of trades and mechanics buy or inquire without calling. With no coding background, he had a friend build an MVP in Feb 2025, then hired three staff pre-revenue, funded by his marketing agency. Early traction came from door-to-door sales with iPad demos and brochures; trades responded best, so the product was adapted to them. Revenue went from A$597 (Aug 2025) to A$63K (Aug 2026); Tom says A$85K/month now.

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7 tactics

Avenue · B2B · booking widget for trades

Walk into local businesses and show them the product in person

Founder says it got early traction quickly; no customer numbers given

“Door-to-door sales, essentially.”

Workedin-personoutbound-sales

Starter Story · 2026-09-20

Avenue · B2B · booking widget for trades

Demo the website widget on iPads instead of phones and leave printed brochures

Cleared up confusion that it was an app; early traction followed quickly

“Initially, we showed it on an iPhone and they'd go, "Oh, what is it? It's like an app." And I'm like, "No, it goes on your website." There was a lot of confusion about what the product actually was. Then we switched to iPads.”

Workedin-person

Starter Story · 2026-09-20

Avenue · B2B · booking widget for trades

Pitch every open business on the street, then focus on whoever responds best

Trades responded best; product adapted for them and they became the core customers

“when we first went door knocking, we didn't skip a business.”

Workedpositioning-nichevalidation

Starter Story · 2026-09-20

Avenue · B2B · booking widget for trades

Sign lots of small local businesses first so bigger ones have seen you around

Bigger clients signed because they'd 'seen you guys everywhere'; no numbers

“clients because they go, "I've seen you guys everywhere. A lot of people must”

Workedin-personword-of-mouth

Starter Story · 2026-09-20

Avenue · B2B · booking widget for trades

Hire a designer and two developers before any revenue, paid by your agency income

Gave confidence to sell to bigger companies; founder calls it a terrible idea on paper

“Yet we had zero revenue. So, on paper, terrible idea. Don't recommend it at all.”

Mixedfinancingteam-process

Starter Story · 2026-09-20

Avenue · B2B · booking widget for trades

Have a developer friend build a rough version to prove it can be done

Seeing it come to life convinced the founder to go all in

“February last year, I had a friend that was a developer and he kind of helped like create like the MVP basically to see that it could be done.”

Workedvalidationfeature-development

Starter Story · 2026-09-20

Avenue · B2B · booking widget for trades

Put a 'Book online' button on each client's Google listing, not just their website

“It does go onto Google reservations as well. So, we go onto their Google My Business profile, also.”

Unknownintegrations-marketplacespartnerships

Starter Story · 2026-09-20

Numbers mentioned

Subject	Metric	Value	Quote
Avenue	revenue Monthly revenue 'now' as stated by the guest	AUD 85K/month approximate	“We do $85,000 a month in revenue now in Australian dollars”
Avenue	revenue August 2026 revenue shown on the Stripe dashboard	AUD 63K/month approximate	“Like I feel like from August last year of 597 and then August now 63,000 Australian.”
Avenue	revenue August 2025 revenue on Stripe, as stated (possible caption error)	AUD 597/month	“Like I feel like from August last year of 597 and then August now 63,000 Australian.”
Avenue	revenue Host's 'over $50,000 US per month' framing (also the title figure)	USD 50K/month approximate	“How long did it take you from idea to a working project that is now, you know, scaled to, you know, over $50,000 US per”
Avenue	revenue Figure from the anonymous tweet the host found before the interview ('over $40,000 a month')	USD 40K/month approximate	“An anonymous startup making over $40,000 a month launched just about a year ago.”
Avenue	revenue Description figure ('today it makes $55K per month'); not said in the body	USD 55K/month approximate	“This is Tom, and he built a really simple app that today makes over $50,000”
Avenue	revenue Zero revenue when the first three hires (designer, head developer, front-end developer) were made	AUD 0/month	“Yet we had zero revenue. So, on paper, terrible idea. Don't recommend it at all.”
Tom's marketing agency	customers '70 plus' agency clients still paying for website hosting; this income funded Avenue	70 clients approximate	“run a marketing agency for 10 years, which still had like 70 plus clients paying like website hosting.”