15 Solopreneurs Who Built Million-Dollar One-Person Businesses
Smart systems, loyal audiences, lean business models.
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The Rise of the One-Person Empire
Building a business doesn't require a big team, a physical office, or millions in funding. Many solopreneurs rely on their own expertise, focus, leverage, and smart systems.
In this article, we will cover 15 people who built one-person businesses generating over $1 million a year. Each of them took a different path. Some built audiences first, others launched products directly, and they all share one thing: They kept it lean, they kept it simple, and they kept it theirs.
Here's how the article is structured:
Business: What type of business they run
Location: Where they're based (if known)
Revenue: How much their business generates
Link: Where you can follow or learn from them
Story: A short overview of what they built and how
Action: 1-2 actionable insights you can apply to your own journey
Let's dive in.
Meet the 15 Million-Dollar Solopreneurs
Sahil Bloom
Business: Newsletter, Courses, Investments
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: sahilbloom.com
Why you should watch him this year
After a career in private equity, Sahil Bloom transitioned into the creator world with a focus on educational content around business, finance, and personal growth. He built a massive audience on Twitter by posting short, actionable threads - then expanded into a high-performing newsletter, sold courses, and launched investment ventures. His brand is polished, trusted, and aspirational - blending content, education, and entrepreneurship into a million-dollar ecosystem.
What You Can Learn
Simple, valuable writing can attract a massive audience.
Monetise trust, not just traffic - focus on quality relationships with your audience.
Justin Welsh
Business: Digital Products (Courses, Templates, Playbooks)
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: justinwelsh.me
Why you should watch him this year
After burning out from startup life, Justin rebuilt his career by focusing on solopreneurship. He shares daily insights on LinkedIn and Twitter, teaching others how to build audience-first businesses without teams. By packaging his expertise into digital courses and templates, he now earns over $1 million a year - keeping operations simple, lean, and profitable. His journey shows the power of consistency and productising your skills.
What You Can Learn
Show up daily: One post a day can build a business over time.
Productise your expertise: Package what you know into small, high-impact digital products.
Dan Koe
Business: Courses, Community, Digital Products
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: thedankoe.com
Why you should watch him this year
Dan Koe carved out a unique space around self-mastery, creativity, and digital entrepreneurship. Through simple, powerful writing on Twitter and his blog, he built a loyal audience drawn to his focus on minimalism, productivity, and designing your own life. Dan sells courses, ebooks, and runs a thriving paid community - all while keeping operations simple. His business philosophy is as clean as his branding: build skills, master your mind, and monetise your individuality.
What You Can Learn
Niche down into an idea, not just an industry.
Consistency plus clarity builds an audience that wants to purchase.
Daniel Vassallo
Business: Digital Products (Courses, Community, Books)
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: dvassallo.gumroad.com
Why you should watch him this year
After leaving a high-paying software engineering job at Amazon, Daniel Vassallo took a massive bet on himself - and never looked back. He built a "portfolio of small bets" approach: writing books, creating courses, running a paid community, and sharing his honest journey publicly. His style is refreshing - no hype, just simple products that solve real problems. Today, his one-person business brings in over $1M cumulatively, proving that taking small, consistent bets can beat chasing unicorns.
What You Can Learn
Multiple small bets can outperform chasing one big winner.
Authenticity builds trust - and trust builds sales.
Dickie Bush
Business: Courses, Community (Ship 30 for 30)
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year (cumulative with his partner)
Link: dickiebush.com
Why you should watch him this year
Dickie Bush turned a simple habit - writing online every day - into a million-dollar business. Along with his co-founder Nicolas Cole, he created Ship 30 for 30, a cohort-based course that teaches people how to build a writing habit and grow their online presence. Dickie built his personal brand on Twitter through consistent threads about writing, productivity, and personal growth. His journey proves that starting with one micro-skill (and teaching it extremely well) can lead to outsized results.
What You Can Learn
Small, daily habits are the foundation of big businesses.
Teach what you're actively doing - people crave practical, real-world advice.
Pieter Levels
Business: SaaS Platforms (RemoteOK, Nomad List, Rebase)
Location: Netherlands
Revenue: $3M+ per year
Link: levels.io
Why you should watch him this year
Pieter Levels is the ultimate poster child for solopreneurship. He built multiple profitable SaaS platforms completely solo - including Nomad List and RemoteOK - serving digital nomads and remote workers globally. Pieter famously does everything himself: coding, design, marketing, customer support. His philosophy is radical simplicity - launch fast, improve live, automate everything. Without a team or external funding, he scaled to over $3M/year in revenue, showing that one person with the right leverage can outperform entire startups.
What You Can Learn
Ship fast, learn from users, improve continuously.
Automate everything you can: systems are the real employees in a solo business.
Jack Butcher
Business: Visualize Value (Courses, Digital Products, Community)
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: visualizevalue.com
Why you should watch him this year
Jack Butcher turned abstract ideas into simple, striking visuals, and built a million-dollar brand doing it. After years in advertising, he started posting daily minimalist graphics explaining complex concepts around business, leverage, and thinking. His brand Visualize Value exploded, leading to course sales, a paid community, and digital products like templates and frameworks.
What You Can Learn
Simplicity sells - make ideas easy to grasp and share.
Build assets once (like courses or templates) that can sell repeatedly without your time.
Jon Yongfook
Business: SaaS (Bannerbear)
Location: Singapore
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: bannerbear.com
Why you should watch him this year
Jon Yongfook built Bannerbear, an automated media generation SaaS, completely solo, from coding to marketing. After multiple startup attempts, he committed to building a product that solved a very specific, recurring problem: automatically generating visuals for marketing. Instead of chasing hype, he went deep into one niche and grew slowly but steadily. Today, Bannerbear is a profitable one-person SaaS doing over $1M/year. Jon’s story is a reminder that choosing a boring, practical problem and solving it very well, can be a winning formula.
What You Can Learn
Solve real, boring problems, they’re the most valuable.
Small, steady progress compounds into massive results over time.
Jason Chin (Easlo)
Business: Digital Products (Notion Templates, Online Courses)
Location: Singapore
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: easlo.co
Why you should watch him this year
Operating under the brand name Easlo, Jason Chin quietly built a million-dollar business selling Notion templates and productivity resources. Without showing much of his personal life, he focused purely on delivering high-quality, beautifully designed templates that solved real user needs. By posting consistently on Twitter and building in public, he grew an audience that trusted his work. Jason's journey shows that you don’t need to be loud or constantly personal online: you just need to be relentlessly useful.
What You Can Learn
Consistency and usefulness can build trust without personal exposure.
Pick one platform (like Notion) and go deep - mastery wins over generalisation.
Amanda Goetz
Business: Digital Products (Courses, Community, Brand Building)
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: amandagoetz.com
Why you should watch her this year
After leading marketing at The Knot and juggling the demands of single motherhood, Amanda Goetz launched House of Wise, a CBD brand empowering women, and built a personal brand empire alongside it. Through storytelling on Twitter and LinkedIn, she connected with thousands of women (and men) looking for authenticity in health, wellness, and entrepreneurship. Amanda monetized her audience through brand collaborations, courses, and her own product lines, proving that vulnerability combined with business acumen can create a loyal and profitable community.
What You Can Learn
Storytelling creates emotional connection - and emotional connection drives purchases.
Build trust first, then introduce products that naturally fit your audience’s needs.
Katelyn Bourgoin
Business: Digital Products (Courses, Workshops, Newsletter Sponsorships)
Location: Canada
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: katelynbourgoin.com
Why you should watch her this year
Katelyn Bourgoin is known as “the Customer Whisperer” - and she turned that skill into a thriving one-person business. After working in startups, she pivoted to teaching entrepreneurs how to deeply understand their customers and build products people actually want. Through her popular Why We Buy newsletter, online courses, and corporate workshops, she built a million-dollar business by focusing relentlessly on one skill: customer research. Her success shows that becoming the go-to expert in a narrow but critical area can lead to big rewards.
What You Can Learn
Niche expertise beats being a generalist - own one slice of the market.
Teach companies what they don’t know about their own customers.
Jay Clouse
Business: Courses, Membership Community (Creator Science)
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: jayclouse.com
Why you should watch him this year
Jay Clouse built Creator Science into a thriving platform helping creators turn their skills into sustainable businesses. Through online courses, a paid membership community, and his newsletter, he teaches practical systems for growth, monetization, and scaling without burning out. Jay combines clear writing, strategic thinking, and community building into a simple but powerful solopreneurship model. His journey proves that you can build a high-trust, high-value business by focusing on education, systems, and service.
What You Can Learn
Systems scale you, even when you’re a one-person business.
Build a value ladder: free content, mid-tier products, and premium community offers.
Laura Belgray
Business: Copywriting Courses, Digital Products (Talking Shrimp)
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: talkingshrimp.com
Why you should watch her this year
Laura Belgray turned her sharp, witty writing into a seven-figure solo business. Through her brand Talking Shrimp, she offers courses and resources that teach people how to write like real humans (and not like robots). Laura's authentic, relatable style attracted a loyal audience who values humor, clarity, and honesty. Without a huge team or complex funnels, she built a profitable business simply by being herself, showing that your personal voice can be your greatest business asset.
What You Can Learn
People connect with realness, not perfection.
Your unique voice is your competitive advantage.
Paul Jarvis
Business: Digital Products (Courses, Books, Software)
Location: Canada
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: pjrvs.com
Why you should watch him this year
Paul Jarvis built a million-dollar business by choosing to stay small “on purpose”. His book Company of One became a manifesto for solopreneurs who value freedom over scale. Beyond writing, Paul created online courses, ran paid newsletters, and co-founded a privacy-focused SaaS (Fathom Analytics). His philosophy is simple: growth for growth’s sake isn't the goal - building a resilient, profitable, low-stress business is.
What You Can Learn
Design your business around your ideal life, not the other way around.
Staying small can be a strategic advantage, not a limitation.
Alex Garcia
Business: Marketing Consulting, Courses, Newsletter Sponsorships
Location: U.S.
Revenue: $1M+ per year
Link: marketingexamined.com
Why you should watch him this year
Alex Garcia grew his personal brand by breaking down real-world marketing strategies in a way that anyone could understand and apply. Through his Marketing Examined newsletter, digital courses, and consulting work, he built a million-dollar solo business focused on actionable, no-fluff advice. His success shows that deep expertise, combined with practical teaching, can attract an audience willing to pay for real results.
What You Can Learn
People pay for proven tactics they can use today.
Consistency + clarity = audience trust → magnetisation becomes natural.
What These 15 Solopreneurs Prove
These 15 solopreneurs show that with the right skill, focus, and mindset, you can create a million-dollar business that is smart and lean - on your own terms. We hope that this list gives you a little inspiration for your career as a solopreneur.
Who is your favourite solopreneur? Comment below!
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Such a great roundup! Always inspiring to see how much can be built solo with focus and smart systems.
Fantastic overview of these solopreneurs. I only knew of a couple before reading this. What do you think is the most common product or service from all or most of them?