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Feb 8, 2026 · 16m · starter-story

I Make $150K/Month From 20 Tiny Apps

Katie Keith · 8m spoken Pat Walls · 7m spoken
0:00 / 0:00
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions

In this interview, host Pat Walls speaks with founder Katie Keith, who built a portfolio of 20 software products generating $1.8 million in annual revenue. Katie shares her playbook for organic SEO growth, low-overhead operations, and cross-selling complementary micro-tools tailored to a single target audience.

How this conversation actually went

Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Pat holds 44.3% of the talking time here. How this is scored →

Pat as informed peer 3.0 Guest teaching 4.4 Guest disagreement 0.2 Pat pushing back 0.0
05100:0010:001:30–3:40 · Pat as informed peer 2/10 Business Overview and Revenue Breakdown Pat invites Katie to introduce her background and pull up revenue metrics. Katie walks through her exact business model, subscription tiers, and overall metrics without any confrontation.3:40–6:23 · Pat as informed peer 3/10 Origin Story and Product Ideation Strategy Katie gently reframes Pat's premise about coming up with 19 ideas, explaining that the business grew organically from forum feedback and client feature requests rather than master planning.6:23–9:07 · Pat as informed peer 1/10 Sponsor Break: Delve Compliance Platform After an ad read for Delve, Pat asks how having multiple products fuels growth. Katie explains their systematic cross-promotion, bundling, and automated email marketing strategies.9:07–11:51 · Pat as informed peer 5/10 A 5-Step Playbook for Multi-App Businesses Pat contextualizes portfolio software building with current AI trends and asks for a modern playbook. Katie provides a comprehensive 5-step framework on validation, focused execution, and cross-selling.11:52–13:07 · Pat as informed peer 4/10 Operational Tech Stack and Infrastructure Pat references other portfolio founders like John Rush and asks about operational infrastructure. Katie lists the simple tech stack and plugins they use to run the multi-million dollar business.1:30–3:40 · Guest teaching 4/10 Business Overview and Revenue Breakdown Pat invites Katie to introduce her background and pull up revenue metrics. Katie walks through her exact business model, subscription tiers, and overall metrics without any confrontation.3:40–6:23 · Guest teaching 5/10 Origin Story and Product Ideation Strategy Katie gently reframes Pat's premise about coming up with 19 ideas, explaining that the business grew organically from forum feedback and client feature requests rather than master planning.6:23–9:07 · Guest teaching 4/10 Sponsor Break: Delve Compliance Platform After an ad read for Delve, Pat asks how having multiple products fuels growth. Katie explains their systematic cross-promotion, bundling, and automated email marketing strategies.9:07–11:51 · Guest teaching 6/10 A 5-Step Playbook for Multi-App Businesses Pat contextualizes portfolio software building with current AI trends and asks for a modern playbook. Katie provides a comprehensive 5-step framework on validation, focused execution, and cross-selling.11:52–13:07 · Guest teaching 3/10 Operational Tech Stack and Infrastructure Pat references other portfolio founders like John Rush and asks about operational infrastructure. Katie lists the simple tech stack and plugins they use to run the multi-million dollar business.1:30–3:40 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Business Overview and Revenue Breakdown Pat invites Katie to introduce her background and pull up revenue metrics. Katie walks through her exact business model, subscription tiers, and overall metrics without any confrontation.3:40–6:23 · Guest disagreement 1/10 Origin Story and Product Ideation Strategy Katie gently reframes Pat's premise about coming up with 19 ideas, explaining that the business grew organically from forum feedback and client feature requests rather than master planning.6:23–9:07 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Sponsor Break: Delve Compliance Platform After an ad read for Delve, Pat asks how having multiple products fuels growth. Katie explains their systematic cross-promotion, bundling, and automated email marketing strategies.9:07–11:51 · Guest disagreement 0/10 A 5-Step Playbook for Multi-App Businesses Pat contextualizes portfolio software building with current AI trends and asks for a modern playbook. Katie provides a comprehensive 5-step framework on validation, focused execution, and cross-selling.11:52–13:07 · Guest disagreement 0/10 Operational Tech Stack and Infrastructure Pat references other portfolio founders like John Rush and asks about operational infrastructure. Katie lists the simple tech stack and plugins they use to run the multi-million dollar business.1:30–3:40 · Pat pushing back 0/10 Business Overview and Revenue Breakdown Pat invites Katie to introduce her background and pull up revenue metrics. Katie walks through her exact business model, subscription tiers, and overall metrics without any confrontation.3:40–6:23 · Pat pushing back 0/10 Origin Story and Product Ideation Strategy Katie gently reframes Pat's premise about coming up with 19 ideas, explaining that the business grew organically from forum feedback and client feature requests rather than master planning.6:23–9:07 · Pat pushing back 0/10 Sponsor Break: Delve Compliance Platform After an ad read for Delve, Pat asks how having multiple products fuels growth. Katie explains their systematic cross-promotion, bundling, and automated email marketing strategies.9:07–11:51 · Pat pushing back 0/10 A 5-Step Playbook for Multi-App Businesses Pat contextualizes portfolio software building with current AI trends and asks for a modern playbook. Katie provides a comprehensive 5-step framework on validation, focused execution, and cross-selling.11:52–13:07 · Pat pushing back 0/10 Operational Tech Stack and Infrastructure Pat references other portfolio founders like John Rush and asks about operational infrastructure. Katie lists the simple tech stack and plugins they use to run the multi-million dollar business.

speaking balance: gold is Pat, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)

0:00 · Pat 52.5% · guest 47.5%0:00 · Pat 52.5% · guest 47.5%3:00 · Pat 20.7% · guest 79.3%3:00 · Pat 20.7% · guest 79.3%6:00 · Pat 49.6% · guest 50.4%6:00 · Pat 49.6% · guest 50.4%9:00 · Pat 31% · guest 69%9:00 · Pat 31% · guest 69%12:00 · Pat 55.7% · guest 44.3%12:00 · Pat 55.7% · guest 44.3%15:00 · Pat 63.5% · guest 36.5%15:00 · Pat 63.5% · guest 36.5%
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 3:58 Katie corrects the assumption of having 19 upfront ideas

Katie playfully dismisses the host's premise that they planned out 19 separate products from the start, emphasizing it happened purely organically.

 Hardest push from Pat ▶ 9:07 Pat reframes portfolio strategy in the context of modern AI

Pat pushes the conversation beyond historical context to challenge how building multiple apps is fundamentally different in the era of AI and smaller teams.

 Biggest teaching moment ▶ 10:25 Katie warns against spreading effort across multiple simultaneous launches

Katie clearly instructs founders not to launch multiple products at once, explaining the critical need to market and iterate on a single product first.

 Pat holds their own ▶ 9:07 Pat demonstrates domain expertise in software business models

Pat articulates industry insights on shifting developer costs, cross-selling economics, and pattern-matches Katie's experience against other portfolio founders.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
ChapterTopicPat as informed peerGuest teachingGuest disagreementPat pushing backWhy
Business Overview and Revenue Breakdown 2400 Pat invites Katie to introduce her background and pull up revenue metrics. Katie walks through her exact business model, subscription tiers, and overall metrics without any confrontation.
Origin Story and Product Ideation Strategy 3510 Katie gently reframes Pat's premise about coming up with 19 ideas, explaining that the business grew organically from forum feedback and client feature requests rather than master planning.
Sponsor Break: Delve Compliance Platform 1400 After an ad read for Delve, Pat asks how having multiple products fuels growth. Katie explains their systematic cross-promotion, bundling, and automated email marketing strategies.
A 5-Step Playbook for Multi-App Businesses 5600 Pat contextualizes portfolio software building with current AI trends and asks for a modern playbook. Katie provides a comprehensive 5-step framework on validation, focused execution, and cross-selling.
Operational Tech Stack and Infrastructure 4300 Pat references other portfolio founders like John Rush and asks about operational infrastructure. Katie lists the simple tech stack and plugins they use to run the multi-million dollar business.

Statements from this episode (10)

Assertion Not checkable as stated
Katie Keith: Barn2 generated over $1.7M in 2025 plugin revenue
“This is our 20 25 revenue. You can see it's just over 1.7 million dollars. I know I said 1.8 million earlier. That's Because we have other revenue streams such as affiliate income, and we offer some development services.”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 2:42
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Katie Keith: Barn2 has sold $9.8M in WordPress plugins lifetime
“Over the entire lifetime of the business, we've sold 9.8 million dollars worth of WordPress Plugins.”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 3:10
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Katie Keith: Barn2 has 17,000 subscribers; lifetime deals account for 15%
“We have 17,000 on an active subscription. We do have more paying customers than that, because that doesn't include people who bought a lifetime deal, which is about 15% of our revenue.”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 3:29
Insight
Keith: Turn customer feature requests into standalone products instead of bloat
“So once we've got those plugins out there, customers started sending us requests for new features in that plugin. And sometimes it was best to achieve that, not through a feature, but a completely different plugin. So I would say, get a product out there and t…”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 4:46
Disclosure
Keith: Most Barn2 plugin customers come from organic search
“Most of our customers have always come from organic search.”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 5:36
Disclosure
Keith: Barn2 drives cross-sells offering 50% off three days post-purchase
“For each of our products, we have selected a closely related plugin that we try to upsell with it. We then do additional tasks such as after three days following the purchase, we send an email offering them 50% off their next plugin.”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 8:14
Insight
Keith: Prioritize multi-product ideas with overlapping audiences for cross-promotion
“That means start with a long list, research and validate every idea and choose a handful of ideas that have the most potential and then prioritize the ideas that have overlapping markets so that you get that cross promotion opportunity.”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 10:26
Insight
Keith: Multi-product founders should launch one product at a time
“Don't build multiple products and launch them all at once, because every time you build a product, you need to give it a decent amount of time to do the marketing and grow it without distractions, and also to listen to your early users and continue improving t…”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 10:56
Disclosure
Keith: Barn2 runs multi-million dollar sales on $300-a-year Easy Digital Downloads
“And we also use lots of WordPress plugins, but in particular, easy digital downloads, which is the e-commerce software that we use to sell our plugins and sort out all the licensing and the download delivery and so on, which costs us about 300 dollars a year.”
Katie Keith Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 12:52
Insight
Walls: AI commoditizes software development, shifting all value to audience ownership
“But with AI, you don't really need engineering teams to build stuff now. Actually, software is becoming commoditized and you can spin up an app in one day In the audience and the customer is what's valuable.”
Pat Walls Feb 8, 2026 ▶ 14:50
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