listennotes has become my go to site when I want to find podcast for my daily commute (about 30min). Its got good UI/UX. Pretty well executed for a one man company.
I wonder though if the niche search engine market can fetch them enough money to be profitable.
Regarding the profitability, the founder discusses in other posts, that they get the bulk of their revenue from their API (they also have some cash flow coming from ads). I think he was for a while bootstrapping, and then got some VC funding. Still he pays for a not that cheap office at a WeWork location in SF and from the API service numbers I saw, if they are legit, he should have more than enough ARR to live well from his site (and that's exactly the impression one gets from reading his blog posts). Nonetheless, he is totally against posting openly about the financials of his business, and showing actual data.
I wonder though if the niche search engine market can fetch them enough money to be profitable.