On February 21, 2025, I registered Digitura at the Chamber of Commerce. Almost a year later, I’m reflecting on what I’ve learned building my own software business. This isn’t a success story with impressive revenue numbers. It’s an honest look at the reality of starting a software business while working as a Software/DevOps Engineer.
Why Start Digitura?
I started Digitura because I wanted to learn. Not from books or online courses, but by actually doing it. I wanted to understand how to work with clients, build a business, price my work, handle invoicing, and make all those entrepreneurial decisions that you can’t really learn from the sidelines.
Sure, I could keep building side projects or doing a few projects under my personal name. But I wanted the real thing. A proper business. The structure that forces you to figure things out. The kind of learning that only happens when it’s your business, your decisions, and your responsibility.
I already had one client at that point. I had built a website for them under my personal name. When I registered Digitura, the first thing I did was onboard them properly. Real contract, proper invoicing, the whole setup. That’s when it started feeling real.
What Is Digitura?
Digitura is my software business based in the Netherlands. It’s a one-person operation focused on helping small businesses with their digital needs. The website is in Dutch (digitura.nl) because my clients are primarily Dutch businesses, though the technical work itself is language-independent.
The name comes from combining “digital” and “futura” (Latin for future). Digital solutions for the future. Simple, clear, and it actually means something.
The Three Services
I structured Digitura around three main services: websites & hosting, custom software, and technical support. Not because these are trendy, but because they’re what small businesses actually need.
Websites & Hosting: Most small businesses don’t need a fancy CMS or a team of developers. They need a fast, secure website that’s always online. I build that and host it. SSL certificates, updates, and backups are all handled. They get a website. I get recurring revenue. Simple.
Custom Software: Some businesses have specific problems that off-the-shelf software doesn’t solve. That’s where custom development comes in. I don’t pitch them on building “enterprise solutions.” I build tools that solve their actual problems.
Technical Support: This one surprised me. Many businesses have existing systems that work, but they need someone who can jump in when things break or when they want to add something. I’m not the one who built their system, but I can usually figure it out and fix it.
How It Started
The First Real Client: Going Big
That first client I mentioned? They wanted to go big with their second business: a luxury outdoor furniture webshop called Zonkey. Not just a simple website this time. They wanted to actually sell, to grow, to make it work.
I rebuilt their website from scratch. Fast, clean, focused on conversion. Set everything up to maximize sales and support growth. Modern web technologies, optimized performance, the works.
The result? They sold their entire inventory. That’s when I realized something important: building software that actually helps a business grow hits different than just building something that looks good.
Fixing What’s Broken: KwekerHeij
Around the same time, someone I knew reached out. Their website for KwekerHeij, an international plant nursery, had issues. SSL certificate expired. Contact form stopped working. Small problems that make a business look unprofessional.
I didn’t just fix the immediate issues. I modernized the whole site. Proper SSL, working contact form, modern design, secure setup. Sometimes you need to rebuild the foundation, not just patch the cracks.
This taught me something: many businesses are running on duct-tape solutions. When things break, they need someone who can actually fix it properly, not just apply another patch.
TGMontage: Sometimes Simple Is Enough
Not every project is complex. TGMontage needed a landing page. That’s it. A professional online presence where people could find them and understand what they do.
I built them exactly that. Clean, fast, professional. No unnecessary features. Just what they needed.
Lesson learned: resist the urge to over-engineer. Sometimes a well-executed landing page is the right solution, even if it feels “too simple” to build.
Software Agency: The Technical Deep Dive
This one was different. A software agency paying over €1,200 per month for hosting. Unreliable infrastructure. Deployments that sometimes worked, sometimes didn’t.
I helped them migrate to optimized hosting and implemented Infrastructure as Code (IaC). Reproducible deployments. Stable infrastructure. Significant cost savings.
This project reminded me that DevOps skills translate directly into business value. Many companies are overpaying for hosting because they don’t know how to optimize it, or dealing with reliability issues because their infrastructure isn’t properly managed.
Building StaticForm: Scratching My Own Itch
After building several client websites, I kept hitting the same wall: contact forms on static sites. Static sites are fast, cheap to host, and easy to maintain. But they can’t process forms server-side.
Third-party services exist, but they’re either expensive, unreliable, or missing features I needed. Every project meant shopping for another form service, configuring it, hoping it worked properly.
So I built StaticForm. A service that handles form submissions, automatically filters spam, and reliably stores every message. Point your form to our endpoint. It works. That’s it.
This is my first real SaaS product. Not a client project where you build for one specific use case. A product where anyone can sign up and use it immediately. Where you’re solving the same problem for many different businesses with different needs.
It’s teaching me things client work never did. Product decisions. Pricing. Support. Marketing (which I’m still learning). The difference between building for one client and building for everyone.
Still early, still learning. But there’s something different about having a product out there that works independently of client contracts.
What I’ve Learned
Being The One Contact Person Actually Matters
Every single client has mentioned this. They appreciate working directly with me. No project managers translating requirements back and forth. No rotating team members who need to be brought up to speed. Just one person who knows their project, their problems, and their goals.
This isn’t scalable. I know that. And I’m fine with it. I’m not trying to build a 50-person agency. The lack of scalability is actually the feature. It’s what makes Digitura work.
Simple Solutions Beat Complex Ones Every Time
I’ve spent years building complex enterprise systems. I know how to architect distributed systems, implement complex patterns, build for scale. But that’s almost never what clients actually need.
The projects that work best are the ones where I resist that urge to show off technical skills and instead focus on: does this solve the actual problem? Is it maintainable? Does it work reliably?
Turns out, a well-built simple solution beats an over-engineered complex one every single time. Both for the client and for future maintenance.
DevOps Skills Are Underrated Business Value
The infrastructure optimization project taught me this clearly. Many businesses are bleeding money on hosting or dealing with unreliable deployments. They don’t know how to optimize it, or they’re afraid to touch it because “it works.”
Being able to look at someone’s infrastructure, spot the problems, and actually fix them? That’s immediate, measurable value. Cost savings. Better reliability. Reproducible deployments.
Technical skills that translate directly to business outcomes are valuable. DevOps is one of them.
Products and Client Work Are Completely Different
Client work: clear requirements, defined scope, fixed timeline, known customer. You build it, deliver it, get paid, move on.
Products: endless decisions about features. What to build first? How to price it? How do people find it? What happens when something breaks at 2 AM and you don’t have a “client” to report to?
Building StaticForm taught me that product work requires a completely different mindset. It’s not harder or easier. Just different. And you need to be okay with uncertainty and iteration in a way that client work doesn’t require.
Know What You’re Good At (And What You’re Not)
I can build software. I can solve technical problems. I can optimize infrastructure. I can talk to clients about their needs and translate that into working solutions.
Marketing and sales are skills I’m still learning. I don’t enjoy most social media, but I do enjoy providing value and helping people. That’s why platforms like Reddit work for me. It’s not about promotion. It’s about human interaction where you can actually help someone solve a real problem. That kind of marketing feels natural because it aligns with what I already enjoy: solving problems and sharing knowledge.
Instead of trying to be good at everything, I focus on what I’m actually good at. Everything else either gets outsourced, automated, or kept minimal. This isn’t giving up. It’s being honest about where your value is.
Entrepreneurship Is Different From Engineering
The biggest lesson? Being good at building software doesn’t automatically make you good at running a business. They’re related but different skills.
Engineering: solve well-defined technical problems. There’s usually a “right” answer, or at least better and worse approaches.
Entrepreneurship: make decisions with incomplete information. Choose between options that all have trade-offs. Figure out pricing when you have no baseline. Decide what to build when you could build anything.
I started Digitura to learn this. One year in, I’m still learning. That was the point.
What’s Next
I’m continuing with client work because it pays the bills, keeps my skills sharp, and I genuinely enjoy it. I’m also investing time in StaticForm and exploring other product ideas.
The goal isn’t to become a millionaire or scale to 50 employees. It’s to build a sustainable business that gives me control over my work and lets me build things that matter.
One year in, Digitura is small but real. I have clients, recurring revenue, and a product in the market. Not everything has gone according to plan, but that’s part of it. You adjust, you learn, and you keep building.
If you’re thinking about starting your own software business, my advice is simple: start small, focus on solving real problems, and ship things. You’ll figure out the rest as you go.
Want to know more about Digitura? Check out digitura.nl. Have questions about starting a software business or need help with a technical challenge? Get in touch.