An indie hacker is not a freelancer and not a venture-backed founder. The freelancer trades hours for invoices; the founder trades equity for runway. The indie hacker ships a product and lives off whatever MRR it generates — no clients, no board, no buffer. The bottleneck is rarely engineering. It is the surrounding loop: a landing page that converts, a price the market accepts, instrumentation that tells you what is working, an experimentation rhythm that compounds answers, a free-tool wedge, a launch that does not fizzle on day two, and a referral mechanism that turns the first 100 users into the next 1,000. The eight skills below address that loop. Each is a real, verified Claude Code skill from a plugin with public commit history and real star counts on GitHub.
From the ai-agent-camp plugin (358 stars, 3 contributors). A landing-page workflow that walks an indie hacker from a one-sentence value prop through messaging organisation, wireframe, design, and HTML implementation. Most indie products die on the landing page, not the product — the visitor lands, cannot tell in three seconds what the thing does or who it is for, and bounces. The skill enforces the structural work most solo builders skip: who is this for, what problem does it solve, why is the alternative worse, what does it cost, what is the proof. Once that is on paper, the HTML is the easy part.
When to use: on day one of a new product, before any code beyond the auth flow is written. Re-run any time the homepage conversion rate drops below a baseline you trust. Pair it with the solo-founders skill stack for the strategic groundwork that should happen before the landing page.
Also from ai-agent-camp. Supports pricing design, packaging, and monetisation — tier definition, anchor pricing, annual versus monthly, free-tier limits, and the eternal "should I add a usage component" question. Pricing is the single decision with the biggest leverage on revenue and the one most consistently made by gut feel. The skill produces three candidate tiers with rationale, anchors them against reference points the visitor recognises, and forces a decision on the free-tier boundary instead of leaving it as an accidental product of what the database happened to allow.
When to use: before the first paying customer, every time MRR plateaus for more than two months, and before any major feature ships. Re-run on a quarterly cadence — most indie hackers underprice by 30 to 50 percent and find out years late.
Also from ai-agent-camp. Sets up GA4, conversion events, UTM parameters, GTM configuration, and the event taxonomy that makes the dashboards readable six months later. The product without analytics is a product running blind — you think you know which page converts and which campaign brought the user, but you do not, and every decision after that is a guess. The skill installs the instrumentation that turns guesses into a working feedback loop, with an event naming convention that prevents the "what does click_button_2 mean" problem on month nine.
When to use: on day one, right after deploying the landing page and before running a single ad. Re-run any time you add a new conversion surface. Pair it with the data-analysts skill stack once you have months of data and need real cohort analysis.
Also from ai-agent-camp. Designs and helps implement A/B tests — hypothesis framing, variant design, sample-size estimation, and the reading-the-result step most indie hackers get wrong. It prevents two failure modes: running a test never powered to detect a realistic effect, and reading a noisy mid-experiment number as if it were final. For a one-person company with a few thousand monthly visitors, the sample-size calculator will frequently tell you the honest answer is to ship the better-looking variant and skip the test.
When to use: any time you are about to change the headline, the CTA, the pricing layout, or the onboarding step order. Run the design phase before launch, the analysis phase after, and never peek in between. Pair it with analytics-tracking above so the events the test depends on are actually captured.
Also from ai-agent-camp. Plans "engineering as marketing" — the free tool, calculator, or single-purpose utility that sits next to the main product and pulls in qualified traffic that converts over time. The pattern is the most consistent winning move in indie hacking: HubSpot did it with the website grader, Stripe with radar test cards. The skill walks through candidate tools (what does your audience repeatedly search for, what is one step in your main product that could stand alone) and scopes the smallest version that ships in a weekend.
When to use: month two, once you know who the customer is but before you have run out of organic ways to reach them. Build one free tool a quarter and let the SEO compound. Pair it with the marketers skill stack for distribution, and with analytics-tracking above so you can measure which tool drives signups.
From the gstack plugin (104,138 stars, MIT, 10 contributors — the largest plugin in the index). A structured land-and-deploy workflow that takes a feature branch from passing tests to live production with the safety rails an indie hacker wants: pre-deploy review, canary verification, rollback plan if the canary degrades. For a one-person company the production deploy is the most dangerous five minutes of the week — no on-call rotation, no SRE checking the migration, no one but you to notice when the dashboard goes blank on a Friday afternoon. The skill bakes the discipline into a workflow that survives the weeks when you would otherwise skip it.
When to use: every deploy bigger than a copy fix. Configure it with setup-deploy on day one. Pair it with the devops-engineers skill stack for the observability and incident-response half.
Also from ai-agent-camp. Plans product launches, feature releases, and GTM sequencing — phased launches, channel strategy, momentum building, and Product Hunt preparation. The difference between a launch that gets 500 upvotes and one that gets 50 is almost never the product; it is whether the founder did the four-week prep before launch day (the email list, the supporter network, the hunter, the assets, the timezone-aware launch hour, the rolling reply cadence). The skill produces the checklist, calendar, and asset list, sized for a solo operator.
When to use: four weeks before any Product Hunt launch, two weeks before a major feature release. Pair it with the content-creators skill stack for launch-content production.
Also from ai-agent-camp. Designs referral programs, affiliate programs, and word-of-mouth strategies. For an indie hacker paid acquisition is rarely viable — the LTV is too small, the CAC math does not work, and ad accounts get suspended at the worst possible moment. The growth that does work is referrals: the happy customer who tells two friends, the affiliate who lists your product in their newsletter, the social-proof loop that turns the first 100 users into a trickle of the next 1,000. The skill designs the mechanism — incentive structure, trigger moment, asset (referral code, unique URL, partner dashboard), and tracking — sized for a product without a partnership team.
When to use: once retention is stable (a referral program on a leaky bucket accelerates the leak), once the first 100 paying customers have settled in. Pair it with analytics-tracking for attribution and pricing-strategy so the incentive does not blow up the unit economics.
How to install
Seven of the eight skills live in the ai-agent-camp plugin (358 stars on minicoohei/ai-agent-camp, refreshed the week of writing) and one in gstack (104,138 stars) — a two-marketplace install. Skill Index has the exact install command on each skill detail page with a copy button. The highest-ROI sequence: install gstack first so land-and-deploy is wired up before the first production push, then add ai-agent-camp and run lp-designer and pricing-strategy before opening signups. Layer analytics-tracking in immediately so the loop has data, then ab-test-setup the first time you want to change the headline. Reach for free-tool-strategy in month two when organic reach plateaus, run launch-strategy four weeks before any moment that matters (Product Hunt, a Hacker News post you actually care about), and add referral-program once retention is stable. Pair the workflow with deep-work blocks via focus.thicket.sh and QR codes for in-person events via qr.thicket.sh, and the path from "I have an idea" to ramen-profitable MRR stops being a dice roll and starts being a sequence you can run.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which Claude Code skill should an indie hacker install first?
Install gstack first so land-and-deploy is wired up before the first production push, then add ai-agent-camp and run lp-designer on the homepage and pricing-strategy on the pricing page before opening signups. The gstack plugin has 104,138 stars and an MIT license with 10 contributors — it is the largest, most active plugin in the index — and the land-and-deploy workflow takes a feature branch from passing tests to live production with pre-deploy review, canary verification, and a rollback plan. For a one-person company the production deploy is the most dangerous five minutes of the week, and the skill bakes the boring discipline into a single workflow so it survives the weeks when you would otherwise skip it. Configure it with setup-deploy on day one so the workflow is ready before you need it under pressure.
What is the best Claude Code skill for an indie hacker's landing page?
Use lp-designer from the ai-agent-camp plugin (358 stars, 3 contributors). It walks an indie hacker from a one-sentence value prop through messaging organisation, wireframe, design, and HTML implementation. The reason it matters is that most indie products die on the landing page, not the product — the visitor lands, cannot tell in three seconds what the thing does or who it is for, and bounces. The skill enforces the structural work most solo builders skip: who is this for, what problem does it solve, why is the alternative worse, what does it cost, what is the proof. Once that is on paper, the actual HTML is the easy part. Run it on day one of a new product, before any code beyond the auth flow is written, and again every time the homepage conversion rate drops below a baseline you trust.
How should an indie hacker set pricing without a finance team?
Use pricing-strategy from ai-agent-camp. It supports tier definition, anchor pricing, annual versus monthly, free-tier limits, and the eternal 'should I add a usage component' question. For an indie hacker, pricing is the single decision with the biggest leverage on revenue and the one most consistently made by gut feel. The skill produces three candidate tiers with rationale, anchors them against reference points the visitor will recognise, and forces a decision on the free-tier boundary instead of leaving it as an accidental product of what the database happened to allow. Use it before the first paying customer, every time MRR plateaus for more than two months, and on a quarterly cadence over the existing pricing page — most indie hackers underprice by 30 to 50 percent and find out years late.
What analytics setup does an indie hacker actually need?
Start with analytics-tracking from ai-agent-camp. It sets up GA4 implementation, conversion events, UTM parameters, GTM configuration, and the event taxonomy that makes the dashboards readable six months from now. The unsexy truth is that the product without analytics is a product running blind — you think you know which page converts and which campaign brought the user, but you do not, and every decision after that is a guess. The skill installs the instrumentation that turns guesses into a working feedback loop, with an event naming convention that prevents the 'wait, what does click_button_2 mean' problem on month nine. Run it on day one, right after deploying the landing page and before running a single ad or sending a single launch email, and re-run it any time you add a new conversion surface.
How do indie hackers run A/B tests with low traffic?
Use ab-test-setup from ai-agent-camp. It covers hypothesis framing, variant design, sample-size estimation, and the reading-the-result step that most indie hackers get wrong. The two failure modes the skill prevents are running a test that was never powered to detect a realistic effect (calling the null a win for the control) and reading a noisy mid-experiment number as if it were a final result. For a one-person company with a few thousand visitors a month, the sample-size calculator will frequently tell you the honest answer is to ship the better-looking variant and skip the test, which saves weeks of waiting for statistical significance that was never going to arrive. Run the design phase before the test goes live, the analysis phase after, and never look at the dashboard in between.
What is the 'free tool' growth strategy and how do I plan one?
Use free-tool-strategy from ai-agent-camp. It plans 'engineering as marketing' — the free tool, calculator, or single-purpose utility that sits next to the main product and pulls in qualified traffic that converts to the paid product over time. The pattern is the most consistent winning move in indie hacking: HubSpot did it with the website grader, Stripe did it with the radar test cards, every successful one-person SaaS eventually has one. The skill walks through the candidate tools (what does your audience repeatedly search for, what would they pay for if it cost $5, what is one step in your main product that could stand alone) and scopes the smallest version that ships in a weekend. Build one free tool a quarter, layer in analytics-tracking so you can measure which one drives qualified signups, and let the SEO compound.
How do indie hackers prepare for a Product Hunt launch?
Use launch-strategy from ai-agent-camp. It plans phased launches, channel strategy, momentum building, and Product Hunt preparation. The difference between a launch that gets 500 upvotes and one that gets 50 is almost never the product; it is whether the founder did the unsexy preparation in the four weeks before launch day — the email list, the supporter network, the hunter, the assets, the timezone-aware launch hour, the rolling reply cadence. The skill produces the actual checklist, calendar, and asset list, sized for a solo operator who does not have a marketing team to delegate it to. Run it four weeks before any Product Hunt launch, two weeks before a major feature release, and any time you have built something that deserves a moment in the spotlight you have not given it. The four-week window is the part most indie hackers cut and most flat launches trace back to.
How do indie hackers grow without paid ads?
Use referral-program from ai-agent-camp to design and optimise referral programs, affiliate programs, and word-of-mouth strategies. For an indie hacker paid acquisition is rarely a viable channel — the LTV per customer is too small, the CAC math does not work, and the ad accounts get suspended at the worst possible moment. The growth that does work is referrals: the existing happy customer who tells two friends, the affiliate who lists your product in their newsletter, the social-proof loop that turns the first 100 users into a steady trickle of the next 1,000. The skill designs the actual mechanism — incentive structure, trigger moment, asset (referral code, unique URL, partner dashboard), and tracking — sized for a product that cannot afford a partnership team. Launch the program once retention is stable; a referral program on a leaky bucket just accelerates the leak.