The hard truth about SaaS
We’ve all had this dream as developers: generating passive income with a SaaS to achieve financial independence. But is this dream achievable?
Introduction
On the “tech” Twitter, you’ve probably come across tweets from dev talking about SaaS. These are “Indie Hackers,” dev who aim solely to generate revenue by developing web applications in SaaS mode.
I’m writing this article because I am one of those dev who have embarked on the crazy adventure of SaaS. Through this article, I want to share all the lessons I’ve learned from my previous experiences and projects in the SaaS world.
Context
Before diving into the heart of the matter, let me introduce myself so you have the context for the rest of the article.
By the way, if you’re looking for or know someone who’s looking for a freelance Ruby on Rails developer, you can contact me here.
The freedom that freelancing gives me allows me to test several SaaS ideas in a short time—something not necessarily possible in other types of contracts.
Moreover, I’ve always had a passion for entrepreneurship, participating in competitions and attempting to launch projects, SaaS products, and even a podcast.
The MVP: Your Pillar in This Adventure
Since you likely already have a professional activity that takes up most of your day, you’ll work part-time on your project. Time IS the “variable” you’ll want to manage as much as possible because it’s your initial investment, and you can never get it back.
You need to apply the Pareto principle throughout your project: 80% of results come from 20% of causes. In other words, don’t spend your time on tasks that won’t yield significant results.
That’s where the Minimal Viable Product (MVP) comes in. The concept is simple: it’s the minimal version of your product that includes only your core functionality. I emphasize on “core functionality” because we often tend to add more features than necessary. You must make an effort to reduce the scope of your features as much as possible. The fewer you have, the faster you can test and sell your idea.
Stepping out of your comfort zone with marketing
It’s a well-known fact: developers are bad at marketing. What interests us as developers is diving into the code and deploying features.
The reality is, no matter how many features you release, if no one hears about your product, you’ll make zero sales. Marketing is therefore essential to make your project known to your future customers. But as I mentioned earlier, most developers are not skilled in this area.
To address this, some partner with a “sales” profile to handle all the prospecting, communication, and marketing. Others, who wish to remain solopreneurs, use another method: Build In Public.
As the name suggests, the idea is to build your application in public. This means you’ll share almost daily updates on your application’s progress. Whether it’s struggles, good news, challenges, or your achievements, everything gets shared. The strength of building in public is the hype it generates around a project, all without forcing yourself to create dedicated “marketing” content.
However, communicating as part of building in public is also work! You’ll need to communicate daily and be consistent. The beginnings can be tough because you may not yet have a community following your progress. But this is precisely when you need to hang in there and not give up!
Patience is a virtue
Building a SaaS is a (very) long-term investment, mainly because it takes time to create a good product! From developing your MVP to iterating on it until you reach your PMF (Product Market Fit), it will take several months.
Of course, the fact that you’re not working full-time on your SaaS significantly impacts the project’s duration.
Several months is a “short” timeline—sometimes it can take years. That’s why you need to be very attentive to both weak and strong signals from your users.
Be patient, as it’s a requirement for entrepreneurship, but not to the point of continuing to work on a project with no future.
Beware of “Pickaxe Sellers”
“During the gold rush, it wasn’t the gold diggers who got rich, but the pickaxe sellers.”
On social media, you’ll see many people selling “the complete guide to launching your SaaS” or “the ultimate template for developing your SaaS.” Know that all the help you need is available for free online. Whether it’s subreddits, Discord channels, or YouTube videos, everything is accessible in just a few clicks.
Here are some resources I recommend if you want to learn more about SaaS:
But remember, you won’t learn much by watching 4 hours of YouTube videos—you need to dive in and start building!
A difficult but not impossible path
Building a SaaS is LONG, and the odds of success are definitely not in your favor. However, you’ll learn a lot about yourself and make significant technical progress.
There’s no guaranteed recipe for SaaS success. Like any entrepreneurial project, there’s an element of instinct, where the decisions you make will greatly influence your project’s future. And there’s only one way to improve this instinct: by creating more projects.
Every new project you develop will be better than the previous one because you’ll accumulate experience.
Start as soon as possible—you have nothing to lose except your time. ;)