How to Properly Bootstrap Your SaaS: Idea Validation & Getting First Paying Customers

[beverly09]

Hey guys, I replied to a post on r/startups and felt that it would be useful here. The user asked for suggestions on how he should approach building an idea and as someone who has successfully bootstrapped 2 SaaS products, I offered my advice:

Idea Validation:

1. DO NOT spend a single dollar or second building an MVP (yet)
2. Setup a simple waitlist form (FREE BUILDERS: Google forms, tally.so, etc)
   1. Objective is to collect emails, phone numbers, names, etc
   2. Ask questions that give you insight on whether or not the person
      1. has the problem you are trying to solve
      2. has a potential solution (something they would pay for and how much it would cost)
3. Setup a simple payment page or make an account for money requesting (FREE PROVIDERS: Stripe, lemonsqueezy, paddle, venmo, cashapp, etc)
4. Cold email the potential customers you want to sell to
   1. Pitch them the idea, ask them for their opinions and IF THEY WANT TO PAY FOR IT
   2. Yes? Send the payment page to them (Tell them it's 100% REFUNDABLE)
   3. No? Ask them why? What type of features are needed for them to pay for it?
5. Market and pitch the idea on social media. Do as much as of this as you can
6. If you make more than 3-5 sales, then your idea is validated and you can begin building
7. If you don't make 3-5 sales in A WEEK of cold emailing, pitching, marketing
   1. Go on figma.com and create a super minimal mockup of your idea (As long as it communicates the idea and the value it will provide)
   2. Return to marketing, and pitching
   3. Why not just make the mockup in the beginning? Because your idea may have pivoted after talking to potential customers. The mockup you have now is vetted from your conversations and is ultimately what people would pay for (hypothetically)
8. Ideally you should have some sales now and can finally begin building the MVP
9. Keep marketing, keep cold emailing

DISCLAIMER: Not securing 3-5 sales in a week doesn't mean your idea isn't viable or undesired. You may need to search for potential customers in a different area. So if you're starting out, take your time on this. It is certainly a learning curve for non-sales people like myself.

If you want to become a technical founder, then I would recommend my tech stack (for web apps) as it is, in my opinion, the best documented and most reliable.

My Go-To Tech Stack:

1. React w/ Next.js - Frontend
2. Node.js & Express - Backend
3. Supabase - Database & Auth
4. Vercel - Website Hosting
5. Render - Backend Server Hosting
6. Lemonsqueezy - Payment Provider
7. Porkbun or Namecheap - Where to buy your domain name
   

If you are not a technical founder and want to work with someone technical, my suggestion is to make sure they are well compensated so they feel eager to work and build out your idea. Of course, it's ideal to work with a friend or someone close, but if that is not an option, then you either have to look for a cofounder that is just as passionate about the idea as you or hire an experienced dev that can do the job with proper compensation.

TLDR: Validate idea first before doing anything. Use cold emails and waitlist forms that funnel into a payment screen. 3-5 pre-sales is ideal. Market, market, market. Keep finding and talking to potential customers.

 

[kaylarose3]

@beverly09 Do you have an example SaaS company that is currently in the wait-list stage you can share?

 

[beverly09]

@kaylarose3 I do actually. I am currently validating Affpaca. So right now, I'm spending most of my time cold dming/emailing potential users (mainly targeting SaaS founders with affiliate programs on their site so I can fill up my database with genuine affiliate programs).

 

[przemek]

@beverly09 Great stuff @beverly09

In my personal opinion, I find building MVP to check PMF is more practical.

That being said, I'm against building an MVP out of no where.

SaaS founders need to observe and do proper market research to identify if there's a problem that affects a significant number of people.

Only then, building an MVP would be the way to go.

 

[deathbeforedishonor9453]

@beverly09 Affpaca looks really slick. I like the minimal design and it scales across screen sizes well I see. Did you write the CSS or is it a UI library?

 

[beverly09]

@deathbeforedishonor9453 Thank you so much! It’s all custom CSS. I did want to use a UI library like shadcn but felt rushing to get the waitlist out was more important. I need to fix up some mobile styling issues though hahaha

 

[bigfranck22]

@beverly09 I'm curious about the payment thing. If I ask a potential customer to pay before the product is made, how does that work? They won't receive a product immediatelly after paying, so why would they pay and why would I accept payments for it? Am I supposed to give them something other than the product in return for payment? I understand how this would work in a fixed price case, i.e a preorder, but how would it work in a subscription based model?

 

[beverly09]

@bigfranck22 The simplest answer is to just promise them an “early bird” type of pricing model. Where that customer pays a one time fee for version 1 of your product. You might think you’re losing out on additional MRR but the first paying customers you have for your SaaS are actually the most valuable and priceless assets of your business.

They are your beta testers, they are going to be the ones shaping and guiding your product towards $1k+ MRR. They are going to tell you what features are good, what needs fixing and what needs to be added. Hope this helps.

 

[bigfranck22]

@beverly09 Ok, thank you for your response, that makes sense

 

[stephen583]

@beverly09 Appreciate your post. I have two SaaS ideas I've been formulating and assessing demand and I found this read very helpful. Thanks

 

[beverly09]

@stephen583 Makes me really happy you found it useful. If you have any other questions or concerns my DMs are open!

 

[elthia]

@beverly09 Your approach of validating the idea and getting pre-sales is spot on. Focus on understanding customer requirements, the problems they face, and then shaping your idea around that is the key. It definitely strikes a chord with my experience of prototyping an idea where I couldn't code or program. At that time, instead of hiring freelancers or a dev agency, I took assistance from buildmystartupidea.com. It's a tech incubator comprising of successful tech exfounders who specialize in working with non-technical entrepreneurs like us. This was immensely beneficial for me, and it might be worth considering for you too. Good luck with your venture!