Whats up w these SaaS advice?

[jdimmick]

Ive seen alot of ppl in here giving others advice and 90% of them are all talking about "launching fast" i dont understand how its a good advice to tell people to make something and launch as soon as possible without focusing on devloppeement alot.

i get u should spend an eternity trying to make a products perfect but this is just bs bc if u rush things imo u wont get any payed costumers bc u products is just not devlopped well,
everything takes time and especially devlopping a SaaS.

Idk if im missing something here or not but i wanna know what yall think about this advice.

 

[newmommie305]

@jdimmick On the flip side of the coin, why would you waste a lot of development time on an unsure product?

The actual product will be continuously built over time, once the ideas been validated and there's proven market fit, but by marketing early, and being able to get a quick MVP out there, you're able to get quick feedback and decide whether it's worth the dev time.

 

[ck90]

@newmommie305 A lot of components in a SaaS are reusable: both frontend and backend. Many parts will just start to become repetitive, except if you are trying to do something special, that is not CRUD. Or if the API you are integrating needs a lot of workaround and it is not well documented.

Building the first one is usually the hardest. Then, building something similar (with a similar payment model, admin panel, and others) becomes exponentially easier.

So you don't have to rush the first one.

 

[elmarie111]

@jdimmick I agree with you OP.
You only get one chance to make a good first impression.
If your product is badly developed or rushed, your potential customer won’t come back, even if your product is good a few months later.

But, and that’s what most people don’t get, MVP doesn’t mean « badly developed, rushed and half baked », it means « feature limited ». It still has to be properly developed, polished and good looking.

 

[jdimmick]

@elmarie111 Thats what im saying, its okay to start off with a good product that has limitations but rushing things off and offering a bad product is prolly what kills most SaaS businesses bc it damaged the trust between u and ur users which is the worst thing that could happen to u

 

[bustinjustin]

@jdimmick Bad product is not what kills most SaaS businesses.

Building products is easy these days - new devs after a 6 month bootcamp can build a Facebook/instagram/reddit/twitter clone.

Building things no one asked for, solving problems which have no demand and having no sales is what kills SaaS businesses.

 

[martinthomas]

@jdimmick This type of advice is irrelevant without context.

Making something super simple, ship fast.

Making something super complicated (say a competitor to Google Maps), it takes a lot longer.

 

[jdimmick]

@martinthomas They never give context whenever i see someone making a post asking for advice its just a bunch of people telling them to "launch as soon as possible"

 

[martinthomas]

@jdimmick most people don't know what they are talking about, which is why most people have never launched a successful saas

 

[jdimmick]

@martinthomas What do u think the secret to launching a successful saas in ur opinion?

 

[martinthomas]

@jdimmick christ there is no secret. it's a highly competitive and complicated marketplace where everything this evolving constantly. it's like asking, what's the secret to winning the superbowl, and having a talking head say, "running the ball up the middle". it's never a super simple answer, and anyone who thinks there is a formula or that the same thing will work over and over again is probably just making money off selling that snake oil.

you asked a question, ship fast or ship better product, and no one can give you any reasonable advice because we don't know a million other factors that go into your business. how much runway do you have? what other competitors are out there? what are they doing? do you have the resources to make more than an MVP no matter how long you take, and so on and so on.

i would either make your question much more pointed and specific, or find some people in real life or online who have experience and success with saas and talk with them in detail about the ins and outs of your situation.

 

[richardwinn]

@jdimmick Before even launching, it's best to validate the idea and prove there are paying customers using absolute minimal effort.

 

[zois]

@jdimmick This is the ycombinator way of doing things, as explained in the 10 year old playlist "How to launch a startup", by Sam Altman on YouTube:

validate
build mvp fast
launch
take feedback
improve

 

[martinthomas]

@zois a reasonable answer should be upvoted