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Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

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Re: Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

#111

Post by DataCrayon »

go_prodev wrote: post #88
DataCrayon wrote: post #75

For PlotAPI ( https://plotapi.com ) I’m using: - FastAPI for the SaaS itself - WooCommerce for the accounts and subscriptions - Nikola for the gallery and feature demonstrations - FreeAgent for handling all the tax obligations (UK) I’ve been checking out Ghost CMS recently. It’s looking great so far for content and subscription management.

Hi thanks for sharing. Can you please explain what Nikola is? I tried searching for it, but it's a common name.

Hi - my pleasure!

It's as mkl said - a static site generator. It's a Python-based one so I was more comfortable customising it.

Re: Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

#112

Post by jmstfv »

> I want to mostly focus on development and skip the marketing

Please don't. More often than not, better-marketed products win over better products. It's unfortunate, but that's how it is.

> I like building products after all.

Most of us do, but you're unlikely to gain any traction without marketing, and after failing to see tangible results, grow resentful towards your project and start losing interest. Been there, done that.

If you want to minimize time spent on marketing in the longer term, your best bets are word-of-mouth, referrals, and SEO (if you're after low-competition keywords). However, not all businesses are conducive to these strategies.

Regarding tools, pick the ones (1) you're familiar with, (2) don't have complex billing, (2) and don't lock you in (in that order). There are exceptions, but this is a good rule of thumb (and that's the rule I have been sticking to in my current business).

Don't get bogged down in minutiae. Ship it!

Re: Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

#115

Post by withinboredom »

KronisLV wrote: post #104
rawoke083600 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>* Sendgrid for transactional/outbound email All good recommendations ! I would advise/caution AGAINST SendGrid. They have a quite the terrible reputation and my n=1 experience is that over a weekend they suspended my production account without cause ! 1) I've been sending the EXACT same mails and number (less than 200-300 a month) to the exact same ppl on their free-tier. 2) I asked to upgraded to a PAID account to…

Genuine question: why not just have your own e-mail server with a bit of automation thrown in, something simple like https://github.com/docker-mailserver/docker-mailserver I can understand something like SendGrid or PostMark for the more complex use cases or larger platforms, but surely for a one man SaaS, the simple self-hosted option wouldn't be out of the question either? Interacting with a mail server shouldn't b…

When you run your own email server, you run a significant risk of getting to spam folders, especially at the beginning if one of your first customers marks your email as spam.

You also have to deal with abuse complaints and discovering where the form is for whichever provider is blocking your email addresses while also dealing with a customer who never got an email from you with their receipt or invoice. It’s a pita.

Did it once, never again.

Re: Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

#116

Post by withinboredom »

movedx wrote: post #94
nkozyra wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably not a good enough benefit in the age of letsencrypt but you do get free certs if you're with R53.

Not to mention the dynamic alias records, automated certificate validations and auto-renewing, and the very excellent integrations with other AWS services. People like making life harder for themselves /shrug

Most decent registrars have APIs allowing you to do all of this with just a few lines of code in a script.

Re: Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

#117

Post by withinboredom »

nojito wrote: post #80
ignoramous wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better yet, keep it on Lightsail, it has fixed pricing plans for containers ($7 per mo), VPS ($3.5), database ($15), blob store ($3 per 100GB), and disk ($1 per 10GB). Lightsail can peer into (same region) regular VPC as well for $1 per 100GB ingress+egress.

That’s ridiculously expensive.

I can’t upvote this enough!

Re: Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

#118

Post by thisisrajat »

This is a great time to be solo building your company. Most of the services have generous free tier. These are the ones I use personally.

* Hosting + DNS with AWS & Cloudflare * Code with GitHub and mirror to GitLab * Domain with Godaddy * Transactional emails with PostMark * Errors with Sentry * Docs, Mail, Calendar with Google Workspace

Re: Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

#119

Post by weird-eye-issue »

thisisrajat wrote: post #118

This is a great time to be solo building your company. Most of the services have generous free tier. These are the ones I use personally. * Hosting + DNS with AWS & Cloudflare * Code with GitHub and mirror to GitLab * Domain with Godaddy * Transactional emails with PostMark * Errors with Sentry * Docs, Mail, Calendar with Google Workspace

GoDaddy, seriously?

Re: Ask HN: Great tools for solo SaaS founders?

#120

Post by ignoramous »

nojito wrote: post #80
ignoramous wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better yet, keep it on Lightsail, it has fixed pricing plans for containers ($7 per mo), VPS ($3.5), database ($15), blob store ($3 per 100GB), and disk ($1 per 10GB). Lightsail can peer into (same region) regular VPC as well for $1 per 100GB ingress+egress.

That’s ridiculously expensive.

Apply my comment in the context of "keep all the backend stuff on AWS." Of course, if one's backend is Scaleway, Vultr, DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Linode, or CoLos then even AWS Lightsail would be ridiculously expensive, but that's not what the thread is about.
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