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Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

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Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#71

Post by [deleted] »

cod3boy wrote: post #64
johnwheeler wrote: post #50

To me, it is the product... You’ve essentially taken a bunch of things that are already free, bundled them together, and charged a steep price. * Your NDA could be replaced with a simple Google search * There are plenty of ways to throw together a quick, pro looking website. * Scheduling calls is done over email, and gmail and outlook already add appointments to your calendars. * Chat assistant can be replaced with T…

I don't think so. All of the things you explained below takes at least a week in real life to complete. To and fro emails to get the requirement right, using DocuSign to sign NDAs, then setting up a call. While with Sieve PRO all of this happens right away. About equity, we've already raised an angel round, so I think it creates some value, but now I think we need to convey this better to the audience.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#72

Post by cod3boy »

sumedh wrote: post #62
cod3boy wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's embedded in the typeform.

You are giving other people websites yet you cannot build your own form?

It was a part of our lean method :) We actually had tons of questions and branches there before, and using typeform helped us launch faster.

Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#73

Post by cpfohl »

ryandrake wrote: post #49
cod3boy wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Noted, we'll be reworking the home page completely and about the signup flow. We are already working on the video as we speak. Here is raw demo if you are intrigued https://drive.google.com/open?id=11uAP1oNm7HzLo3q9fHiAXheFg6...

Maybe a demo video is a good idea, maybe not. Personally, I would not look at a demo video at all, but perhaps others would. Don't take my word for it (sample size N=1) Presumably you've asked your potential customers and believe it would help. Agree 100% with the other commenters: The sign-up flow is super-high friction. You did the first step right though, you measured the funnel and found out that people are dropp…

+1 no videos. Gifs yes. Screenshots and text descriptions yes. No videos:

A video can't be searched, it can't be scanned, and it can't be watched without headphones on in many settings.

I recognize lots of people learn by video or research by video, though I feel like a person watching a video has to have a level of commitment to your product that's higher than a person scanning for screenshots. Video should be "level 2"

Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#74

Post by discordance »

You were giving away shares in your company in return for people signing up for your product?

I get that this might sound like a nice referral scheme idea, but it’s way too much to think about if I were one of your potential customers. Feels like a modern take on the free steak knives.

Why not incentivize around what your product does? - a 30 day demo or access to parts of the pack.. etc

Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#75

Post by wellboy »

How much did you pay for those 600 people and were they targeted long-tail searches from google (ndas for freelancers) or random visitors? Usually the conversion rate for visitor to payed customer is 0.1-1%, depending on your product, that's normal.

Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#76

Post by SimonPStevens »

Just my thoughts.

I need to see far more, with far less commitment from me before I start evening thinking about paying you.

I need to see demos and example pages, and perhaps a trial of some kind where it basically works immediately, and I can fill in as much or as little as I want to get an idea about what it does and how it might work for me.

Basically all you have is a couple of screenshots on your landing page, and a list of features that I can't really visualize and then you start immediately asking me for email and linked-in address when I hit 'get-started'. I need to see the product first, I'm not ready to start filling in forms yet, I need to see it working to understand what it does.

Secondary to that... I'm a freelancer, and I don't think I would use your product. I put together a website myself (and in fact, freelancing as a developer I think your website is at least partly your portfolio, so doing it yourself to showcase your ability is important), I manage contracts/NDAs/Invoices and stuff easily enough already, and I talk to my clients via email/phone to gather requirements, etc. So I'm not sure of the value of the client on-boarding part. Perhaps I'm just not your target market, so take this part with a pinch of salt. Perhaps for freelancers in a non-tech sector where they don't have the skills to create their own website might be more your target.

Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#77

Post by briandear »

So Stripe Atlas for freelancers except it costs money. Look at how Atlas works and ask: why does Stripe do it? The answer is because it gets a new Stripe customer out of the deal and SV Bank gets another customer and the follow up legal services generate some money as well; so everyone gets paid at some point but there’s more of a value chain.

Why not give away some parts, charge for other parts on the backend rather than upfront.

Look at the Atlas model and see where you can copy that in the freelancer context. Perhaps make some deals with companies to provide qualified freelancers to members of your service; then you have a lead generation value prop to add to your product.

Freelancers need clients more than they need an NDA. So work all sides of the freelancer’s pain.

And stop with the “shares” thing. Honestly, nobody wants a piece of your business (yet,) so that’s just meaningless.

Why not $29 per year? What’s your actual marginal cost per user? Find that number, mark it up some amount and then go after scale. Alternatively, market to new freelancers — existing ones already know what they’re doing.

This is a big market but a really tough one. Freelancers are generally opposed to spending money unless absolutely necessary to their business because the one that can afford your service, don’t need it and the ones that do, can afford it — meaning the value doesn’t exceed the cost.

Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#78

Post by nivertech »

cod3boy wrote: post #16
wnm wrote: post #9

I also clicked on signup, but then didn't. Here is why: I wanted to sign up to test the product, but after clicking on signup I get a Typeform modal. Typeform as a signup form makes me suspicious that the product doesn't really exists, and the startup is doing some sort of landing page -> signup validation. You also ask that I enter my credit card and you want to charge me 10$ upfront, without having established any…

Thanks, Makes sense. Before we were asking $348 ;-) but then our program was that we'd giveaway shares for the first 100 people. The whole thought process behind that was, We are a small team of hustlers wanting to build the best experience for freelancers to work with their clients. Soon in our journey, we realized building a startup is a lot of work, and it’s hard to focus on multiple areas. This is why we’ve launc…

I don't know where this company is located, but in US giving away securities is illegal.

Re: Ask HN: We didn't get a single person to pay for our SAAS – what could be wrong?

#80

Post by comstock »

cod3boy wrote: post #64
johnwheeler wrote: post #50

To me, it is the product... You’ve essentially taken a bunch of things that are already free, bundled them together, and charged a steep price. * Your NDA could be replaced with a simple Google search * There are plenty of ways to throw together a quick, pro looking website. * Scheduling calls is done over email, and gmail and outlook already add appointments to your calendars. * Chat assistant can be replaced with T…

I don't think so. All of the things you explained below takes at least a week in real life to complete. To and fro emails to get the requirement right, using DocuSign to sign NDAs, then setting up a call. While with Sieve PRO all of this happens right away. About equity, we've already raised an angel round, so I think it creates some value, but now I think we need to convey this better to the audience.

As a freelancer, this also just doesn’t fit with my personal experience. When a client wants an NDA, they send one. I rarely/never care. I’ll check over the language, but they don’t want to use my NDA in general.

Invoicing, time tracking is done through my accounting system.

Scheduling meeting is pretty easy.

Setting up a personal website is pretty easy, and if you’re a Webdev you probably already have one. In my experience most work comes through personal contacts anyway.

So, it was hard for me to see how this would be useful. Maybe I’m not the audience. Posting a survey might get you more statistics on what’s wrong with the site.

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