51–60 of 104 posts
His main point being You might know what won’t work, but you still don’t know what will work. That’s not much of a lesson.
(1) https://signalvnoise.com/posts/1555-learning-from-failure-is...
I have been building and failing multiple websites/mobile apps since 2006. To this day, I don't think I could ever be in that situation of creating something that somehow takes off. Theres gotta be a place for failed web/mobile app developers to get together and figure out a way to make it, anyone know of such a place?
Why not simply work at a company?
We don't know what the SaaS products were, what he is describing, how much they were, who was the target... I am just fascinated by these type of posts which people can sit down and write longer than I can tolerate to read. I still don't know what the author tried to convey. Impressive this got 99 votes here.
Once I wrote a blog post that I knew most people would just disagree with, so I wrote out a full length explaination. I posted it on Reddit, hardly anyone read actually read it and every single one of their comments againist my point was commented on in my post. Lots of people upvote and downvote based on title. Which kind of makes sense since you normally have to go to the page and read it before making a decision but the upvote and downvote buttons are right next to the link. One of the reasons I don't upvote often is I just forget. I've clicked the link read it and I'm off to my next post.
He starts out by citing Field of Dreams "if you build it they will come" but then seems to completely miss that point by building it without validating it was something people actually wanted.
"I didn’t care so much about creating a product that would actually make me money, I just wanted someone to use something I built." perhaps sums this piece up best. He's getting into this for the wrong reasons - to be an "entrepreneur" or have a "passive income" rather than solving a problem anyone wants solving.
Once again this post follows the usual strategy to make sure to fail your startup https://blog.luap.info/how-to-make-sure-to-fail-your-startup... These people are very motivated, are able to start new projects and working hard on it. Unfortunately contrary to what the world wants to make you think. Succeeding is not only a question of working hard, there is a lot of luck involved and also a lot of knowledge. But it i…
"This is always difficult to make an article to tell people how to be successfull. Because for any tips that you may give, there are always people who will succeed by doing the opposite. People are very different and we have to accept it. Also being successfull is all about being yourself and being innovative, so really the kind of things which don't follow rules."
I'm not sure in which areas the author released SaaS products but what's mind-boggling to me is how fast successful SaaS businesses get copied these days, especially if they are rather "simple" (in the sense of being reproducible by a small team without large investment). Privacy-friendly website analytics is maybe a good example. There are literally thousands of companies with almost the same USPs (GDPR-compliant, c…
If you are building a crud application (todo list/trello, social media scheduling, and analytics are all examples of simple crud applications), the moment you see success it will be cloned by people in eastern Europe, India, or SE Asia, and priced at 10% of yours.
A moat or barrier to entry is a must now. Solve hard problems.
I'm not sure in which areas the author released SaaS products but what's mind-boggling to me is how fast successful SaaS businesses get copied these days, especially if they are rather "simple" (in the sense of being reproducible by a small team without large investment). Privacy-friendly website analytics is maybe a good example. There are literally thousands of companies with almost the same USPs (GDPR-compliant, c…
A little off-topic, but how should one go about incorporating their side project/saas? Is it ok to start off as a sole proprietorship and later set up a LLC? I'm sure a lot also depends on local laws etc.
There could be other reasons. Take for instance my own case. I started freelancing and do side projects. In this case I approached it with a reason. Namely my revenue as freelancer is funneled into my side projects. This means expenses i make like purchasing other services, SaaS or tooling to support my side projects are written off my revenue. Im re-investing my revenue into other venues.
As my side projects are maturing i’m switching now to a limited liable legal entity from self-proprietary.
Hope this gives you some ideas.
That was a painful read, sorry. My advice for the author is to take a moment and look at the things they pay actual money for. Goods, services, Etc. And how they discriminate between vendors of those goods. (Why buy brand X when brand Y is cheaper, when you need a widget how do you find where to get one? How do you decide which one to get? Things like that.) It is a big "ask" to ask people for money in exchange for a…
I have a day job, and run my SaaS as a side-business, so maybe not the OP’s aspirations. However, I want to add one point:
> “...happy to be reminded that others have failed many more times before finally getting their overnight success.”
Don’t build optimizing for overnight success, that’s essentially a casino.
Waiting a few weeks to see what sticks and what doesn’t is way too short based my experience.
From PG’s essays:
“Actually startups take off because the founders make them take off. There may be a handful that just grew by themselves, but usually it takes some sort of push to get them going.”
And while ideally you’d validate the product as quickly as possible, most businesses can take years to truly take off. Often involving many pivots along the way.
Maybe I misunderstood, but don’t make “overnight success” your north star.