Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month • Hacker News Board

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#71

Post by bovermyer » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:43 PM UTC

jjjensen90 wrote: post #38

disiplus wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

im not sure the "amateur" needs changing, it could be used to point more users to middle tier, we have something like that, where we call our first tier something that like that, and the second "smart" and people take the second one. also there is a decoy effect. we push our middle tier like that without "fake" most popular tier badge. we don't have a free tier.

Amateur, at least in common American English, is virtually never used in a positive or neutral sense. It should definitely be changed in anything marketing-related.

I speak common American English, and I've always equated "amateur" with "not paid or licensed to do the thing," rather than "awful at the thing."

It's neither positive nor negative most of the time.

Context: I've lived primarily in the Midwest and the East Coast, with a few years spent in New Zealand. I've also been either involved in or peripheral to a few hobbies that style themselves as "amateur X."

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#72

Post by atombender » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:45 PM UTC

mduerksen wrote: post #55

yroc92 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any chance we could check it out?

Sure: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/veggie-garden-planner/id132992... Suggestions are always welcome. My friend is also working on an Android version, though it doesn't have feature parity (yet).

Looks nice! As someone thinking about building an app, how are you balancing the app's free functionality with paid functionality? That's the tricky thing — you want the free functionality to be useful, but you also want as many people as possible to upgrade.

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#73

Post by seanwilson » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:46 PM UTC

natch wrote: post #30

frits1993 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've definitely considered it, and I use some custom plans for users who exceed the limits of the Pro Plus plan, but I think current prices are alright. Also, keep in mind that these prices apply on yearly plans, and most paid users use monthly pricing, where prices range from $2 to $8.

I like your current prices. When I consider subscribing to something (rarely) I have to weigh something like a $10 / month cost heavily because I can only have a few of those total. But if the service is significantly lower ($1, $2.50 in your case) it's a no brainer. $5 would be in the middle somewhere as definitely easier to accept than $10. It seems obvious that as a user I would like low prices, but at the risk of…

> But if the service is significantly lower ($1, $2.50 in your case) it's a no brainer.

I think this rational is okay for selling things like a coffee or a mobile game but not for a service. If you're thinking of pricing this low, you really have to start targeting users that value what you're selling more or expand the product to solve more valuable pain points. If you've got a niche product, you're unlikely to sell a big enough volume to earn a living selling it cheap as well.

You'll lose the "no-brainer because it's so cheap" market by increasing prices but those customers aren't necessarily the customers you want.

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#74

Post by CPLX » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:48 PM UTC

jjjensen90 wrote: post #38

disiplus wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

im not sure the "amateur" needs changing, it could be used to point more users to middle tier, we have something like that, where we call our first tier something that like that, and the second "smart" and people take the second one. also there is a decoy effect. we push our middle tier like that without "fake" most popular tier badge. we don't have a free tier.

Amateur, at least in common American English, is virtually never used in a positive or neutral sense. It should definitely be changed in anything marketing-related.

I'm real good at speaking common American English and I don't agree.

The word means non-professional. So you don't do it for a living. Which is directly factually a description of what's happening here.

In some contexts is could be negative, because the concept of a non professional doing the thing is scary. Like there's nothing positive about an amateur heart surgeon, or amateur parachute designer.

But in the context of gardening it's clear and descriptive. The needs of a professional farmer and someone with a backyard garden are very different. The term clears up which one this app is made for.

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#75

Post by _ea1k » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:49 PM UTC

beznet wrote: post #46

ohadron wrote: post #7

I guess this is the tool, from OPs submission history: https://m3u-editor.com/

I might be living under a rock, but what is IPTV? Even a Google search on it makes me scratch my head. I use Netflix, Hulu, etc but those have always been referred to as 'Streaming Services' , are those somehow categorized in the IPTV umbrella?

The ones called IPTV are the ones with really questionable sources, in my experience. I'm not sure how the term IPTV became synonymous with that.

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#76

Post by dgellow » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:49 PM UTC

esch89 wrote: post #67

That's so exciting and encouraging! Congratulations :) Looking forward to your future update that says, "My SaaS paid for my yacht."

I hope he would do something more interesting than spending his money on a yacht.

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#77

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:58 PM UTC

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Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#78

Post by husarcik » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:59 PM UTC

frits1993 wrote: post #23

Gys wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What tech do you use? Really like your website btw, friendly, clean and clear

Thanks. It all runs on a Laravel codebase, and the SaaS part is handled by Laravel Spark. UI of the landing page is a template I bought, the dashboard is own tinkering.

It is awesome that you used Laravel! Have you needed to do any tweaks for performance?

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#79

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 4:59 PM UTC

mduerksen wrote: post #47

Pardon my complete speculation, but I bet your success factor is "I built ... my girlfriend a tool." My only successful product to this date is an app I built because my wife asked me to. It is in an non-technical domain which I knew nothing about. I thought it was rather non-promising, but, since it was a pet-peeve of hers, I gave it a try. It was an awesome (and very bonding) experience - she explained me the probl…

[deleted]

Re: Thank HN: My SaaS paid my rent this month

#80

Post by subhro » Mon, Jan 20, 2020, 5:02 PM UTC

mduerksen wrote: post #55

yroc92 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any chance we could check it out?

Sure: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/veggie-garden-planner/id132992... Suggestions are always welcome. My friend is also working on an Android version, though it doesn't have feature parity (yet).

There’s no ‘e’ is potato