Ask HN: One person SaaS founder, any tips for someone wanting to get in?

6 points by Lesabotsy 5 years ago | 8 comments

Hey everyone. So because of some personal problems, I have to go back to my home country in the next 6 months probably (third world country). I want take this as an opportunity to create my own online business (if I can not find a remote job that pays well), no idea in what yet, just starting to brainstorm. But because I'm really new to this, I'm looking for your experiences and tips to minimize mistakes along the way. I'm not looking to make much, 500$ a month would be good enough (perks of living in a third world country I guess). The biggest problem I face is that targeting local market is not an option, people are poor around here. I have the next 6 month free, so I want to at least launch something quick and dirty every month and see where it goes (if you have some ideas to share I'm all ears). Thanks.

kirubakaran 5 years ago |

Managing your psychology is probably the most important component in this. "Success is going from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm" afterall! I'm sharing my experiences of making https://histre.com/ as a solo founder almost daily, while I have my second cup of coffee here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHkgOonAQd5haT8HHJhpg6g You may not get anything in the form of "advice" there, but I hope the camaraderie would help.

ben-gy 5 years ago |

My recommendation, think short term, ask what your customers want, make money from day one. Every journey is different, but if you're willing to talk to customers, build what they need as fast as possible, and make money from day one then you have a chance.

In terms of ideas, I would recommend exploring solutions you take for granted in you current country, that don't exist (or could be improved) in the country you're moving to. That's usually a good place to start.

In March I lost my 1.1m seed round for a startup I was starting in the event sector. Whilst carefully watching what was changing as a result of COVID-19 I founded https://covidcomply.org - first version was built in 6 days, 44 days of development later I can't keep up with customer requests now.

Take away; Chase daily revenue (small), daily product improvements (small), daily customer feedback (as much as possible).

That's my 2 cents - hope it helps ;)

coucou 5 years ago | |

Hi, it's a great web-app, indeed a requirement during this COVID19. Quick question, how do you first market it? Thanks

ben-gy 5 years ago | | |

I post asking for feedback in Facebook forums for restaurants and cafes

Lesabotsy 5 years ago | |

Thanks for the input. Congrats on your site by the way.

codegeek 5 years ago |

What are your skills ? $500 a month is very achievable with a remote job since starting a business is a whole different ball game. If you are skilled enough, finding a $500 a month job/project is much easier.

Lesabotsy 5 years ago | |

I'm an accountant. Have been programming for years, paid college by hacking games and selling bots. Covid19 quarantine gave me the time to dive back in and actually relearning programming correctly, and rekindled my passion for it. It's actually harder to find a remote job because if I work full time for someone else I will not settle for 500 and probably will not accept anything paying less that my job now.

_448 5 years ago |

Read "How to make a million before lunch"[0] by Rachel Bridge.

[0] https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Make-Million-Before-Lunch-ebook...