At the start of 2017, he recently hit $50k MRR. (online business management SaaS)

How?

This posts explains...

‍The old model: build SaaS then try to find customers

‍The new model: Find customers then build SaaS

Why Most SaaS Startups Fail

I don't have the stats...

But I bet that the majority of SaaS businesses fail because they end up building something that people don't really want.

Why?

Because we bullsh*t ourselves.

Just because we are so fixated on the outcome we want, we convince ourselves that what we are building is the best thing our customers have ever seen.

The remedy to this disease?

Find the customers first...

This is exactly what Aurelien did with Systeme. He already had a 50k email list for his online business that was pulling in $30k per month through online courses.

Upon launch of, he sent a couple of emails to the list and landed 400 paying customers, approx. $15k MRR right away.

Take, for 5 years before launching their webinar SaaS, Omar built up the $100 MBA Podcast.

They PRE SOLD 250 people from that audience before even building their MVP.

This does two things:

You KNOW these customers inside out, you speak to them all the time and have a MUCH better idea about whether they would actually pay for your SaaS
You can launch with people paying right away, giving capital to invest further in the product, leading to more customers, etc...

Welcome to... the new model:

The old model: build SaaS then try to find customers
‍
The new model: Find customers then build SaaS

So the question becomes... what do you think #saashacker will eventually sell? ;)

What did we learn?

Building an audience first can reduce risk and kickstart growth for your next SaaS project.