

Ask HN:  First I found a client, then I build a Product, now.. - eof

To make a short story even shorter; I was traveling and basically not working.  A tiny bit of lingering consulting but mostly just spending money slowly and having a nice time.<p>It came up in a conversation with someone I met that I was a programmer, and that they were looking to get something built.  Predictably the upper end of their budget is about a fifth of the bottom end of my estimate.  They were going the elance route.  I gave him some pointers on getting what he wanted and nt getting burnt and went on my way.<p>It occured to me later that this guy is in a similar position to lots (maybe.. ~1-2k identical small businesses in the world) and maybe there was something to this.  I have never built a 'product' up to this point.<p>So, I asked him if he would be interested in instead of owning the software, if he would be fine with being a customer of a SaaS implementation.  We had really good rapport and I offered to just build it and as soon as it was doing what he needed he would pay me.  a few months of part-time work (and learning haskell) later, the 'minimum product' is built; and he pays me the agreed upon 1k and is actively using it, its solving his problem, and eveyone is happy.<p>Its a webapp; and for the 1k he gets it "forever".  We have no contract or anything.<p>So, now what?  After traveling so long cash is pretty low, like.. I need a gig or I can't pay July's rent low.  I am pretty sure I just closed a deal today that will get me through the summer (my monthly nut is ~= 20 billable hours).<p>Where do I put my energy, how much more of this should I build out?  This thing has zero chance of ever becoming an instagram or something.  I think it could potentially grow into a high-dollar (10-20k a license) situation with a lot more features but in the same space; but for now, if I could get 20-50 paying customers at 100/bucks a month it would really change my life.<p>100/month sounds sort of a like a lot for what it <i>is</i>.  But it is providing that much value for them easily; so I think that's fine.  It's not polished is the main thing; and I am not a designer.  I am using bootstrap which gets me pretty far.<p>It feels to me like the right thing to do is just try and get customers.  It's a slow process because its 100% brick and mortar situation; and there isn't really too much interconnectivity between the customers.<p>I am sort of stuck between a rock and a hard place; I need a designer; but I can't pay for a good one.  And I am scared that I won't be able to get the money to pay for a good one (at least from this project) until I have a designer.<p>For the record, I contacted one potential customer; they agreed to check out the software but never used the account I set up for them.  However I am 95% sure the person I spoke to was not a decision maker.  Also I am not a sales man; but I do know the business reasonably well.<p>I apologize for the rambling nature of this post.. it's admittedly something of a process of mental masturbation, but I am hoping nonetheless for some tidbit of wisdom.
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MortenK
You can design and improve and test the software forever, but if it is working
right now, go out and try to sell it again. A top design is not neccessary for
product success, neither is a lot of features. Plenty of "boring" business
products are simple, and ugly as hell but sells by the boatload.

As for pricing: 100 USD a months is peanuts for most businesses, if they get a
real problem solved. Don't be discouraged by the low-ball pricing of many
current SaaS offerings. They might be what you see most on sites like HN, but
in other parts of the world, ugly, non-shiny, feature-poor SaaS software is
sold for thousands of dollars a month. It's all in the value that the product
solves for the customer.

My advice is don't invest any more time into it, before you have the next guy
that says "sure I'll pay 100$ a month to rent, or 1000$ for a license". Since
you've already proven that the software is valuable, there is no point in
investing more effort _right now_ , gold-plating your software.

What you need is sales, but you already have a valuable product. While it
surely won't be easy, it's doable. You've already proved that yourself. Good
luck!

~~~
masukomi
What he said. Seriously. It's great advice.

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SABmore
Congrats on getting the product built. The key now, before you perform any
additional work on it, is to determine if there is a need/want for your
product outside of your current user and potential user, that warrants
additional time spent, and can subsequently provide you with the ability to
earn some cash.

I'd suggest looking at some of the writing around the Lean methodology,
especially Customer Development. For example, you can create simple surveys
and send them out to potential customers (find customers on forums, FB,
wherever), during which you can gauge interest and if they'd be willing to
pay.

