Day 8: Built a freemium SaaS, pivoting after $0 revenue. Here's what I learned.
I launched HN Startup Hunter 8 days ago — a web app that searches every HN "Who is Hiring?" thread and extracts startup contacts with tech stacks and emails.
App works. Revenue: $0.
What I built:
- Flask app on Render (free tier), searches 200+ companies per HN thread
- Email extraction, tech stack detection, CSV export
- Freemium: 20 results free, Pro $9/mo for full access
- Live at: https://hn-startup-hunter.onrender.com
What happened:
200+ cold emails to companies from the threads. 3 warm replies, 0 conversions. Cold email → paid contract cycle is 2-4 weeks minimum. My kill criterion was 20 days. Math doesn't work.
The pivot:
- Done-for-you lead reports: $75/report. You give me your skills, I run the scraper and deliver a curated CSV of 20-30 companies with direct emails in 24h. Footer CTA is live on the app.
- Pro freemium at $9/mo — gate is live but LemonSqueezy store is in review (can't accept live payments yet, waiting on approval).
- Kill criterion: $1+ revenue by June 7. If I miss it, I shut down and pivot to something else.
What I'd do differently:
- Build the payment layer BEFORE launching the free version
- Validate the $75 service with 3 manual sales before writing a line of code
- Post here Day 1, not Day 8
Currently available for Python automation contracts ($500-1,500 flat-fee, 1-2 week turnaround) while I wait for the freemium flywheel to kick in. See the app as portfolio: https://hn-startup-hunter.onrender.com
What would you try differently?
Trending on Indie Hackers
This is a good honest pivot, but I think the issue is not only payment timing. The bigger issue is that HN Startup Hunter sounds like a small scraper for one source, while the paid use case is actually more valuable: curated founder/company lead intelligence for people selling dev, automation, or technical services.
That changes the positioning. “Search every HN Who is Hiring thread” is a feature. “Get a vetted list of companies hiring with stack, contact path, and automation-fit context” is closer to the buyer outcome. The $75 done-for-you report probably has a clearer path to revenue than $9/mo self-serve because buyers are paying for saved prospecting time, not just database access.
The naming matters here too. HN Startup Hunter is descriptive, but it locks the product to Hacker News and makes it feel like a side tool. If this expands into broader lead discovery, technical prospecting, or founder-sales workflow, a cleaner platform name like Xevoa.com would give it more room than a source-specific name.
Update (Day 9): Still haven't hit $1 in revenue but the product is live and the storefront was completely broken until yesterday (no products were showing — only a subscribe form). Fixing that now. If you're actively job-hunting and want a curated HN startup list matched to your skills, I'll send a free 5-company sample from my $75 lead report service — just reply here.
The "build payment layer before the free version" learning hits hard. I'm about to launch a paid-only finance app at £4/mo, and the calculus that pushed me away from freemium was exactly that: a free tier without working checkout is mostly expensive marketing. Curious about the $75 done-for-you service. Are you setting a specific number of inbound enquiries as the validation bar, or is any paid sale the threshold? Three manual sales before any code feels right in theory but I've been wrestling with where to draw that line for my own launch.