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Rapidly Validate, Fuel Growth - tagline for upcoming tool

by @lunartruesky

Here is my first attempt at building in public. I want to help founders quickly validate their idea based on some learnings I had trying to validate an idea (I put this idea on hold).

I previously posted a question to the community to see if had any tooling around validation. Nobody had any tooling but suggested building using Notion, though I had little experience with Notion and wanted to build something with tools I was more comfortable with.

Having experience building websites from ground up at a software consulting company, I decided to start building a POC to first see if it could help solve my own struggles after using Excel to validate an idea.

Idea

Background

I think many different ways to validate a SaaS idea can be successful. Personally, when I'm looking to start something new, I would rather someone tell me precisely how to do it and improvise or experiment once I'm comfortable. I started my SaaS journey reading "Start Small, Stay Small" and "SaaS Playbook" by Rob Walling followed by his recommended "The Mom Test" by Rob Fitzgerald. In addition, I watched Micro Conf on YouTube to reinforce what I learned from the books. I tried to adopt these techniques but felt I lacked tooling, simply using Excel to start tracking my cold calls (emails). I was hoping to instill this process into others faster than reading the books and watching the videos (though I'd continue to recommend these books to users due to the depth of knowledge these resources can provide).

How I can Help

I want to help new founders jump start their validation using both Robs' processes with a set of tools that are very opinionated. The set of tools includes workflow phases:

  • ideation
  • idea evaluation
  • idea validation

These can all be group using basic constructs:

  • idea matrices
  • contacts/companies
  • emails
  • questionnaires

Combining these constructs together, I hope to guide founders from "thinking about starting" to "starting" to "having a list of potential customers to sell software to".

Recognizing what it's not

My proposed tool set may not be the best CRM or the best email provider, in fact much to the contrary I expect it to be bare bones. However I don't believe that's where the value of my proposed idea comes from. I don't think founders are looking for "the best" at this stage, but I hope to help some jump start that process providing concrete tooling backed by proven processes that help validate ideas, and validate them faster.

Stage 1 - Building the POC

I started building with tools and technologies that I'm familiar with:

  • Frontend - React + npm build for static hosting
  • Storage - localStorage (until I have some interest and/or payments to host storage)
  • Git Repo - Azure DevOps
  • Pair Programmer - ChatGPT 3.5
  • Static Site - Azure (not yet deployed)

When building my React pages, I used ChatGPT to kick start my project. I first created the following pages with basic connections between them:

  • Companies
  • Contacts
  • Email Templates

I later plan to build out the other ends of the workflow:

  • Idea matrices
  • Questionnaires

Stage 2 - Create Landing Page

I was comfortable with my POC that I could connect data elements together using local storage with no real backend to start. That meant I could move on to building a landing site to begin advertising, building in public, and finding my own audience. Because my POC application tries to tie together concepts from Rob Walling and Rob Fitzpatrick, I nabbed the domain name https://startsmallkit.com. It seemed logical at the time.

Using a NextJs template, I started building and customizing my landing site using the following free template (thanks to hiriski for providing this template).

I implemented my hero, the ability to accept emails address via BigMailer, and I was ready to launch my site. My tech included:

  • Frontend - NextJs + npm build for static hosting
  • Azure DevOps - git, tasks, pipeline
  • Git Repo - Azure DevOps
  • Azure Static Website - deploy static site
  • Email Subscriber - BigMailer + Amazon SES
  • Domain - namecheap

Unfortunately throughout the POC build and landing site build, I kept feeling funny about launching my site using Rob Walling's brand (even though the domain was available). I reached out to [email protected] and requested their permission to use the domain name. Although I expected there was a low chance they'd be okay with it, I provided some context: my background building software, my goal of helping others, some ideas I tried validating previously, my strong interest in Rob Walling's products and SaaS growth philosophy, and my aforementioned idea.

The MicroConf team thoughtfully responded, appreciated my interest in their mission, but unfortunately declined my request. I do not plan to proceed against their wishes and respect their desire to keep their brands close to home. I started thinking about alternative names for my idea (more to come, but open to suggestions).

Stage 3 - Changing Domain and moving foward

My one regret, in retrospect, is that I wish I had reached out to MicroConf before buying the domain and setting up the landing page. I configured the Azure site, DNS and the BigMailer + Amazon SES using the https://startsmallkit.com domain.

I've struggled to get motivated to reconfigure those infrastructure related pieces, so I am in a bit of a slump. In the mean time, I've distracted myself expanding the Email Templates page and posting in the #buildinpublic groups. I've convinced myself expanding the POC is useful as I'm not prepared to record and show a demo video of the app or screenshots of the app on my landing page. I think these are important pieces to launching too.

My Request to the Community

I'm feeling out people's interest in my idea. I'm open to feedback and criticism in hopes to hone in on a useful solution.

Thanks for reading my story, and I'll leave you with a quote:

~"If you have no goals, you'll hit them every time." -Zig Ziglar~

Set some goals and keep building!

Timeline

I wanted to record the actual timeline of my effort on this idea. I work nights and weekends as time permits with a wife and child. I will continue to track and expand this timeline with important milestones.

  • Sept 6th - Git Repo first commit
  • Sept 13th - Created Company page
  • Sept 27th - Created Contact page
  • Oct 2nd - Created Email Templates page
  • Oct 17th - Landing Site configured and ready for launch
  • Oct 19th - Sent email to MicroConf
  • Nov 6th - Response from MicroConf (they had an event, I'm pretty happy with this response time)
  • Nov 21st - Email Templates page improvements using liquidjs templating
  • Nov 22nd - Published first #buildinpublic post on Indie Hackers

References

Avatar for @lunartruesky @lunartruesky
posted to Icon for group Building in Public
Building in Public
 on November 23, 2023
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