What if you just needed 100 customers?
The idea of 1000 True Fans has been around for a while. The idea being that having 1000 people spending $100 per year ($8.33 per month ) could well be enough to support you.
1000 doesn't seem like a lot, but realistically speaking it sure can take a while to get there.
Another angle is to create a model of 100 true fans, to get people spending $1000 per year ($83.00 per month).
This is interesting because:
- you don't need a SaaS to do this
- less customers is less transactions which is less paperwork (lots of micro transactions can get complicated to log depending on which country you live in, think VAT Moss, etc)
- SaaS is like the holy grail, but realistically sometimes it is better to start out consulting, coaching, teaching or other kind of things that don't involve complex coding.
- 100 customers feels totally achievable
Source of image and idea:
https://a16z.com/2020/02/06/100-true-fans/
This is basically my model.
Step 1. Make a small high value community.
Step 2. Manage several small high value communities.
Step 3. Teach others to manage small high value communities.
Step 4. Create platform for managing the ecosystem of small high value communities I've created.
Step 5. Make platform that people can use to copycat my model with customizations specific to their audience (could be as simple as localizing what I do, but I envision more).
I think I can do steps 1 to 3 inside of Facebook. Step 3 to 4 might have a transition period using a preexisting solution (like Mighty Networks) but... I'll cross that bridge when I get there. :) Step 5 is having something that's part Patreon and part Might Network (for example), but customized for the systems I've developed. I'm a lover of open source (even though I barely know any code). The dream would be creating a platform that people can take and do what they want to with it! :D Whatever I pull off my dream is to see someone do it better than me! lol Like... WAY better!
Seems like a pretty good plan. You just have to be good at making value within groups. there are some good platforms you could use for this.
I was talking to a friend about this the other day and she told me about the "Better" app. When I went to download it I noticed that it was a Might Networks app. I've been messing around with it this week and it could totally be used as a bridge to something more custom (if that even ever becomes necessary! Who knows what other things will pop up or are already out there. )
https://www.betterapp.us/
I dunno, I wouldn't rely that much on FB.
My "workaround" to not rely too heavily on Facebook is that I create a new group every new cycle. If people want to stay connected in the old group, or even keep things moving forward there, that's fine, but the idea is that I'll start "fresh" each cycle.
If Facebook ever made a change that impacted my ability to manage the group(s) I'd always be ready to move them to a different platform. In this early stage the community > whatever platform I decide to use. :)
I’m trying to do this with Everyoak right now. About 4% of the way there!
Unfortunately for my business it’s not been as simple as only needing to do billing for 100 people, because those 100 people need to bill 100-250 of their own customers and they want my help in doing that. 🤦🏾♂️
That's been always the goal for myself since I started SaaSHub. As the popularity of the platform and the number of products with featured listings grow (currently priced at $99/month), I will be raising the price to keep the number of paying customers around 100.
p.s. I was sharing this story with a friend recently.
I like the idea. I also like the idea of a freemium model, where the freemium layer isn't a crippled crap thing but a thing you can use forever realistically, but is restricted in such a way that companies with money will want to switch up. I guess it is hard to determine what that limit should be.
Netlify for example offer free fast static hosting on a CDN, which is amazing in terms of the quality for a free product. For my side projects the free tier is good forever, assuming they don't change it. But to use their other convenient features, or for more build time, I have to pay. I think that works well as I am now a fan of Netlify, so maybe one day I'll end up using their services over a similar service offered by someone else.
Yeah I sometimes wonder. Given the hypothetical choice between building a SaaS and struggling for a few years, and selling your time now (or soon enough) at a price that means you are working "in your business" say 10 hours a week, so maybe you get $250/hr for those 10 hours. I wonder what people would prefer for their lifestyle goals?
I think whatever you do you are kind of selling your time in one way or another, and really it's just about getting more money for your time in all cases. A SaaS can do that but they might be for some people trickier to set up than just selling their expertise as a consultant. Selling your time for $250 isn't easy either, no one is paying that on those freelance sites for a JS coder. There is some business prowess involved in getting that kind of money and getting work consistently. I think the pyramid you described would help with that though.
love the idea of true fans. Sometimes as indie makers I feel we get too deep into code an automation that we forget we're dealing with people.
When you focus on reaching and adding value to the life of only 100 (and then 1000), I think the game changes and you have a better vision on how to monetize anything around that community.
I'm gonna plug this right here, do you know that 1% of the entire working class (15-65 years old) in the planet is actually ~ 50,000,000 seems like a lot to me
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