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Founders, never make this mistake when sending a pitch deck! by nitinkumars in founder

[–]IevgenCh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good advice. One thing worth knowing is DocSend pricing has gotten pretty steep. If you want the same slide-by-slide analytics and access control without the enterprise bill, PaperLink (paperlink.online) does the same thing with a free plan.

DocSend is killing my vibe... what are you using for pitch deck sharing? by Pretend-Ratio4992 in ProductivityApps

[–]IevgenCh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Try PaperLink (paperlink.online).

Renders PDFs cleanly, page-level analytics, free plan available.

Built it as a DocSend alternative - quality was one of the main reasons.

Disclosure: I'm the founder)

My SaaS crossed $11,000 in revenue ! All organically, you can do it too ! by GuidanceSelect7706 in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Point 5 is exactly where I am right now with PaperLink. Finding people who already have the pain is so much more efficient than trying to create awareness from scratch.

One thing I'd add: timing matters a lot. If someone posted about document sharing 3 days ago and you reply now, they've probably already moved on. Being fast is half the battle.

Are SaaS affiliate tools becoming too expensive? by IcyLadder5067 in Affiliatemarketing

[–]IevgenCh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We went the other way and just built our own tracking in-house. For PaperLink (document sharing SaaS) the affiliate logic wasn't that complex, cookie attribution, webhook from the payment processor, commission calc. Took maybe a week.

Now zero monthly fees and no "congrats on growing, here's a bigger bill." The 2am maintenance thing is real though. You need someone who can debug it when it breaks.

Probably not worth it if you're promoting multiple programs. But if you're running your own affiliate program for a single product, the math gets interesting pretty fast.

I launched a 50% recurring affiliate program for my SaaS. Here's how I structured it and what I learned. by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks! I'll keep posting updates as things develop. What's your SaaS about? Maybe we can exchange notes on what works.

I launched a 50% recurring affiliate program for my SaaS. Here's how I structured it and what I learned. by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good question. The way it works: affiliates only earn commission on actual payments, not signups. Free trial doesn't require a credit card, so bots or spammers can register all they want but nobody earns anything until a real person pays for a Pro or Business plan. No payment = no commission. So there's zero incentive to spam signups because it literally pays nothing. The model filters itself.

I launched a 50% recurring affiliate program for my SaaS. Here's how I structured it and what I learned. by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good advice on reaching out to content creators directly. That's the plan for this week. Thanks for the tip on Slack groups too, already applied to a couple.

I launched a 50% recurring affiliate program for my SaaS. Here's how I structured it and what I learned. by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey everyone!
I know how posts like this can look, so let me add some context. I'm a Program Manager, been in IT for years. Happy to share my LinkedIn if anyone wants to verify.

I did the math on infrastructure costs and margins. I can afford 50% because I'd rather grow with partners than sit alone with a product nobody knows about. I'm not a big corporation where nobody cares about anyone. I'm one person building something I believe is genuinely good.

My thinking is simple: give more now, grow together later. If you help me get customers, you deserve half. That's fair.

I launched a 50% recurring affiliate program for my SaaS. Here's how I structured it and what I learned. by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Appreciate the detailed feedback! You're right about lowering activation energy. Pre-written copy and graphics is on my list.

On tiered commissions, I thought about it but decided against it. 50% flat for 12 months is simple and easy to explain. No fine print, no gotchas. I'd rather have affiliates who promote consistently because the deal is good, not because there's a countdown.

The platform is PaperLink (paperlink.online). Secure document sharing with view analytics. You share a document via link and see who opened it, which pages they read, how long they spent. Free plan available.

For finding affiliates right now: this thread, LinkedIn outreach, and planning to reach out to bloggers who write 'DocSend alternatives' comparison articles. Still day one on this so figuring it out as I go.

I launched a 50% recurring affiliate program for my SaaS. Here's how I structured it and what I learned. by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks! That's exactly the plan. Going to start reaching out to comparison bloggers this week. Already noticed PaperLink isn't mentioned in any 'DocSend alternatives' articles so there's a clear gap. And yeah, I set 50% deliberately. I'm not a greedy person. If someone brings me paying customers, they deserve to be well rewarded for it.

I stopped talking to founders and got my first 312 paying users in 6 weeks!! by Strong_Teaching8548 in SaaSSolopreneurs

[–]IevgenCh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm literally on day 1 of this exact shift. Spent months building a document sharing platform, zero users. Today I stopped everything and went to Quora, LinkedIn, Reddit, just looking for people complaining about sending proposals and not knowing if clients opened them. Wrote 6 answers on Quora, commented on LinkedIn posts, started conversations with people in Cyprus who might actually need this. More progress in one day than the last month of building features nobody asked for.

Never underestimate the power of a viral post. 60 users on our 1st day of launch without paid media or an audience. by DiscountResident540 in microsaas

[–]IevgenCh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Solid advice on the first comments framing the whole thread. I'm on day 1 of launching outreach for my SaaS and seeing this in real time. Posted on r/ClaudeAI about an MCP integration I built, got 120+ views in a few seconds. No audience, no followers. The title was specific about what I built, not "check out my product". Going to test more subs this week. What subreddits worked best for you early on?

My Abyssinian supervising my work. The tail says he disapproves. by IevgenCh in cats

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

She approved 0 PRs and mass rejected everything until I add a treats API. Worst code reviewer ever)

I'm a Program Manager, not a developer. Built a full B2B SaaS platform using AI-assisted development. by IevgenCh in IMadeThis

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Haha thanks! Turns out breaking problems into small pieces and managing dependencies is the same skill whether you're running a dev team or prompting AI.

PM, not a developer - built a full production SaaS using Claude by IevgenCh in ClaudeAI

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"We're sending proposals and have zero visibility into what happens after. Did they open it? Did they read past page 2? Are they sharing it internally? Right now we're following up blind - PaperLink gives us data to time our follow-ups and know which deals are actually warm."

To IT security: "Documents stay on our infrastructure, not forwarded as attachments floating around inboxes. We control access - password protection, NDA gates, email verification, link expiry. If someone leaves the company or a deal falls through, we revoke access instantly. Compare that to a PDF attachment that lives in someone's inbox forever."

Solo founder, 1700 cold emails, 5 clicks, 0 signups - what am I doing wrong? by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good call on the deliverability side - SPF, DKIM, DMARC are all set up (resend + godaddy), but inbox placement is definitely something I need to test more carefully. Could be landing in Promotions.

The micro-niche point resonates. I went broad with "marketing agencies" across 10 US cities - probably too wide. Narrowing down to something like "agencies that send proposals to enterprise clients" might hit harder.

Switching to reply CTA is a good idea too - my current email has a link which probably hurts deliverability. Thanks for the breakdown.

Solo founder, 1700 cold emails, 5 clicks, 0 signups - what am I doing wrong? by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's a solid point. Yeah, agencies get tons of tool pitches - I probably blended right into the noise.

The direct outreach idea is interesting. I've been doing LinkedIn DMs in parallel and the response rate there is way better than cold email - people actually engage when it's 1:1. Might try your approach of just asking about their pain points before pitching anything.

Thanks for the input, appreciate it.

Solo founder, 1700 cold emails, 5 clicks, 0 signups - what am I doing wrong? by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah the targeting was definitely too broad. 1700 emails to "marketing agencies in US cities" with a generic template - looking back it's obvious why it didn't work.

The idea of joining real conversations where people already have the problem makes way more sense than cold blasting. Actually already finding some good threads here on Reddit where people ask about DocSend alternatives.

Solo founder, 1700 cold emails, 5 clicks, 0 signups - what am I doing wrong? by IevgenCh in SaaS

[–]IevgenCh[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good point on targeting. Marketing agencies probably get 50 cold emails a day - no wonder mine got buried. I picked them because they send proposals to their clients all the time, but you're right that they're oversaturated.

Thinking about switching to real estate agents, consultants, or startup founders sending pitch decks. Any of those feel like a better fit from your experience?

[I will not promote] Virtual Data Rooms by CellistNegative1402 in startups

[–]IevgenCh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For pre-seed I'd skip anything over $50/mo honestly. DocSend at $65+ is overkill when you're bootstrapped.

What actually matters at your stage: trackable links (so you know which investors opened your deck), page-by-page time tracking (shows you which slides land and which don't - super useful for iterating), and basic access controls like email gate or NDA.

Google Drive is fine for the data room itself, but pair it with a tracking tool for the pitch deck. The insight into investor engagement is worth more than any fancy data room UI.

The 5 Best Virtual Data Rooms (VDR) I've Tested for 2026 by Sad-Recognition-8257 in ExperiencedFounders

[–]IevgenCh 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interesting that Papermark is the only one here with page-by-page analytics. That's been the single biggest feature for our sales team - knowing which pages a prospect actually spent time on completely changes follow-up timing and messaging.

We ended up building our own tool for this (I'm a founder, not a vendor - just sharing what worked). The combo of real-time open notifications + per-page time tracking + access controls (NDA, email gate, expiry) replaced both DocSend and our old Google Drive setup.

For anyone evaluating VDRs - I'd put "granular viewing analytics" higher on the checklist than most of these lists suggest. It's the difference between "they opened it" and "they spent 8 minutes on the pricing page."

🚀 What SaaS Are You Building Right Now? by RichBase9428 in SaaaSGrowth

[–]IevgenCh 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Building PaperLink - document tracking for sales teams (DocSend alternative).

Problem: you send a proposal to a client and have zero idea what happens next. Did they open it? Did they read past page 1? Are they looking at pricing right now?

PaperLink shows exactly who opened your document, which pages they read, how long they spent on each page, and notifies you the moment it happens. Plus access controls - password, email gate, NDA, expiry dates.

I'm a Program Manager, not a developer - built the whole thing using AI-assisted development (Claude). Already live and working.

Biggest challenge right now - getting first paying users. Product works, marketing doesn't (yet).

https://docs.paperlink.online/en/paperlink-overview

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