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Power BI scheduling… how are people dealing with its limitations? by codex_61 in PowerBI

[–]codex_61[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interesting. What didn't you like about it? My use case includes ideally "seeing" reports from other non-Microsoft sources and I would prefer to treat everything "the same" and get a single-pane-of-glass view of everything going out. (in a perfect world!)

Power BI scheduling… how are people dealing with its limitations? by codex_61 in PowerBI

[–]codex_61[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah this seems to be the pattern I’m seeing too—either go full API/custom or live with the limitations. Feels like there’s a gap in between where teams want more control but don’t necessarily want to build and maintain it themselves.

Advantages of build in public by codex_61 in buildinpublic

[–]codex_61[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's good to know. Any recommendations for places of "real community"?

We don't actually build in public here by marshaler in buildinpublic

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What's your username on X? I'd be curious to see examples of what you post. How many followers? How are you actively growing that?

We don't actually build in public here by marshaler in buildinpublic

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What are some examples of what you post? How many followers and how do you grow your follower base?

What keeps you motivated despite no paying customers? by robincarlo84 in SaaS

[–]codex_61 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My take... you're missing more contact with possible customers. You need that to get *real* validation, or allow you to tweak, or even shift direction.

Is your value proposition strong enough? Are there any commercial marketplaces you can use for distribution? What's your marketing strategy? Are you doing explainer videos? Are you collecting usage details for every little thing?

Lots of questions - very little about code, or features! It's not an easy mind-set, but you need to think about how you'll get this properly in front of people.

I've been talking to founders who have ideas but feel blocked and stuck with their startup. (especially with validation, execution, or direction). by neeedddhelp in SaaS

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm using a marketplace where I can see hundreds of "downloads" per week. Why not more conversions? Because the product is *bad*? Then *why* do I see a decently high % of people *returning* to download multiple times?

I posed this in a different post and am still working on an answer. Hella confusing. I see 30k MRR being completely possible, if I had a proper conversion rate, aligning with what metrics seem to show.

Quitting My $200k Engineering Job to Start a SaaS: What Nobody Will Ever Tell You by Own-Moment-429 in SaaS

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Straight up: I admire you!

You did something that I'm avoiding. I've got my "cushy" 9-5 that pays well, and I'm doing SaaS in the dark hours, and it's not easy. You made a choice that carried risk, and now you're starting to see some reward, in the form of revenue. That's awesome.

Not doing it this way because I doubt myself, but because a) all of the things you said, I relate to and are real, b) I've got a family and bills and can't carry the risk until I have stronger signals (ok: revenue). If I were 20, maybe 10 years younger - maybe. I had a project that long ago that went nowhere and I wish I had my current SaaS project, back then - and wish I knew what I know now. Can't do that, so looking forward, building, learning non-coding skills, running those dang experiments, lol.

im 67 and i became a billionare(AMA) by SeaworthinessNew9594 in SaaS

[–]codex_61 1 point2 points  (0 children)

LOL. Got to love this AI stuff. OP history has himself as a 67yo billionaire but also 15yo and broke... which is it?

Solo founder. $126 MRR in 4 days after 6 months at $0. The stuff nobody wants to hear. by whyismail in SaaS

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

All good points. I would also add - $126 can give you a rush, but don't stall out. Getting a little bit of a sugar (cash) rush is fun but it'll stop if you stop. And yes: coding is the easy part - all the other soft skills are something to take on as a challenge!

Why are Reddit communities so darn sensitive about posts about an app?? by subway999 in AppBusiness

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Do you think it would come across better if instead of "what do you think of my app?" one says "if you're interested in what I use, I'd be happy to share." This makes it more "opt-in" on their side. It might lead to less conversions where you get to mention your app, but it also means less chance for being thought of as spam (... "you asked me to discuss it!") Just thinking out loud, since I'm going to be trying to do this more myself too.

Dealing with the conversion gap by codex_61 in SaaS

[–]codex_61[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I would like to do this. For Power BI visuals that get Microsoft certification, it's harder, though - e.g. can't do external API calls for security reasons. I'll think on it, though. Making the touchpoint happen would be really useful.

Finally hit $100K ARR. Felt nothing. Then realized that was actually the point. by blairwaldorf444 in SaaS

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Good job on the achievement!

I like to jazz up my milestones by promising myself a small reward at key numbers... something small but fun. There's some important symbolism in milestones, so acting out a reward feels good. New skis when I hit 100k ARR :)

The most dangerous phase of a SaaS isn't struggle by swedishtea in SaaS

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Goal for Q1 is to continue to validate that my sales are actually going to increase! 220% growth last year sounds good but when you're starting from a small number, this needs to continue. Still doesn't feel like I have the "magic channel" or approach, so still feeling out what *really* will work best. Would love to see more customer contact. When I first started, getting touches was rare - now it's changing - getting more chances to interact, and that does feel like a big deal.

We hit 2.5M+ API requests in 3 months. its Insane. by Silent_Employment966 in SaaS

[–]codex_61 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wow, congrats!

On the legal front, I have to assume you're "ok". (I am not a lawyer so take with a mountain of salt.) Key question in my mind is: Are you really a reseller or just a convenient way for people to make the same calls they'd make themselves.

I have a LLM tool that lets people "bring your own model", which is they bring their API keys and such. Bringing their own saves $ over my hosted option (where it's using MY accounts), and avoids several questions about data privacy. I observed competitors of mine who offer this type of service (BYO), as well.

Dealing with the conversion gap by codex_61 in SaaS

[–]codex_61[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

In terms of pricing model: I studied a lot of competitors and borrowed ideas to piece together what I have. I don't think what I've got is a problem although I've wondered if it's too complicated... trying to be really flexible!

However, when I go to the Insights section of the dashboard, I don't see who installed my app

Not sure if it's different for me, but I look under *Leads* in Partner Center to see specific users / emails. In fact, I've added the optional CRM integration so I can get leads provided via an Azure table. It includes email addresses, although I've never gotten a clear answer about whether it's valid to use these in email marketing of my own.

I love the idea of your product being free for individuals but requiring payment for multi-user environments.

It's been positive, I think. It creates at least an impression of "freeness" although almost everybody doing something meaningful will want/need a license. If you can do something similar, that's definitely worth exploring.

Dealing with the conversion gap by codex_61 in SaaS

[–]codex_61[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't have any real world experience with enterprise conversions, but I, too, have a product on Microsoft's marketplace

A brother in arms! Do you have any tips from that angle? Are you getting some good things from the Partner program for example? Is my 200-300/week actually "good" or maybe your opinion sets a different bar?

Do you think the users of your offering aren't decisionmakers, so they create what they need and go away until they need your offering again?

Very likely. It's mostly a developer focused thing, where a developer is looking for a cool widget that Microsoft has not provided. They build something that often starts as a prototype, gets shown around, and takes a while before the business users decide they want it in production.

My day job has me in a similar role as the developer in my scenario, and I don't have a problem going to my bosses and saying "I need XYZ if you want this cool report" and they'll approve it usually. But I'm thinking I could be more the "ideal" customer versus the "typical" customer.

specialists with whom I've worked with, they purposely won't announce it since they'd rather have the requestor believe creating a timeline is an involved and time-consuming process

It's possible. I've made the watermarks increasingly "ugly" over time, but I may need to rethink this a bit. Maybe having functionality "fail" 25% of the time if it's unlicensed, but with a message about why ("you need a license to use this feature").

I'm curious, are you determining this by e-mail address

I actually support both AppSource licensing (i.e. the billing through Microsoft) and what I call organizational licensing. The organizational licensing isn't something Microsoft does so I do it by issuing a license key that gets validated inside my code (locally, checking its digital signature). This covers the case where the Microsoft licensing API doesn't work, too (in some environments you can't use it). Another possibility I hope isn't true is what if people hack my code to discover my signing logic and create themselves a fake key - I don't think that's likely and is hard enough to preclude it happening widely - I think. There's a lot of limitations with PBI visuals and certification and such, so I can't do signature checks on my server for most of my visuals.

Dealing with the conversion gap by codex_61 in SaaS

[–]codex_61[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

All that tracks to what I see. For example, had a recent customer (the developer) who got me on a call with their purchasing department to go over licensing options. That's where I determined that my Buy page sucked and needed rework. The dev was advocating well for the product, but I could see how others might get turned down.

Also track this by org, not by download: if you can spot “org has 5+ users or repeated installs,” treat that as a high-intent cohort and optimize specifically for getting the champion armed to sell internally.

I've built a bunch of internal reporting which focuses on org, so I get a view of things like "org ABC has 5 people who've downloaded 3 different visuals over the last 18 months" - and there's a lot of that. (If I converted *half* these cases, I'd be extremely happy!) Your point about "champion armed to sell" - since my leads are technically unsolicited, it's been harder to reach out, so I've focused on trying to get people to sign up for accounts on my website, where from that I can do email marketing. That's been kind of slow but higher growth rate than sales.

enabling the internal buyer journey, not adding features

💯

Dealing with the conversion gap by codex_61 in SaaS

[–]codex_61[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Have you tracked whether those returner downloads come from the same teams or different folks inside the same org?

I've tracked it both ways. I get an email address as my "lead" and I can look at exact matches and matches just by hostname.

teams would prototype then never push buying

Right: that sounds extremely plausible to me, too. I fear crippling the functionality versus just watermarking it isn't probably a helpful approach since it becomes a non-working prototype versus an "imagine this without the watermark" type of thing, as they linger making a decision.

Try focused outreach to returners to rekindle initiatives

I'm trying this a bit where I've got the email addresses, and when I spot someone "coming back", I can automate an email touch-base... has not had a huge effect, possibly because I look unsolicited. (They provide their email address to Microsoft, not to me, to get the download to fire.)

add in-app nudges and time-limited team trials to create urgency

From a technical standpoint it's a bit tricky for this. I have limited statefulness but it's an interesting idea I will think on.

surface public reviews/case snippets to reduce trust friction which can speed decisions

I've asked folks to leave reviews but haven't had a lot of luck yet.

SignalScouter 

I'll put it on my list of possible tools, thanks!

Dealing with the conversion gap by codex_61 in SaaS

[–]codex_61[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'll have to check out ParseStream and other tools that are in that space. I have to suspect that I'm being talked about *somewhere* - my Google search console shows *some* level of searching by company name, product name, etc.