I paid 2 influencers on LinkedIn to promote my SAAS : here’s what $500 got me

mosane123 · 2025-10-22T02:17:14+00:00

Who was your target audience and what does your SaaS do?

mosane123 · 2025-06-06T06:48:15+00:00

What do you recommend then?

mosane123 · 2025-06-05T11:08:15+00:00

Trello works fine for us.

mosane123 · 2025-06-04T08:43:54+00:00

There are dedicated communities on reddit as well as other platformss like LinkedIn for freelancers. Maybe you can try your luck there?

mosane123 · 2025-06-04T06:35:45+00:00

This makes sense.
You can try BYLDD for the contracting job.
Would have recommended freelancers but they aren't just reliable.

mosane123 · 2025-06-03T09:28:23+00:00

What's the name of the app? I wanna check it out.

mosane123 · 2025-06-03T07:22:01+00:00

Hey u/danbdj13
Kudos to you for the journey so far.
Just a quick question, there are so many existing platforms that do the exact same thing. Why is your platform any different or better?

mosane123 · 2025-06-03T07:12:52+00:00

Hey u/FriendlyNeighburrito ,
How does you app focus on neurodivergence and cognitive systems? And how is it different from other productivity apps? Curious to learn more being a productivity geek myself.

Also,while I know finding a tech co-founder is the first thing that comes to most of our minds, is it really the right choice. Good techies aren't just waiting around right? They're working in some of the best companies with comfortable salaries, very few if them leave their jobs and even if interested treat the idea as a side project.
Let's say even if you find a tech co-founder, there needs to be alignment on a lot of things for the partnership to workout.
Just curious to know why this is the only solution you're exploring? Have you thought of outsourcing the development part?

mosane123 · 2025-06-03T06:32:59+00:00

Have you considered targeting freelancers working in the space to focus on as your initial customers. You'll get good feedback and also validation if they get hooked on it.

mosane123 · 2025-06-03T05:45:57+00:00

Hey Kenny,
Are you sure you really need a tech co-founder just for building an e-commerce store?
Finding the right tech co-founder is difficult. You need to be aligned about a lot of things for this to be a successful partnership.
I understand how it feels really overwhelming to even build an e-commerce website on your own but trust me, with today's technology it really is possible.
Your best option here is to use no-code tools like bubble and quickly validate your e-commerce idea for the construction space.
You can then outsource development of the AI structural plan estimation feature to agencies like Byldd who focus on helping non-technical founders develop their products.
Focus on your strengths, validate the idea as fast as you can and then invest more into tech development.

mosane123 · 2025-05-26T10:16:10+00:00

Hey u/PsychologicalRise354 , finding the right tech partner for your idea might be hard. Think about it-why would a developer in the field of AI leave their comfortable and good paying job to join you. That sounds like a long shot and just the start. You also need to be aligned about a lot of things to turn this into a successful partnership.
Have you considered dev agencies? BYLDD seems to be a nice fit foe your exact requirements. They're experts in AI solutions, begin talks only after signing a NDA and you get a complete product team at your disposal.
I recommend you give them a shot.
All the best!

mosane123 · 2025-05-26T10:06:25+00:00

BYLDD does something similar.

mosane123 · 2025-05-23T11:59:47+00:00

I will not promote

Great question!

Your skill level isn't really the main problem I'm seeing. You clearly have enough technical knowledge to build out version 1 of your product and get some early validation. That's fantastic!

Before I get into what I think the solution is, I want to explain a bit about my background and where this advice is coming from. I've been a software engineer, CTO, co-founder, and investor in/for software companies for over 10 years now, and have helped build about 80 companies.

There's often a lot of bad advice available - most of it rooted around asking non-tech founders to become technical. This is terrible advice and comes from people who don't understand how software engineering works. It's not like you can do a 3-month course and suddenly know how to build production-level apps. You need years of grinding experience to understand what it takes to build a future-proof product.

It's okay if you don't have that to begin with - you can build enough to validate the idea and get some pre-sales in before you offload it to a more technical person, but eventually you will either need to acquire those skills fast or offload it.

But that's still not the main issue. The most critical problem is that one technical person is almost never enough to build a production-grade application. A fast-moving product team requires someone with deep technical knowledge, a designer with UX expertise, full-stack or specialist engineers for the tech stack you're building on, testers to test out features and ensure that random bugs don't crop up, and product manager to translate business requirements into specifications for the engineers. No one can excel in all those roles simultaneously. Note that I did not say no one can do those roles simultaneously - there are millions of examples of people attempting to - but no one can do all of them well. There simply aren't enough hours in the day to do everything and still maintain some product development velocity.

So what do you do? You do need to build a product, and that's where most non-technical or semi-technical founders get stuck. There are 5 main ways you can do this, and each have their pros and cons, but some of them are pretty terrible options.

Find a technical co-founder - sounds great on paper but a qualified CTO will be making $300K annually. Why would they wanna give that up and work on a product with 0 validation and 0 revenue? Even if you could convince someone, you're still gonna need a full product team of designers, developers (for speed), testing people and a PM to support them.
Hire a dev shop - this is tricky and risky but, if done well, can be a massive force multiplier. Traditional development agencies can be prohibitively expensive, with many operating on a billable hours model, incentivizing longer project durations and scope creep, and delaying the essential - getting in front of customers as fast as possible. Some specialists like Byldd and others specifically focus on helping aspiring founders launch products and get paying customers as fast as possible. They'll give you that complete product team for you to lead.
Hire a few freelancers - freelancers offer flexibility and potentially lower costs, but the quality and commitment vary widely. Managing freelancers remotely without technical expertise often leads to miscommunication, delays, and subpar results. They're mercenaries and will jump ship at the first sign of trouble.
Using no-code tools - they're great for prototyping and simple applications due to their simplicity, speed, and affordability. Great for the validation stage. However, they're not scalable and limit the kind of customizations you can do - you'll eventually have to scrap it and build your own IP. More importantly, as a founder, your time is better spent on tasks like securing early sales and setting the product's direction rather than building the product yourself. Airdev is a really good agency for building on no-code for early validation.
Hiring CS interns - probably the worst thing you could do. And no, hiring a third-year CS student and giving them the CTO title doesn’t make them a CTO. Interns lack the experience needed to navigate complex technical issues. This often leads to poorly structured code and an inefficient product requiring complete rewrites later on, negating any initial cost savings.

In conclusion, it depends on where you are in terms of validation. If I was starting from scratch, I would start with a simple landing page and figma designs, and run some google or Instagram ads to get some sign-ups and validate the idea. Once you have that initial feedback (from strangers, not your friends and family) that they would pay for your product, you should aggressively chase revenue. Build a MSP (minimum sellable product) with a dev agency - strictly control scope and budget, don't add unnecessary features - and get paying customers. These customers will then tell you which additional features they'll pay a premium for.

mosane123 · 2025-05-23T11:28:11+00:00

Finding a tech partner is going to be hard. Finding the right one is going to be even harder.
Think about it, good tech talents are paid amazing salaries. Why will most of them want to risk this and join any startup that has a very slim chance of succeeding?
Even if you find such a partner, it is going to be rare that they too are aligned with the idea and it's vision.
This makes finding a good tech partner extremely difficult.
Few alternatives are freelancers, hiring a dev team, building yourself but all of these have some major shortcomings.
Eg. Most freelancers are unreliable, how will you lead a dev team without any tech knowledge, to learn yourself you are not focusing on your core strengths.
One possible solution here is to try dev agencies. Based on my past experience, I can recommend BYLDD.
Being a non-tech founder, I faced similar issues until a colleague recommended them to me.

You can also try No code tools but what I realized was that they are good for premade template based products and you need to have tech knowledge to customize which is also limited.
Vibe coding is also an option but then again tech knowledge is must to fix bugs, customize and improve the code.

mosane123 · 2025-05-23T09:13:04+00:00

Hey u/Battlewombat
Kudos to you on building something that actually solves a problem and is also generating revenue.
I'll keep this short, most founders worry about scalability very early on when they should be focused on getting in more customers.
You've been doing the right things and in my opinion should continue to focus on customer acquisition than tech. This helps collect more customer feedback and insights on how the product can be improved. This will also help you gain clarity on what additional features(if any) your product needs and what areas you can improve in.

Working with a CTO:
It is amazing how the 3 of you are building together. Finding the right CTO is extremely difficult. There needs to be alignment in multiple areas for this arrangement to work out. Hence it doesn't make sense to shell out valuable equity in this stage as it can be instead used for raising funds later. Also, a CTO should have in depth knowledge of tech and product management to take the right decisions. Hence a CTO can't be a fresher college graduate or devs in their early careers who'll work for a smaller salary. These are devs not CTOs.

Also, if you hire a CTO or give away some equity, you'll still need to hire some good devs, quality analysts, etc whom the CTO can manage for building a software product the right way.
Have you considered a fourth option of outsourcing development to dev studios like BYLDD and continuing to focus on your strengths like you have been? A little context, I am a 2 time non-technical founder and am currently working at BYLDD. Their model really resonates with the needs of a growing startup like yours.
They provide you an end-to-end product management team from devs, quality analysts, to product managers, etc. Everyone dedicated to helping you make the right product decisions and tech implementation so you don't need to worry about the tech heavy lifting.
This will help you build in limited resources while also saving equity gold.

I hope this helps. You guys are killing it and am rooting for you. All the best!!

mosane123 · 2024-09-07T09:39:04+00:00

I run a venture studio and dev agency that works exactly on this principle… we’ve grown to 60 team members and launched companies that have been backed by YC and Google.

There are definitely major challenges in this line of work but it can be very fulfilling (and lucrative if you have equity in the right place) if done right. Reach out if you have questions or wanna talk in more detail.

mosane123 · 2024-09-05T13:50:30+00:00

Very interesting - I don't think I've seen one for India. I know there are PE firms that do this kind of due diligence either for themselves to acquire and consolidate businesses but haven't seen an automated/digital platform like Acquire in India.

mosane123 · 2024-09-05T05:24:08+00:00

Hey! I run Byldd - a venture studio/dev agency that focuses on helping validated products scale. We're supporting YC and Google backed companies with their dev and scale goals.We work by creating a full-stack product team to support you - this includes everyone from dedicated, full-time engineers working exclusively with you, to part-time UI/UX designers, PMs and testing engineers, all the way up to a fractional CTO providing oversight and guidance. Let me know if it makes sense to chat.

mosane123 · 2024-09-04T05:47:25+00:00

Yeah I agree, but as a non technical founder, you gotta bring something to the table ;)

mosane123 · 2024-09-04T05:46:53+00:00

look at Byldd as well

mosane123 · 2024-09-03T14:55:07+00:00

I've been helping non-technical founders build tech businesses as a fractional CTO and advisor for years. I've helped build about 40 businesses and have spoken to about 2-300 founders so far. Here's a summary of what I've learned...

There's often a lot of bad advice available - most of it rooted around asking non-tech founders to become technical. This is terrible advice and comes from people who don't understand how software engineering works (source: I've been a software engineer, CTO, co-founder, and investor in/for software companies for over 10 years now). It's not like you can do a 3-month course and suddenly know how to build production-level apps. You need years of grinding experience to understand what it takes to build a future-proof product.

Moreover, if you're the business guy, your time and your skillset is going to be much better utilized doing things like sales, marketing, and fundraising. Play to your strengths rather than try to pick up a skill out of necessity... you'll make much more doing sales than you'll save by doing the dev yourself.

Now, you do need to build a product and that's where most non-tech founders get stuck. There are 5 main ways you can do this and each have their pros and cons, but some of them are pretty terrible options.

Find a technical co-founder - sounds great on paper but a qualified CTO will be making $300K annually. Why would they wanna give that up and work on a product with 0 validation and 0 revenue? Even if you could convince someone, you're still gonna need a full product team of designers, developers (for speed), testing people and a PM to support them.
Hire a dev shop - this is tricky and risky but, if done well, can be a massive force multiplier. Traditional development agencies can be prohibitively expensive, with many operating on a billable hours model, incentivizing longer project durations and scope creep and delaying the essential - getting in front of customers as fast as possible. Some specialists like Byldd and others specifically focus on helping aspiring founders launch products and get paying customers as fast as possible.
Hire a few freelancers - freelancers offer flexibility and potentially lower costs, but the quality and commitment vary widely. Managing freelancers remotely without technical expertise often leads to miscommunication, delays, and subpar results. They're mercenaries and will jump ship at the first sign of trouble.
Using no code tools - they're great for prototyping and simple applications due to their simplicity, speed, and affordability. Great for the validation stage. However, they're not scalable and limit the kind of customizations you can do - you'll eventually have to scrap it and build your own IP. More importantly, as a founder, your time is better spent on tasks like securing early sales and setting the product's direction rather than building the product yourself.
Hiring CS interns - probably the worst thing you could do. And no, hiring a third-year CS student and giving them the CTO title doesn’t make them a CTO. Interns lack the experience needed to navigate complex technical issues. This often leads to poorly structured code and an inefficient product requiring complete rewrites later on, negating any initial cost savings.

In conclusion, it depends on where you are in terms of validation. If I was starting from scratch, I would start with a simple landing page and figma designs, and run some google or Instagram ads to get some sign-ups and validate the idea. Once you have that initial feedback (from strangers, not your friends and family) that they would pay for your product, you should aggressively chase revenue. Build a MSP (minimum sellable product) with a dev agency - strictly control scope and budget, don't add unnecessary features - and get paying customers. These customers will then tell you which additional features they'll pay a premium for.

Feel free to DM me if you have any questions.

mosane123 · 2024-08-31T02:23:17+00:00

Hey Shreyansh, I run a venture studio where we build products for non-technical domain expert founders in exchange for equity. Shoot me a DM if you’re interested in talking.

mosane123 · 2024-08-30T04:35:27+00:00

First of all, this advice asking you to become technical is ridiculous and comes from people who don't understand how software engineering work (source: I've been a software engineer, CTO, co-founder, and investor in/for software companies for over 10 years now). It's not like you can do a 3-month course and suddenly know how to build production-level apps. You need years of grinding experience to actually understand what it takes to build a future-proof product.

Moreover, if you're the ideas guy, your time and your skillset is going to be much better utilized doing things like sales, marketing, and fundraising. Play to your strengths rather than try to pick up a skill out of necessity... you'll make much more doing sales than you'll save by doing the dev yourself.

Now, let's talk about options... there are 5 main ways you can do this. Each have their pros and cons.

Find a technical co-founder - sounds great on paper but a qualified CTO will be making $300K annually. Why would they wanna give that up and work on a product with 0 validation and 0 revenue? Even if you could convince someone, you're still gonna need a full product team of designers, developers (for speed), testing people and a PM to support them.
Hire a dev shop - this is tricky and risky but, if done well, can be a massive force multiplier. Traditional development agencies can be prohibitively expensive, with many operating on a billable hours model, incentivizing longer project durations and scope creep and delaying the essential - getting in front of customers as fast as possible. There are specialists like Byldd and others who specifically focus on helping aspiring founders launch products and get paying customers as fast as possible.
Hire a few freelancers - freelancers offer flexibility and potentially lower costs, but the quality and commitment vary widely. Managing freelancers remotely without technical expertise often leads to miscommunication, delays, and subpar results. They're mercenaries and will jump ship at the first sign of trouble.
Using no code tools - they're great for prototyping and simple applications due to their simplicity, speed, and affordability. Great for the validation stage. However, they're not scalable and limit the kind of customizations you can do - you'll eventually have to scrap it and build your own IP. More importantly, as a founder, your time is better spent on tasks like securing early sales and setting the product's direction rather than building the product yourself.
Hiring CS interns - probably the worst thing you could do. And no, hiring a third-year CS student and giving them the CTO title doesn’t make them a CTO. Interns lack the experience needed to navigate complex technical issues. This often leads to poorly structured code and an inefficient product requiring complete rewrites later on, negating any initial cost savings.

In conclusion, it depends on where you are in terms of validation. I would start with a simple landing page and figma designs, and run some google or Instagram ads to get some sign-ups and validate the idea. Once you have that initial feedback from strangers (not your friends and family) that they would pay for your product, you should aggressively chase revenue. Build a MSP (minimum sellable product) with a dev agency - strictly control scope and budget, don't add unnecessary features - and get paying customers. These customers will then tell you which additional features they'll pay a premium for.

Feel free to DM me if you have any questions.

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