Why your next SaaS should start without code.
I stumbled across a YouTube video last month that completely flipped my thinking about building software products. The creator shared something that hit me like a cold shower: Never write code before securing paying customers. As someone who’s spent years building things nobody wanted, this felt personal.
Here’s what I learned about the micro-SaaS approach that actually works:
Start with people, not products: Your first stop isn’t your code editor — it’s Reddit or find communities where your potential customers hang out. Join their conversations. Listen to their problems. Get them to sign up for something that doesn’t exist yet.
Build a landing page first: Before you write a single line of code, create a simple page that explains your idea and collects email addresses. This becomes your validation tool and your first marketing asset.
Ask for money upfront: Offer lifetime subscriptions to early supporters. If people won’t pay for a promise, they probably won’t pay for the product either.
Embrace imperfection: Use AI tools and modern frameworks to ship fast. Your MVP doesn’t need to be perfect — it needs to solve a real problem for real people who’ve already paid you.
Set a deadline: Give yourself three weeks. If you’re not generating revenue by then, move on. The market is telling you something important.
Build only what’s requested: Create a roadmap, but resist the urge to build features nobody asked for. Let customer feedback drive your development priorities.
Keep the feedback loop tight: Make it ridiculously easy for customers to reach you. Their complaints and suggestions are more valuable than your assumptions.
Understand the psychology: Study how people make buying decisions. The best product doesn’t always win — the best-marketed one does.
The most counterintuitive part? The less you build upfront, the more likely you are to build something people actually want.
What would you build differently if you knew someone was already willing to pay for it???
Credits
- Images are taken from unsplash
- The video is in Tamil, but the strategy speaks every entrepreneur’s language.
