"Don't be afraid to let your ideas fail."

Justin Jagiello built a technical product for non-technical users and was confronted with high churn. So he learned how to communicate with his customers — and how to not overwhelm them with fancy features.

Now, his product is bringing in a healthy $34k MRR. Here’s the scoop. 👇

Translating tech (and cutting back)

James: What challenges have you faced on the way to $34k MRR?

Justin: FormWise is a SaaS platform that allows non-technical business owners to create their own proprietary AI tools with no code.

My expertise is on the technical side, so making a complex product that was accessible to non-technical people was actually quite difficult for me at first.

James: How so?

Justin: I was facing the challenge of building a platform that allowed anyone to leverage AI in their own sandbox environment without technical experience. But I also had to cater to our more technical users.

I’ve had to become much better at translating difficult concepts, such as RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) and Prompt Chaining, into easier-to-understand ideas that anyone can use.

James: How do you do that?

Justin: When we have a new feature, I create instructional content on it for the non-technical users. Then I run it by my non-technical friends!

James: Smart.

Justin: If they can understand what I’m trying to explain, then I did my job.

If it’s too complicated, I go back to the drawing board and approach the concept through the lens of somebody who isn’t familiar with AI or even with the broader technologies surrounding our platform, such as APIs.

James: Has this challenge affected product development too, or just the documentation?

Justin: Yeah, it has. A good example would be our interface. When we first started the platform, it was all technical and we provided every feature to every user right out of the gate.

But we had issues with users understanding how to get from A to B, and that resulted in a high churn rate.

So we decided to overhaul our interface. We started from scratch and cut it down to the point that many of our features weren’t included.

James: Did it help?

Justin: We cut our churn almost in half.

James: Not easy to cut out features like that.

Justin: We now default all of our new users to this new interface, and only once they have created a few tools in the platform do we allow them to toggle on our “advanced” (legacy) interface.

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Finding a familiar niche

James: What's something else that you've done with outsized results?

Justin: Niching down was super important.

James: You didn't start with a niche?

Justin: No, we had to remind ourselves that we aren’t catering to every individual in every industry.

I think many founders cast their nets too broadly in the hopes of capturing a slim percentage of a larger market. If that’s what your business plan is, I would encourage you to redefine your customer avatar.

James: So how did you do it?

Justin: As we grew and attracted a specific user base, we refocused our product development and made a product that works really well for our specific avatar, which is marketing SaaS owners and coaches.

Were able to transition the platform into something which is indispensable for specifically those users.

James: How did you choose that niche?

Justin: My cofounders are marketers so they were already familiar with this community. They knew the pain points.

Without their industry knowledge, we wouldn’t have been able to do such a good job niching down.

James: So you found your niche based on founder-market fit. Would you advise indie hackers to do the same?

Justin: Yes. You already know the pain points of being in that industry — it just makes sense.

Start by identifying an industry you are already familiar with. Focus on those users.

James: Then what?

Justin: You have to identify a pain point in your target market that you know how to solve. It doesn’t have to be incredibly complex, but if you solve a large enough issue that your customers actually face, they will pay for a solution.

Cofounders and growth

James: You have two cofounders.

Justin: Yes, Javier and Shawn.

James: Is three a crowd?

Justin: No, it's been really helpful.

I've always been entrepreneurial, so I worked on other projects before this. But I'm more interested in building things — not so much the sales side. This is where good partners come in.

James: Did the other projects do well?

Justin: None of them were commercially successful.

James: And you attribute some of your current success to having a team?

Justin: I do. Not every business requires a cofounder, especially something like a simple micro-SaaS, but I would definitely insist on one if you can.

James: What makes a good partnership?

Justin: Good partners can help provide insight in ways you might not see yourself.

James: How can indie hackers build strong partnerships?

Justin: Clear communication is extremely important.

And delegate responsibilities. We segment our responsibilities between our cofounders — we are very clear about who is responsible for what.

James: I know it isn't your department, but how did you grow to $34k MRR?

Justin: We grew FormWise exclusively through organic content marketing and a generous affiliate program. We haven’t spent anything on paid marketing yet, and don’t think we need to for the time being.

Entrepreneurship is not for everyone

James: What's something you've learned along the way?

Justin: If you start a business because you don’t want to work a 40-hour week, you’ll be disappointed. You’ll very easily find yourself working an 80-hour week.

It requires a lot of sacrifice. I think most people are unaware of that until they get into the thick of it.

James: Is it necessary to sacrifice work-life balance?

Justin: You can definitely retain a work-life balance. But it’s not easy. Most people end up prioritizing the project too much.

James: So what's the lesson — expect sacrifice but don't sacrifice too much?

Justin: Don’t let your work consume your life.

And don't be afraid to let your ideas fail.

James: Interesting, go on.

Justin: There are good ideas and bad ones. You might just have to let go of your bad ideas. Or pivot.

James: Are you okay with failing?

Justin: If the business idea is inherently bad, yes. It’ll be an uphill battle to try and make it work without drastic change. You'll have to sacrifice a lot for it. Better to fail and get it over with.

James: How do you know if it’s a bad idea?

Justin: Always get a new set of eyes on your product. Ask for honest feedback and don’t be afraid of criticism.

If your customer avatar looks at your product and doesn’t find utility in it, then it’s probably not a good product. That, or you’re not doing a good job of conveying the utility.

James: Other than ditching bad projects, how do you maintain balance?

Justin: I learned to delegate.

James: That's notoriously difficult for indie hackers.

Justin: I don’t find it difficult to delegate because I define a clear scope of work to be done, and I am always able to be reached if someone has a question.

James: Similar to your cofounder relationships — clear delineation of roles and scopes. What do you delegate?

Justin: Most of my delegating revolves around development — bug testing, integrating features, UI/UX, and optimizing the platform.

James: Any final words of wisdom on the topic?

Justin: Hobbies are important.

And entrepreneurship is not for everyone.

James: Where can people find you?

Justin: I'm on LinkedIn and you can check out FormWise.ai.

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