$20,000 MRR bootstrapped - Here's how we did it

Last month, we've reached a new milestone of $20,000 MRR with my SaaS business Upvoty (user feedback software).

In this post, I wanted to share the main strategies we applied to grow and scale our software.

If you want to watch instead of reading, go check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ncu-hkZEW4Q

💡 Idea validation: I think an important part, and something we can't ignore if we want to talk about the complete picture here, is the key of validating. We validated our idea by launching a landing page with an explainer video and a signup form. Only after 200 signs ups, we started building the first version of the product.

✅ Product validation: With these first beta testers, we started building the first version, and with the help of these first users, based on their feedback, we managed to build a really slim and basic feedback product that was already valuable to some of our target audience (even some of the first beta testers upgraded to one of our paid plans during this period)

💁‍♀️ Target audience: Talking about the audience, one thing I can recommend is to really narrow down your target audience. This made it so much easier for us to target and reach potential new users and customers. When you focus on a small group of people, every output becomes easier (such as the copy on your site, social media posts, etc.)

🚀 Beta Launch: We launched our beta version on different platforms where we could reach our target audience. Main channels that worked well: BetaList, FB Groups, Twitter, and IndieHackers.

💬 User feedback: From the very start, we listened really carefully to the feedback of our users (of course by using our own product - upvoty.com). This resulted in us building a product that was valuable and people actually wanted to pay for it.

🎗 Customer Support: Don't underestimate what customer support can do for you, especially against bigger competitors that are too big to be lean and flexible on support. I, as a single founder, was constantly online on the chat, replying within minutes if a new potential customer or an existing user started to ask questions. I also was sending personal emails (print screen in the video) to every new sign-up, just to start a conversation in order for me to really understand the main goals and pain points of this new potential customer.

🏆 Competitors: Leveraging on the name of our competitors was something that brought quick and easy growth. At some point, users are going to switch and look for alternatives for different reasons. Make sure to be active with an 'alternative to' ad and landing page. You can find an example in the video.

💪 Product: Leveraging our product was also one of the smartest things we've done. By adding a 'Powered by Upvoty' mention and link in our product, the customers of our customers saw our tool and they immediately knew where to look if they wanted such a cool feedback product as well. We're still getting tremendous amounts of referrals because of this.

🔗 Integrations: By building integrations with 3rd party software, software that is being used by our customers, we made it easier to work with our software in their current workflow. We also acquired new customers that found us through the app stores of these integrations. We've built awesome integrations for Zapier, Intercom, and Slack for example.

💰 Paid marketing: We've paid influencers to promote our product on YouTube, on their podcast, and we're experimenting with Facebook and Google ads.

🎨 Branding: Being around for over 3 years, we can now leverage our brand as well. We launched the 'Upvoty on Product' newsletter and blog, and soon we're starting a new podcast and YouTube channel.

💸 Feature-based Pricing: We're launching new and cool features on higher-tier plans. This resulted in more upgrades among our users and thus more MRR.

Again, if you want to see examples or just watch the full journey, go and watch my latest vlog here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ncu-hkZEW4Q.

If you want to follow the next journey to $50,000 MRR, follow me on:

Instagram
https://instagram.com/mikeslaats

Twitter
https://twitter.com/mikeslaats

YouTube
https://youtube.com/mikedotsaas

If you have any questions, shoot 👇

Take care,

Mike