What's New: 9 strategies to grow your SaaS

(from the latest issue of the Indie Hackers newsletter)

Has your business growth plateaued?

• Build a free tool, blog, attend conferences, or start a referral program. Also, find opportunities to guest on other people's platforms.
• Pinterest is a valuable tool for driving traffic. The key is choosing the right keywords to rank for when uploading your Pins.
• A DM on X led to a $10K sale for Marc Lou. When he doesn't have obvious traction, he starts preparing to sell and moves on.

Want to grow your business? Try running a promo in the Indie Hackers newsletter to get in front of nearly 70,000 founders. Use code NEW500 for $500 off an intro section ad.

Nine Ways to Grow Your SaaS 🚀

by Charlie

Here are nine strategies to grow your SaaS products to $10K MRR, and beyond.

Let's jump in!

1. Build a free tool

Build a separate free, but highly limited, version of your paid product. This is a way to spin off a key feature of your product, and get your value proposition directly in front of the customer the moment they hit your site.

This full guide explains why this strategy works, and how to start using it for your SaaS.

2. Start a referral program

Offer your existing customers, ambassadors, and social media followers the chance to earn rewards for referring customers to you.

Referrals naturally have a low customer acquisition cost, as the hard work is done by the referrer, not you. Platforms like ReferralRock and Reflio make this super easy to set up.

3. Socials

Building in public has always been one of the best ways to get your customers excited about your product roadmap.

4. Engage in forums

Places like Reddit, Hacker News, Facebook Groups, and Discord and Slack channels are magnets for solution-orientated conversations.

Contribute to discussions, help others, and mention your product as a solution to someone’s problem.

Here's how to find relevant subreddits and engage.

5. Blogging

Create informative blog posts around:

• Pain points your SaaS solves.

• Comparisons to your competitors.

• Product updates.

Make sure to include a CTA to sign up in each post.

6. Launch on Product Hunt

Product Hunt continues to be the holy grail of social proof for SaaS founders.

7. Attend conferences

Meeting industry professionals or like-minded individuals is a great way to, not only gain insight on how to improve your product, but also find new customers.

This is especially important if you’re in the B2B space, where relationships are key to closing sales.

8. Be a podcast guest

Podcasts are hot right now, and being a guest is a great way to reach more customers.

Talk about your product and how it solves people's problems. Ask the host to share a signup link in the podcast description and show notes.

9. List in SaaS directories

Listing and directory sites are trusted places that potential customers visit when looking for new or alternative solutions to their problems.

Each week, discover the top growth, marketing, and product development strategies for free on IdeaHub!

Discuss this story.

In the News 📰

from the Growth Trends newsletter

👀 X is launching two subscription tiers.

💲 Get $100 off an In the News section ad with code MINUS100.

🚪 Tech layoffs are back with a vengeance.

🥶 Cold plunges are going corporate.

💥 The power of temptation bundling in sales.

🤖 A wave of NSFW generative AI chatbots are entering the market.

Check out Growth Trends for more curated news items focused on user acquisition and new product ideas.

Elevate Your Business With Pinterest 📌

by Justin Albertynas

Brands tend to undervalue Pinterest, but it's a valuable tool for driving traffic and boosting brand recognition.

Why Pinterest works

• Visual appeal: Images showcase your products and brand story effectively and conveniently.
• Traffic boost: Drive free organic traffic to your website through your Pins by adding a link to every Pin.
• Expert positioning: Share valuable insights to build trust and credibility.
• SEO-friendly: Optimize your content with keywords to appear in search results.
• Community engagement: Connect with your audience and build brand loyalty. Create interesting boards, reply to comments, and be active in the community.
• Content longevity: Your content can rank years and years later if the same keywords start trending again.

How to use it

Pinterest rewards consistency. Maintaining a regular posting schedule is vital.

You can choose any number of Pins you want to do a day, but your growth and numbers will vary in relation to that. Taking days off is not a big deal. You can regain your traction as soon as you return if you return with good, trending content. Tips:

• Pick a niche and stay consistent with it.
• Create boards that are relevant to your audience, and add Pins from your home feed that are relevant to those boards.
• Your Pin boards don't have to be made up entirely of your Pins. Browse Pinterest and add other relevant Pins to your boards. Like and interact with other Pins to maintain a real presence on the platform.

Tags

Start by identifying keywords that are directly related to your content:

With time and patience, you will find the tags that work for almost every piece of content you put out there.

Describe the Pin in detail, providing valuable information that complements the image. Sprinkle your keywords throughout the description to make it search engine-friendly. Ensure your Pins are pinned to boards that are thematically relevant.

Use the Pinterest Analytics Trends tool. Every time you want to upload something, go into the trends analytics and look up the keywords and interests that are relevant to your niche of content to see what is ranking or not.

Over time, you will notice that some keywords stay popular more consistently than others. Nothing affects your engagement more than choosing the right keywords to rank for when uploading your Pins.

Discuss this story.

Top Posts on Indie Hackers This Week 🌐

🗣 66 sites to promote your startup. Posted by Nick.

📱 We sent 900 DMs on X. Here are the results. Posted by Mario Armenta.

💰 Is it profitable to build wrapper apps? Posted by Darko.

💪 A meta discussion about the Indie Hackers site. Posted by Primer.

💸 10 years without making a single dollar online. Posted by James Fleischmann.

🏃‍♀️ How do you stay motivated? Posted by AI Junction.

Want a shout-out in next week's Best of Indie Hackers? Submit an article or link post on Indie Hackers whenever you come across something you think other indie hackers will enjoy.

Habits Garden Sold Via DM 🪴

by Marc Lou

I just sold my first indie startup, Habits Garden. Here are the details:

• One X DM.
• Zero calls.
• $10K.

This is my second acquisition this year. I wrote an article on how to value micro-startups and sell fast.

The background

The story started in March 2022. I had 200 X followers, and barely any income; just $700 per month from an old startup. I love games and habits. I combined both to create Habits Garden, a gamified habit tracker to grow flowers when building habits. In September 2022, the app made less than $200, despite it being my full focus.

Then, I met Dan Kulkov (who is now my good friend), and the game changed.

He helped me bury the product-obsessed developer I was, and turn into a founder. I launched several free side projects to promote the habit tracker, using engineering as marketing. The most viral one is VisualizeHabits.

Three things happened:

• Habits Garden's revenue tripled.
• My X growth tripled.
• I realized speed is more important than focus, at least at the beginning.

The setback

By January 2023, my X account had crossed 10K followers, and Habits Garden was paying the bills (~$800 MRR). I decided to build the most requested feature: A mobile app. As a web developer, this is daunting, but I got it done in two weeks with the help of Martin Donadieu.

Unfortunately, in March 2023, the app wasn’t paying much more than the bills, despite my working all day on it. I decided to move on. It was really hard to turn the page after one year of focus.

The sale

Ron Gross reached out through an X DM, offered to buy at my asking price, and…we closed a deal!

Fast forward to today, and I still fix bugs (if any), answer emails, and make sure everything is running well. I don’t add new features, and barely tweet about Habits Garden, but the revenue is quite steady ($500 MRR).

Here’s what I learned from this experience:

• The people who engage with you in the comments can become your friends and make you a better person. I wouldn’t be here without Dan and Martin.
• Focusing on a startup without obvious traction means losing time and being stressed.
• Launching fast creates a shipping muscle, and inspires others.

Discuss this story.

The Tweetmaster's Pick 🐦

by Tweetmaster Flex

I post the tweets indie hackers share the most. Here's today's pick:

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Forward it to a friend, and let them know they can subscribe here.

Also, you can submit a section for us to include in a future newsletter.

Special thanks to Jay Avery for editing this issue, to Gabriella Federico for the illustrations, and to Charlie, Darko, Justin Albertynas, and Marc Lou for contributing posts. —Channing