Thank you for sharing.
LTD on an AI product makes no sense.
There is a possibility that you fail. What happens then? Will you keep paying the (relatively large) AI costs for your LTD customers?
It makes sense for OP because he is not into long term viability. The goal is to make a quick buck on the AI hype and move into the next thing. Considering it took him almost a year to archive 30k not sure it is such a success…
Yeah I've already thought of that. If I haven't done LTD, it would have never taken off. My MRR customers are compensating for LTD customers. I'm here in the long run.
Most businesses change over time, so "product market fit" is not static.
1. Their business increases or decreases – your solution loses product market fit
2. They go bankrupt
3. They get disappointed about your customer service, mistake, product decision
4. They pay a subscription, but do not really use the product, then credit card expires and no one cares to update it
5. Competition, better offer
6. Tech / policy / law changes and the solution doesnt work for X amount of customer base
There are many LTD marketplaces. i.e. Appsumo, SaasZilla, RocketHub.. You can apply on their website. If your product is good, they'd do exclusive deal for you.
Ive been building and sharing it in public
Check out my old tweet when I reached $20k
Tweet source - [https://twitter.com/ankit\_saas/status/1776463972431962480](https://twitter.com/ankit_saas/status/1776463972431962480)
You can also scroll and check older tweets. I've been open about it and sharing it on public.
Look for personal problems first. Maybe reach out to folks who are facing the problem. A bit understanding of the problem is necessary.
For Dottypost:
I had a personal problem, I've been writing on LinkedIn since mid 2022, and found that market do not have affordable + content gen solution for LinkedIn.
So I built it.
Look for pain points. They’re everywhere, especially if you speak with actual business operators.
I found phrasing it as pain points instead of problems yielded much better results.
Regarding terminology some say need, problem, pain point etc, bottom line it same same.
I spoke with several business owners, ppl in diferent domains and no real must have pain point pop up, some start to be interested but after short validation I eliminate them. Happy to hear what you found:)
Im not sure about it, I like to find those in niches to, if you have some pain points that you dont plan to solve you can share with me, lots of luck for you too!
Nice work and great post.
What marketing channels were most successful for you? I like the idea of building in public but how do you find where your ideal audience is and get their attention?
For my case, Dottypost is a LinkedIn AI Tool. So I regularly write on LinkedIn.
I do write on X too, mostly insights on SaaS, AI, Growth. (@ankit\_saas)
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How has it been the transition from LTDs to subscriptions? Did the conversion drop? (I also offered LTDs for my app, but now that it's evolving I'm considering switching to a subscription model - any advice about this is apprecciated.) Thanks!
We've just started our MRR journey. For MRR, the best way is to launch on PH and let your LTD customers support it.
LTD is for initial cash so you can get things going. in the long, MRR helps you compensate for LTD customers and make you profitable startup.
you haven't really answered the question... You don't have any subscription customer yet? I was interested in understanding what was the impact of the switch (for example in conversion).
I didn't get "transition from LTD to Subs". could you please elaborate?
Just to be clear, our major revenue is from LTD, we do have MRR customers too, but not significant.
sure I can elaborate better. So you are selling LTDs to start a new product. That's great and you say it has given you an influx of revenue to fund the initial development of the product. However, at a certain point you need to move to a subscription model, right? Otherwise you might not be able to cover the future costs of maintaining the project (e.g. maintanance, hosting, database, ...). Rightly so, you say you started introducing the subscription, but you have only a minority of users who are on this plan (as it's more expensive for them, and therefore more difficult to convert them).
What I wanted to understand, is **how much difficult** it is to convert them (with data). For example, maybe before you had 4% conversion with a LTD priced $XX (not sure how much you sold it for?), and now that you switched to $29/month the conversion has dropped to 1%. Of course these are random numbers I just made up. I would appreciate if you could share approximately the real ones. I'm in the process of switching to a subscription model for my app and, although I would imagine % changes a lot from product to product, I was interested in understanding how much I can expect my conversion to drop.
Run an AB-test for pricing (but don't code it, just show an error message), comparing your prodcut to others will not give you enough certainty. If you do not have enough volume to get certainty fast enough, just do it. You can always get the next 100 customers if it doesn't work out.
With the people you initially gave for free to get feedback, did they permanently get access? And did you limit the number of people that could sign up when it was free?
Hi! What does distribution mean? I just soft launched my mvp and looking to learn more about getting it in front of people.
I’ve been seeing directories, but most of them either take a long time (and just a chance) to get listed, unless you pay for it.
All the LTD's distribution partner you mentioned, i did launch with them. They rip you off with 60%, 80% commission and what you get is a bunch of users who wants more and more in that price. For your example, $32,618 for 208 items that mean per quantity price was $144 now if you have to make $144 per sale and + 60% commission of distribution partners that means the product sold price would be approx $344 now if you visit there websites . Max sales comes at a price of less than $100 or you can visit the distribution partners site right now, and none of the product ranged at 340 above had made 208 sales in April. So either you're bluffing or you've been paid for this. Which they do so....
We launched with 5 plans.. $69, $149, $299, $399, $499 (please check my product to understand more)
Only Appsumo exclusive charges 70%
Appsumo normal listing is 30% cut
Rest are at 50%
I bought a Dottypost tier 2 plan a few weeks ago. Coincidentally activated and started testing today, so funny to see you here.
Decent tool, but the templates don't fit my niche (retirement planning/expat services), so I'm not sure if I'll keep it.
We're launching a new version in June, where you'll have custom post templates as per your niche/industry.
We've got this feedback from some customers and We're building it.
Nice site, although I’m not heavily into LinkedIn. For the LTDs, do they need you to have a certain amount of users or revenue before signing you onboard?
Thank you for sharing. LTD on an AI product makes no sense. There is a possibility that you fail. What happens then? Will you keep paying the (relatively large) AI costs for your LTD customers?
It makes sense for OP because he is not into long term viability. The goal is to make a quick buck on the AI hype and move into the next thing. Considering it took him almost a year to archive 30k not sure it is such a success…
I always thought the only way this would work is if the user brings therey own key
Yeah I've already thought of that. If I haven't done LTD, it would have never taken off. My MRR customers are compensating for LTD customers. I'm here in the long run.
I think that might hurt you in the long run ngl but hopefully not
Every single customer will churn. I think this is a great investment – if the market is big enough, it's a drop in a bucket.
why will they churn? b/c bad product?
Most businesses change over time, so "product market fit" is not static. 1. Their business increases or decreases – your solution loses product market fit 2. They go bankrupt 3. They get disappointed about your customer service, mistake, product decision 4. They pay a subscription, but do not really use the product, then credit card expires and no one cares to update it 5. Competition, better offer 6. Tech / policy / law changes and the solution doesnt work for X amount of customer base
Can you please go into more detail about distribution partners? How it works, how to get started, etc.
There are many LTD marketplaces. i.e. Appsumo, SaasZilla, RocketHub.. You can apply on their website. If your product is good, they'd do exclusive deal for you.
Any proof that you made $30k in April?
Screenshot attached :)
Yeah that is undeniable proof for sure
Ive been building and sharing it in public Check out my old tweet when I reached $20k Tweet source - [https://twitter.com/ankit\_saas/status/1776463972431962480](https://twitter.com/ankit_saas/status/1776463972431962480) You can also scroll and check older tweets. I've been open about it and sharing it on public.
how long did it take you to build up the fist audience. do you have any tips there
Started writing on Twitter around mid-2022, now have 2k+ on Twitter Share your learnings, failures, insights, building in public.. it works.
how do you get people to pick up on it when you have no followers?
What is a LTD?
Life time deal
Please elaborate on how you find a real problem (section 1)
Look for personal problems first. Maybe reach out to folks who are facing the problem. A bit understanding of the problem is necessary. For Dottypost: I had a personal problem, I've been writing on LinkedIn since mid 2022, and found that market do not have affordable + content gen solution for LinkedIn. So I built it.
Im looking for a year and a half for a real problem to solve, I spoke with many and still couldnt find any
Look for pain points. They’re everywhere, especially if you speak with actual business operators. I found phrasing it as pain points instead of problems yielded much better results.
Regarding terminology some say need, problem, pain point etc, bottom line it same same. I spoke with several business owners, ppl in diferent domains and no real must have pain point pop up, some start to be interested but after short validation I eliminate them. Happy to hear what you found:)
Not gonna publicize my ventures as they’re both very niche and early stage rn but I wish you the best, you’ll find a problem to solve.
Im not sure about it, I like to find those in niches to, if you have some pain points that you dont plan to solve you can share with me, lots of luck for you too!
Nice work and great post. What marketing channels were most successful for you? I like the idea of building in public but how do you find where your ideal audience is and get their attention?
For my case, Dottypost is a LinkedIn AI Tool. So I regularly write on LinkedIn. I do write on X too, mostly insights on SaaS, AI, Growth. (@ankit\_saas)
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How has it been the transition from LTDs to subscriptions? Did the conversion drop? (I also offered LTDs for my app, but now that it's evolving I'm considering switching to a subscription model - any advice about this is apprecciated.) Thanks!
We've just started our MRR journey. For MRR, the best way is to launch on PH and let your LTD customers support it. LTD is for initial cash so you can get things going. in the long, MRR helps you compensate for LTD customers and make you profitable startup.
you haven't really answered the question... You don't have any subscription customer yet? I was interested in understanding what was the impact of the switch (for example in conversion).
I didn't get "transition from LTD to Subs". could you please elaborate? Just to be clear, our major revenue is from LTD, we do have MRR customers too, but not significant.
sure I can elaborate better. So you are selling LTDs to start a new product. That's great and you say it has given you an influx of revenue to fund the initial development of the product. However, at a certain point you need to move to a subscription model, right? Otherwise you might not be able to cover the future costs of maintaining the project (e.g. maintanance, hosting, database, ...). Rightly so, you say you started introducing the subscription, but you have only a minority of users who are on this plan (as it's more expensive for them, and therefore more difficult to convert them). What I wanted to understand, is **how much difficult** it is to convert them (with data). For example, maybe before you had 4% conversion with a LTD priced $XX (not sure how much you sold it for?), and now that you switched to $29/month the conversion has dropped to 1%. Of course these are random numbers I just made up. I would appreciate if you could share approximately the real ones. I'm in the process of switching to a subscription model for my app and, although I would imagine % changes a lot from product to product, I was interested in understanding how much I can expect my conversion to drop.
Run an AB-test for pricing (but don't code it, just show an error message), comparing your prodcut to others will not give you enough certainty. If you do not have enough volume to get certainty fast enough, just do it. You can always get the next 100 customers if it doesn't work out.
With the people you initially gave for free to get feedback, did they permanently get access? And did you limit the number of people that could sign up when it was free?
Hi! What does distribution mean? I just soft launched my mvp and looking to learn more about getting it in front of people. I’ve been seeing directories, but most of them either take a long time (and just a chance) to get listed, unless you pay for it.
For LTD distribution there are marketplaces like Appsumo, Rockethub, SaasZilla etc.. you ca. List your product there
1) How do you pick a problem that people have , what sources you follow
This Tweet might help: [https://twitter.com/ankit\_saas/status/1784062178091323704](https://twitter.com/ankit_saas/status/1784062178091323704)
Thank you, may I know what PG you are using, stripe or lemon 🍋 Thank you. I'm from India so stripe or lemon squeeze is better for me
Solid advice, Ankit! Just tweeted my support. 🚀 #profullstack
Thanks man
Have you had MRR yet?
Yes definitely
All the LTD's distribution partner you mentioned, i did launch with them. They rip you off with 60%, 80% commission and what you get is a bunch of users who wants more and more in that price. For your example, $32,618 for 208 items that mean per quantity price was $144 now if you have to make $144 per sale and + 60% commission of distribution partners that means the product sold price would be approx $344 now if you visit there websites . Max sales comes at a price of less than $100 or you can visit the distribution partners site right now, and none of the product ranged at 340 above had made 208 sales in April. So either you're bluffing or you've been paid for this. Which they do so....
We launched with 5 plans.. $69, $149, $299, $399, $499 (please check my product to understand more) Only Appsumo exclusive charges 70% Appsumo normal listing is 30% cut Rest are at 50%
[https://appsumo.com/search/?query=Dottypost](https://appsumo.com/search/?query=Dottypost) "" # Sorry, we couldn't find any results matching "Dottypost"
He launched on Saaszilla...
I bought a Dottypost tier 2 plan a few weeks ago. Coincidentally activated and started testing today, so funny to see you here. Decent tool, but the templates don't fit my niche (retirement planning/expat services), so I'm not sure if I'll keep it.
We're launching a new version in June, where you'll have custom post templates as per your niche/industry. We've got this feedback from some customers and We're building it.
Might be cutting it too close to my return window. I might have to return and rebuy it after the update.
Nice site, although I’m not heavily into LinkedIn. For the LTDs, do they need you to have a certain amount of users or revenue before signing you onboard?
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