Road to $100K ARR from $0 | Bootstrapped SaaS

I should have written this in March 2022. Though it's a bit late to write this now, it's never too late to share.

"It's never too late" — this philosophical mindset ultimately led me to achieving $100K in revenue.

Long Story Short

• 2016 - Built a live chat product that helps businesses convert website visitors
• I didn't understand the market or its potential
• I was skeptical about why customers were using my product and why their customers would want to chat with businesses. I thought both parties were misguided, only to later realize I was the one who didn't get it.
• I was completely new to building businesses
• 2018 - Regretted not seizing the opportunity
• Several unicorns emerged in the customer support space
• At least 5 major players were capturing the market while I was busy
• I was focused on building another product startup and a service company (which I'll write about in a different article)
• 2019 - Expected my first product to fade away naturally after years without updates
• We had to shut down the product startup I was working on
• My existing customers informed me they would stop using my product and switch to a different solution in the coming year.
• 2019 Q4 - A customer shared their pain point regarding multi-sales and explained why competitor products weren't meeting their needs
• This made me wonder why this problem remained unsolved
• I spent 4-5 weekends understanding my old code and building the requested feature, which helped retain the customer
• 2020
• I analyzed the market and products in the space
• I couldn't grasp the market size or opportunity
• My Thoughts: Competitors were spending heavily on advertising and branding. I didn't think I could compete without raising money, and I thought my time would be better spent on newer opportunities.
• Finding well-paying customers in my local market was challenging
• During COVID-19, several customers requested to use the specific features I built in Q4 2019
• I noticed more companies entering the customer support and communication market
• This made me question whether "it's too late" was just a myth
• 2020 Q4 - Started spending weekends rebuilding the product with new branding and a codebase I enjoyed working with
• Hired several part-timers to work on different aspects of the product
• 2021 Q4 - Launched the product and deployed it to my existing client
• 2022 March
• Through word-of-mouth alone, I signed up 30+ brands and reached $100K in ARR

This was a major revelation: it truly was never too late from the start.