ONLY 4 fundamental ways to make money in SaaS

After building SaaS MVPs for clients over the years, I've noticed every successful product falls into one of these categories:

  1. Solve problems customers CAN'T solve themselves - Get paid $$$$
  2. Solve problems customers WON'T solve themselves - Get paid $$$
  3. Solve problems customers DON'T solve consistently - Get paid $$
  4. Solve problems customers ALREADY solve easily - Get paid $ (if you're lucky)

Another way to think about it:

  1. Mission-critical pain points - Premium pricing $$$$
  2. Urgent but not core business - Good pricing $$$
  3. Important but not urgent - Fair pricing $$
  4. Nice-to-have features - Race to the bottom $

From a growth perspective:

  1. Find MORE customers with the same problem (market expansion)
  2. Solve MORE problems for existing customers (feature expansion)
  3. Make customers use it MORE (increase engagement/usage)
  4. Charge MORE for the same solution (brand/positioning)

From a product perspective:

  1. Make it work BETTER than alternatives
  2. Make it work FASTER than alternatives
  3. Make it CHEAPER than alternatives
  4. Make it EASIER than alternatives

The hard truth I've learned:

Most failed SaaS ideas I've worked on were solving problems in category #4. People would say "that's cool" but never pay for it.

The successful ones? They solved problems that kept people up at night or made their job significantly easier.

My validation framework now:

  • Is this problem painful enough that people actively search for solutions?
  • Do they experience this problem weekly (not once a year)?
  • Can I easily reach people who have this problem?
  • Is my solution at least 3x better than their current workaround?
  • Are there early adopters willing to pay for an imperfect solution?

Key insight from experience:

Don't build what you can make. Build what you can sell.

I used to start with "cool idea → build product → find customers"

Now it's "identify reachable audience → understand their urgent problems → build solution → validate willingness to pay"

The difference in success rate is dramatic.

Which category does your SaaS fall into? And more importantly, how are you validating that people will actually pay for it?

Author: Warm-Reaction-456