- If your building a SaaS business,
one of, if not the most important
thing to really nail down,
really stress test,
really validate is your core idea.
Having built SaaS businesses for the last 10 years,
having scaled them,
having helped exit them and exit my own,
I've sort of developed a framework
on how to validate ideas.
And in this video,
I'm gonna walk you through
the three principles to actually
stress test your SaaS idea.
Intro.
(upbeat music)
(beeping) What's up everybody?
Welcome to Unstoppable. I'm TK!
And on this channel,
I help startup founders like you
build and scale unstoppable SaaS businesses.
Whether you're in the path,
to navigate a product-market fit.
Or you're on the path
to actually get to the next stage of growth.
If you're new to our community, welcome!
I drop a video like this every single Sunday,
Wednesday and now Friday.
So be sure to hit that subscribe button
and that bell icon
so that you get notified every single time I drop a video
to help you scale your SaaS business,
with the TK quarantine hairstyle.
Also, by the way,
if you are building a SaaS business
and you don't wanna go at it alone,
I will include a link to my SaaS school program.
In my SaaS school program,
I help founders actually build and scale Saas businesses.
And we're now actually accepting new members.
So I'll link to it at the end of this video
so that you can check it out.
Now, before you go anywhere else,
let's dig into the reason you're here.
Which is, how do you
actually stress test your SaaS business?
Now, after having spent nearly a decade
starting my own Saas business,
exiting it, helping exit the one that bought mine,
and also helping other founders
that supported my Saas school program,
really validate and clarified their Saas ideas
and grow them.
Here's the framework that I followed
to really validate an idea.
I'm gonna walk you through the three principles.
So we're excited to dig in.
And go ahead and smash that like button
for the YouTube algorithm,
and really for my team,
because we love seeing that.
Let's dig into principle number one.
So principle number one
is number one,
"Are you solving an important problem?"
I see this all the time.
Where founders, and we're all a very passionate bunch,
we get excited about this idea.
We're a little unclear on who it solves it for,
who our ICP is,
but we're like, this is the thing,
this is gonna be amazing.
We're gonna be cool.
And I'll always ask, like, All right!
For the group of people
that would use this,
is this an actually important problem?
Meaning, is there a budget allocated for this?
Is there money set aside for this?
If they do this,
will this save money or make more money?
Those are simple questions
that you can ask to really hone in on
is this an important problem?
Because look, we have a billion problems in our lives
and in our businesses,
but that doesn't mean we're gonna solve them.
Or it doesn't mean we're gonna buy software
to actually spend time
and fix those problems.
So the first question you really want to dig into,
is this truly an important problem?
Once you've dug into that,
the next question you wanna ask is,
"Has there been a big change that makes this urgent?"
Meaning this problem,
like I have a lot of problems in my life,
in my business that are there
and they may be important,
but they're not urgent.
Until, (finger snapping)
something happens!
Something happens,
and all of a sudden,
I'm like, oh my God!
We better solve this.
Otherwise, we're going to be in deep trouble
or we're going to lose this
or we're never gonna be competitive enough.
So is there some sort of big macro trend,
some big change, some big threat that's happening
that makes it where,
not only is this an important problem,
but all of a sudden,
it is actually an urgent problem.
An urgent and important problem
is where the opportunities truly lie
in getting the attention of business owners
and other people that are using your software.
So the first two,
is it an important problem
and is it an actual urgent problem
that's powered by some sort of big macro trend?
Some big change that's happened in the world.
One example for this is say,
remote offices and remote collaboration.
Every single company has been thinking about
how to actually go digital,
how to drive their digital transformations,
which takes decades.
And all of a sudden,
because COVID-19 happened,
all of a sudden,
that problem became very urgent!
Not only was it an important problem
to stay competitive in the market
and in the workforce,
but also at the same time, it became urgent.
They could not do business otherwise.
And, what happened?
All of a sudden,
every single thing that solved
the remote collaboration problem
became top of mind for every business leader.
And all of a sudden digital transformations,
which would normally take billions of dollars
and tens of years,
got done in two minutes by downloading Zoom.
That's a perfect example
of actually how important and urgent,
is super important.
If that makes sense?
(laughing)
And also on top of that,
finding a macro trend
that's proving that this is an important
and urgent problem is super powerful.
Now before I go on to number three,
and I have a bonus one for you,
let me just pause here for a second.
If you're starting to think about your idea,
and you start think about
whether it's important and urgent.
And if it is important and urgent,
can I just get a yes!
In the comments below,
so that I know you're with me.
And if it's not yet,
don't worry, I actually have a 10-Point Checklist
on how to start and build a SaaS business.
And how to hone in on the right idea.
I'll tell you more about that
at the end of this video.
Okay.
So let's now move on to number three.
Number three is,
"Has there been a tech breakthrough?"
Is there some sort of big platform shift
or big technology shift
that makes your solution
a better solution right now?
So even if a problem is urgent,
and it's important,
if you can't come up with a solid,
great, awesome, easy-to-use solution to solve it,
people are not gonna pay you money.
And usually, the opportunities
for this come around
when there's some sort of big platform shift.
So, one big platform shift
was actually going on to the web. Right?
Instead of On-Premise software,
instead of downloading software into a floppy disk
and shipping it
and then you have to install it in your own data centers,
there is the web.
And you could host software online,
and people could just log in
and use the software.
That's one big shift.
Another big shift was social.
Another big shift was mobile.
Those are all big platform shifts
that allowed you to create new software
that solved these urgent
and important problems,
In a whole new way,
In a whole new cost-structure,
In a whole new level of efficiency,
or at a whole new level of feature set
that made it a better solution.
And what you ended up with,
was an urgent and important problem
with a big tech breakthrough,
that made it like, wow!
We have to leverage this.
Otherwise, we are gonna get disrupted.
And that's why businesses
started buying a lot of SaaS software.
So the question becomes,
do you have all three of these things?
These three things is a trifecta.
When, they are,
it is an important problem you're solving.
When it is an urgent problem.
And when you have better solution
because of some technology breakthrough,
that's where the magic comes.
Those are the three things
that have to stress test for your idea.
If it's not urgent,
if it's not important,
there's not a macro trend around it,
and there's not some big new way,
new technology breakthrough
that allows you to deliver
this in a really compelling way, don't bother!
That idea is not gonna go anywhere.
Now there's one more thing
that I wanna add to this.
I promised you a bonus.
The last thing.
The bonus one,
that I actually want to tell you is that,
"The market will tell you very quickly."
A lot of us think that you know,
if we just slog away on the idea,
this one idea I've got,
over and over, forever!
Then finally we'll break through.
This is a common misconception.
Yes.
It does take persistence to get to something that works.
However, if you keep honing in on the same idea,
and the market just keeps saying, no!
Chances are, the idea is either bad
or the timing is completely off.
And your best bet
is to keep pivoting
to actually fit into something that people want.
And usually people want something
that solves an urgent
and important problem
in a whole new way.
And that way,
they can actually save money
or make more money.
Especially when it comes to business software.
So listen to the market.
Even if you have deep conviction, and you should!
You should still timebox your approach
on how long you stick to one idea.
You should carefully listen
on what's actually being said by the market.
Whether they like it,
and if they don't like it
and what they like and don't like,
and what's the reason for buying is.
And that will help you
actually identify whether you've got the right idea.
So just to recap,
those are the key things
that you should look at to validate your idea
as you start a Saas businesses.
Is what I did!
When I started my recent Saas business,
number one, are you solving an important problem?
And if so, for who?
Is it urgent because of some big macro trends?
A big change that's happened in the world.
And number three,
can you solve it in a uniquely great way,
because of a recent technology breakthrough?
Lastly, can you take it to the market,
so that they'll tell you very quickly,
how do you actually talk to people
in sales conversations,
so that you can actually validate this very quickly.
When you have that
you end up with a trifecta.
You end up with the kill zone,
which is all the money in the world
because you're solving a very important problem
that's urgent and with a great solution.
Now, if you are building a SaaS business,
whether you're just starting out on the journey,
or you're in the point
where you're trying to get to product-market fit,
I encourage you to download
my 10-Point SaaS Business Checklist.
In that checklist,
I'll go through the 10 key points.
Bigger than this.
Even more, it builds on this.
The 10 key questions
to actually ask and answer
so that you can really validate
and hone in on your core Saas idea.
It takes you everything
from having a market strategy
to a product strategy,
to a go-to-market strategy.
So you can actually test your idea very quickly.
So you can go down
and follow the link below.
It's my 10-Point SaaS Checklist.
Or you can just go to tkkader.com/saas-checklist
If you go there,
you can download the guide.
It's completely free,
and I'll walk you through the whole process.
And lastly, if you got value from this,
please be sure to smash that like button.
We drop a video like this
every single Sunday, Wednesday and Friday.
So be sure to hit that subscribe button
and that bell icon,
because we want to partner with you
to actually grow and scale your SaaS business.
And lastly, remember,
everyone needs a strategy for their life
and their business.
But when you are with us,
yours is gonna be unstoppable!
I'm TK.
And I will see you in the next episode.
(melodious music)