SaaS founders nearly quit due to the difficulty of building
48 posts across 16 communities in the last 30 days; 31% from r/SaaS.
“Thank you for sharing this experience so candidly. The point about "selling to a cost center" really stands out. Getting people interested is one thing, but getting the budget owner to actually part is a completely different challenge. It sounds like you learned some painful yet…”
“that feeling when the numbers actually back up what you've been telling yourself hits in a way you can't really explain to people who haven't been there the sprint work style is underrated, honestly. not everyone needs to grind 9-5 every day to make things happen. when the…”
“Congrats on the earnout, and recognize how hard it is to build from scratch, as well as your own personal situation. It reminds me of this clip from Succession (if you haven't seen it yet) "Five is a nightmare." Your experience in your company's vertical is highly valued, which…”
Multiple posts reveal that SaaS founders experience significant challenges and consider quitting during the development process. The perseverance demonstrated by these individuals underscores the demanding nature of creating a successful SaaS business.
SOURCES (60)
“600K without pitching anything says a lot.. congrats. I'm literally just starting on Reddit as a founder so I'm watching how people do this tbh. One thing I'm planning is keeping a note of people who reply to me more than once and talking to…”
“wow amazing man, well done. [re: A failed launch took me from €0 to €16,000 total (No Promotion)]”
“I used to be in gold and had an AWFUL acceptance rate. My market is so slow that I just wasn’t getting any offers anymore, but I slowly made it back up. Yay!! My next goal is just to get my 30 day orders back to 200 :) submitted by /u/camandator [link] [comments]”
What a milestone! Im still searching for my first sign up haha!
“Thank you for sharing this experience so candidly. The point about "selling to a cost center" really stands out. Getting people interested is one thing, but getting the budget owner to actually part is a completely different challenge. It sounds like you learned some painful yet valuable lessons, which will undoubtedly make your next attempt more precise and efficient. Best of luck next time!”
“It helps the SaaS founder take better decisions and build personal intelligence of their startup.”
“Yeah I'm taking some time for myself and will try again in a bit. I want to see what happens with AI in the coming months and years too. I appreciate the kind words. This was my 2nd SaaS attempt and 3 startup attempt. Hopefully the next time it works.”
It is better to know when to walk away than to keep beating a dead horse.
“Depends on your goals. This is not a shortcut to riches. I created my store after being laid off, knowing I wouldn't make money for a long time. More to keep my skills sharp and continue learning Ecommerce while unemployed. Store has been open since August and I've made 2 sales. While I'd love to have this replace my job, I dont see it happening quickly, and even if it doesnt it was worth it for me because of what I have learned.”
“Day 4. Honest version: today was an off day. I took a break, watched anime and gave my brain some rest. Some days that's the right call. But a few things still moved: - A founder friend mentioned AskVerb in her newsletter today. 2,500+ subscribers. - I sent in a written interview for a maker series on another founder's site. I'll share both links when they go live. - Last night someone tried to jailbreak the AI agent on my landing page. Asked it to write code "before buying"”
“the grind culture thing is rough because hustle gets normalized so fast in founder circles. everyone's exhausted and nobody says it. what i noticed in myself was the difference between tired-because-something-real and tired-because-i-lost-the-thread. second one is way harder to recover from”
“yeah the "what almost would have kept you" framing is so much better than a generic exit survey”
“If you truly feel for your people, the best thing you can for for them is to coach them, teach them to be self sufficient.”
“Users and revenue will never make up for tons of features! I just added another feature to one of my islands of best intentions and laughed out loud when I told Claude that no one looks at it anyway :D”
“No get a job an start your business on the side. Having gone down this route myself during the SaaS boom and failing I'm not bothering with starting my own thing on the side it's really rather pointless.”
“Motivation comes and goes. What’s helped me more is reducing the size of the next step until there’s almost no excuse not to do it. One useful task completed every day adds up surprisingly fast.”
“Motivation comes and goes. What’s helped me more is reducing the size of the next step until there’s almost no excuse not to do it. One useful task completed every day adds up surprisingly fast.”
“Man tbh not being disrespectful, Touch grass. I'm not being disrespectful you really need to meet people and understand the position other people in ( by people I didn't mean other startup bros). Calm down and practice meditation at a center also get therapy it's amazing man. You are doing fine.”
“Im a few steps ahead of you so I've gone through the pain and the wounds are still healing. Its a lot to type out but happy to share my experience. My biggest hurdle was getting that first paying client and showing traction in order to get investors. Its funny because if you have revenue you might think you don't need investors but you need it to scale before a competitor jumps all over it. I have a closed beta mvp right now. I have clients ready to pay but just trying to get it more sta”
“Thanks. Wishing you the best. Remember to post what you have as early as possible to get a reality check and valuable feedback :)”
“that feeling when the numbers actually back up what you've been telling yourself hits in a way you can't really explain to people who haven't been there the sprint work style is underrated, honestly. not everyone needs to grind 9-5 every day to make things happen. when the inspiration kicks in and you ride that wave for 10 hours straight, you get more done than most people do in a week also smart move keeping the brother out of it. nothing kills momentum faster than someone who talks”
“It's so true. There’s this weird pressure to always be hustling for growth, like if you're not exploding in size, you're somehow not doing enough. Sometimes, the real win is just being happy and stable with what you’ve built, not everyone wants or needs to chase that next big funding round.”
“Just be patient and make it worth it or call it a day lol submitted by /u/Infamousdriver81 [link] [comments]”
“I finally understood and implented all propagations levels in transaction -now implenting isolation levels and debugging old features -debugging never ends r/SaaS r/micro _saas r/buildinpublic submitted by /u/Secure_Vermicelli873 [link] [comments]”
“The product wasn't the hardest part. Trust and distribution are. No shit. LOL 😂”
“Sometimes cashing out now is worth more than years of uncertainty, especially if they’re just bored or ready for the next thing 😅”
“wait working 7 days a week solo for almost a year without paying yourself isn't dumb man that's someone who refused to quit. most people would've bailed way earlier”
“Finally a real post, I also launched a year ago and made $4 - the 4$ was myself checking the payment system worked 😂”
Exactly, youre right! But even if its not a gold medal theyre all still very successful :) Thank you!
“They are worth a lot. Well, anything could happen, I guess... but I think positively these days, and not based in fear. I think the recurring contracts have no reason not to come around again next Fall.”
“It sure is a miracle with debugging - especially in the full stack. I never feel like i get stuck anymore.”
“keep going guys!! it eventually works istg, just keep pushing it! have faith! submitted by /u/FitFindAI [link] [comments]”
“and no this is not a promotional post i have always been fanatic of building something and a thing that i can say is mine that passion lead me to build a few small saas projects in the covid era but tbh they were failures and i lost nearly all of my income trying to get more users through ads and all but over a period of god knows what i was able to figure out multiple ways to get lead and enrich them this eventually lead me to building my own plat form for getting high intent leads it helped me”
“Would I quit if I weren't monetized already (since this year)? No, but I'd be disheartened. That said, I now know first-hand how minuscule the numbers are. It's been 5 months or so and I've accumulated 30 bucks towards the 70 needed for a payout. But I like what I do and I have a handful of loyal viewers, that's already a success.”
“I know this feeling. I also made my first internet money few months ago and I was on top of the world. Keep growing!”
“you're seeing the loudest ones for sure. the divorced workaholic founder is a better story than the guy who runs a plumbing company and coaches his kids soccer team on weekends. most successful founders i know personally have families. they just dont post about it. they set boundaries and treat their calendar like a contract. 5pm is family time no exceptions. stuff like that. does it cost something? yeah. you sleep less. you say no to a lot of stuff. your friends stop inviting you places bec”
“Congrats on the earnout, and recognize how hard it is to build from scratch, as well as your own personal situation. It reminds me of this clip from Succession (if you haven't seen it yet) "Five is a nightmare." Your experience in your company's vertical is highly valued, which doesn't mean you go off and have to start something from scratch. Plenty of FT roles out there that would pay you well and not be nearly as intense. Think of baristaFIRE but at a much higher level th”
“its just that build feels more fruitful in a short span we get what we want very easily and get the short accomplishment dopamine that make us feel we are on the right path and distribution is a total different ball game it a complete mess of trial and error errors that we are not used to because of how easy development phase has become”
“Going from $726k in debt to $1m in revenue is a significant journey, and I appreciate that you’re willing to share the difficult parts rather than just the success story. My biggest suggestion would be to focus on specific lessons and decisions rather than trying to tell the entire story at once. What mistakes led to the debt? What changed when you started rebuilding? Which decisions made the biggest difference? Those details would make the story more valuable to entrepreneurs who are still at t”
“The honesty about failure and the lessons learned make this more valuable than most entrepreneurship posts. Especially the shift from chasing growth to understanding profit.”
“Love this initiative. I spent the last few years building, crashing hard, and then rebuilding from scratch. I used to spend all my time thinking about sales and growth, but after going through a severe business collapse, I became obsessed with the psychological and recovery side of entrepreneurship, how to handle creditor stress, family trust, and staying sane. Eventually put all those frameworks and creditor scripts into a short guide called The Calm After the Cras h. Always down to chat about”
Just wait until you get to the negatives. That when the real fun begins
“Been in the same boat. I can feel for you. Shut it down in June. solving similar problem.”
“It definitely feels that way but just keep pushing and get initial traction (that's the hardest part). No one can deny meaningful traction. A good way to get in front of people might just be open-sourcing and advertising broadly so business could potentially come to you.”
“the 20% cut hurts but going from $0 to any recurring revenue at all is a completely different game imo”