Mike Strives

simple hack to find a winning idea:

You only need 101 customers at $99/m to reach $10k MRR.

Or just 67 at $149.

Only way to achieve this fast?

b2b!

Entrepreneur:

START DOING.

Wantrepreneur:

Read, Learn, Watch, Research, Overthink.

This “simple” form builder is doing $2,000,000/year.

I just love the founders’ tweet.

It’s an MBA on how to succeed in SaaS.

Add a "buy" button on day 1.

Want to scale to $10k with your SaaS?

It takes time (and focus).

I watched this 1-hour-long video with Mike Krieger (Anthropic CPO) on where AI value will be created.

(packed with golden nuggets)

Here are my notes for you:

The next unicorns won’t come from boardrooms:

How I create winning meta ads:

1. Go to Meta’s library
2. Look up any niche-related business
3. Scroll all the way down
4. Discover the best-performing ads
5. Recreate in your style
6. BOOM!

Affiliate marketing is criminally underrated.

Especially for small teams.

→ Low effort
→ High trust
→ Only pay for results

Compounding returns.

We just got our first annual referral 🥳

In 2 years, we grew to a DR of 75.

Adding 1000s of traffic.

This was our SEO game changer:

Slack for SaaS marketing:

1. Join Slack communities
2. Set your display name to "Your Name (Your Company)"
3. Set up keyword notifications
4. Jump into conversations with those keywords

☑️ Instantly connect with potential buyers

This is what real PMF looks like:

Framework that simply just works.

1. Go to Reddit
2. Search on “alternatives”
3. Find pain points of existing products
4. Build a better alternative

Full list to launch your product on Reddit:

(bookmark for later)

It’s called Software-as-a-Service.

✅ Self-served onboarding
✅ No mandatory demos
✅ Pricing communicated clearly
✅ 1-click plan cancellations
✅ Proactive support

If you don't have these, you’re not running a SaaS.

6. Ship fast, don’t overthink
7. Make data-driven decisions
8. Build a true pain-killer
9. Love your audience
10. Obsess about the problem you’re solving
11. Everything takes time
12. Design a roadmap, but don’t stick to it
13. Simplicity always wins
14. Dream big, start small

14 biggest lessons learned scaling my SaaS to $60k/month.

1. Progress beats the sh*t out of perfect
2. Solve a problem for a small audience
3. An idea is just a thought: go out there!
4. Validate with paying customers
5. Listen to user feedback

I make $60k/month with my products and I only need this:

$1M business idea framework:

1. Find a $1B SaaS platform
2. Build apps for their marketplace
3. Reach 1000s potential customers instantly
4. Make a lot of money

5. Go to FB/Insta
6. Wait for the ad to pop up

Now you know what ad works best.

Learn from the ad copy and landing page.

Optimize your own ads.

Simple (and smart) marketing hack.

1. Go to Facebook’s Ad library
2. Look up your competitor
3. Turn off your cookie blockers
4. Visit competitor's website

Me at 16:

"When I make millions, I want to spend money on cars, watches, and champagne!"

Me spending money at 37:

Do this for your next idea:

- Ship just ONE core feature
- Make a one-page waitlist
- Promote it everywhere
- Send them an email offering a lifetime deal

5 customers = idea validated.

You can work on it full time.

We all start at 0.

0 followers → start posting
0 sales → start doing marketing
0 network → start connecting
0 blog posts → start writing

Old pricing models are dying.

Usage-based pricing is taking over SaaS in AI.

(don't ignore)

All the fastest-growing SaaS tools in the AI space have 1 thing in common.

They adopted usage-based pricing.

Is this the future of SaaS?

3. Build for your ICP

Align your product, messaging, & channels

Ensure your product roadmap, messaging, and marketing channels all align with the needs of your target audience.

2. Learn about your ICP

Start talking with prospective ICPs.

Seek to understand how your target audience works and validate that the problem your product solves is important to them.

1. Find your ICP

Start with a hypothesis about what your ICP (ideal customer profile) is.

Focus on what your product helps people achieve and the problems it solves.

Want to make money in SaaS?

Use this “secret” formula:

Audience x Problem x Solution.

Here’s how: 🧵

(number 3 is underrated)