🚪How Ken turned a manual service into a $4000 MRR SaaS
🚪How Ken turned a manual service into a $4000 MRR SaaS
The No-Code Success Story of Ken Savage and JobMate
Hello there,
While you are reading this, I escaped from my computer and I’m cycling through Slovenia. There are some mountains to conquer, so I hope I will make it back :).
Before my holiday I talked to Ken Savage: marketer and internet entrepreneur.
Read about:
✨ How to validate before you automate
💥 The No-Code tools that turned it into a SaaS
🔥 The Power of indexed Reddit posts
👑 A cheap trial to build trust
Enjoy and happy building.
PS: missed the last interview? Read here how THIS newsletter was acquired (but I’m still here :)). Thank you all for the warm words and wishes!
🎈 5 Cool Finds
Simple Analytics offers an amazing free alternative to clunky overwhelming Google Analytics.
I really liked this Tweet about the best criteria for starting a new online business.
A supercool tool that gives you product recommendations based on Reddit posts. I found it helpful to do research for new ideas.
I have been enjoying the videos of Doc Williams on no-code tools and how to start online businesses.
TaskMagic is a user-friendly automation tool, automate unlimited tasks between apps or turn your walkthrough videos into automations.
🔥 No-Code Founder Interview
Learn every week from a real world no-code success story
Hello! What's your background?
Hi, I’m Ken. I have been working for 20 years as a marketer for a bunch of SaaS and cybersecurity companies in the Boston area. I needed to create quick apps and landing pages like within a day and not months with a developer. I discovered Carrd and Bubble. Now I can create my own apps within days and focus more on growing them.
How did you come up with your idea?
Five years ago I was looking for my last job. I thought it was crazy that I had to send out 100 resumes and fill out 100 applications just to be put in a pile on somebody's desk. There should be a way to automate this. So I built it myself.
It takes your resume and location
It shows you relevant jobs
You choose which jobs to approve or deny
Then we fill out those applications for you
It saves you 12-15 hours per week job hunting.
Which No-Code platforms did you use?
Bubble for the front and backend of the SaaS. I use Gumloop for all the backend automations, API and scraping. Loops handles my transactional emails.
I like to keep things simple and compact as not to get things too complicated. When it comes time to sell this is makes it easier to transfer to a new owner.
What went into building the first version?
In 2020, when I was job hunting, I created something ugly just for myself. Then COVID hit and I shut down that idea.
About a year later I posted a few times in Reddit to find people needing help applying to jobs that didn't have the time. I got about 80 interested people and put up a simple landing page for $25/week. More than 40 signed up and all of a sudden I had a side gig.
After servicing all 40 people in a few days I posted again on Reddit. Again I got a few dozen people interested and the lightbulb went off.
At that time everything was manual. No software, no scrapers and definitely no automation. I collected manual payments and their resume/CVs and got to work. After this initial validation, I put the manual outreach on hold and started building the software.
What is the business model?
Applying to jobs sucks and we can do it for them saving them 12-15 hours per week. That alone people are willing to spend money on. We'll do the hard part. They just have to answer emails and setup meetings. I tested a few price points over the years. Now I'm at $9 for a trial week and that renews to $99/month. Customer stay for about 2.5 months on average or ~$200. I've helped 196 customers to date.
How have you attracted users and grown your product?
Those first Reddit posts got indexed in Google for some great keywords and search intents. Now I have around ~100 visitors a day come from those 2 Reddit posts for the last 4+ years.
Next to Reddit marketing, I have been working on SEO. I optimised the website for a keyword and wrote some blog articles.
I also have a referral program in place where people can earn credits for every paying client they refer with the custom referral link in their profile.
Next I want to put out even more interesting content and launch on Product Hunt.
What's your advice for people just getting started?
Create processes to automate everything you can. If you're looking to exit then an investor would be willing to buy a business where they don't have to work in the business themselves. Something they can train someone else to do.
Thanks for sharing your story Ken, I hope you get to the golden $10k MRR.
🍿 Katt builds in public
My actions, fails and wins on the road to ramen profitability with no-code
The last weeks have been mostly about the Build The Keyword challenge for me. We gave ourselves 2 weeks to:
Find keyword with significant volume and low competition
Build a landing page or first version of the product
Optimize for SEO
Get backlinks
I had a cool product idea but because I suddenly got busy ;-) I focused on creating a landing page with a very simple product (that is far from finished). I did some basic SEO and listed it on some websites to get backlinks. When I see in a few weeks / months that it gets organic traffic, I will continue working on it. Perfect small bet!
You can see here what other participants built.
🙌 When you’re ready, here’s how I can help
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