How We Built a $10K/mo SaaS
Starter Story
Sep 27, 2025
Josef and Timo met at a coworking space and decided to build an app together. But both were burnt out from spending months building projects that got 0 customers. So this time, they used a different approach, and now their app is at $10K MRR
Get design inspiration from the world's best apps → https://go.starterstory.com/joseftimo
Build your own AI app→ https://build.starterstory.com/build/ai-build-accelerator?utm_source=youtube&utm_campaign=joseftimo
Follow Josef: https://x.com/josefbuettgen
Follow Timo: https://x.com/timonikolai
🔔 Follow the Second Channel: @StarterStoryBuild
🏁 We're hiring: starterstory.com/jobs
0:00 - Intro
0:51 - Who are Josef & Timo
1:05 - What is Setter AI
1:38 - How they validated Setter AI
2:28 - Fake landing page that made $500
3:58 - When is an app validated?
4:48 - $10K/month Validation Framework
7:41 - $$$$ opportunities to build NOW
8:37 - SEO growth strategy
9:47 - Numbers behind Setter AI
10:25 - Tech stack
11:26 - Costs & margins
11:49 - Charge early on
This video is an educational case study of one founder’s experience. It is not financial advice and does not guarantee any income or results. Every business is different and your results may vary.
Chapters
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Transcript
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No tools listed for this business.
My
name
is
Joseph
and
I'm
Timo
Together
we
built
SaturAI
to
10K
MRR
These
two
guys
met
each
other
in
a
co
working
space
and
decided
to
partner
up
but
they
were
burned
out
by
what
I
like
to
call
builder's
disease
I
quit
my
job
and
spent
a
whole
year
building
without
any
traction
So
they
came
up
with
a
better
strategy
Get
paid
before
building
anything
We
made
500
before
we
wrote
a
single
line
of
code
So
I
brought
them
both
onto
the
channel
to
break
down
the
exact
validation
strategy
to
not
waste
years
on
a
dead
product
the
deposit
framework
which
is
how
to
ask
for
a
refundable
deposit
before
you
build
anything
and
the
exact
fake
landing
page
and
demo
they
use
that
changed
their
business
This
video
may
rewire
your
brain
on
how
to
validate
and
build
a
startup
startup
today
I'm
Pat
Walls
and
this
is
Starter
Story
All
right
Welcome
Joseph
and
Timo
to
the
channel
Tell
me
about
who
you
guys
are
what
you
built
and
what's
your
story
My
name
is
Joseph
I
quit
freelancing
as
a
software
engineer
to
start
indie
hacking
And
my
name
is
Timo
I
live
in
Bangkok
and
together
we
started
Setter
AI
which
now
makes
10K
MRR
All
right
Well
before
we
get
into
what
you
guys
built
how
you
built
it
in
this
awesome
story
can
you
just
tell
me
about
what
Setter
AI
is
What
kind
of
app
is
this
Setter
AI
is
an
AI
appointment
setter
that
follows
up
and
qualifies
with
your
leads
instantly
It's
a
high
ticket
agentic
B2B
SaaS
We
have
a
pretty
classical
subscription
model
which
starts
at
around
50
per
month
Some
pay
over
500
bucks
and
our
biggest
customer
pays
up
to
5
000
per
month
We
mainly
target
the
solar
industry
coaches
financial
services
anywhere
to
replace
sales
reps
Okay
So
one
thing
that
I
love
about
your
guys
story
is
that
you
technically
validated
this
idea
before
you
built
anything
I
think
that's
amazing
I
think
there's
a
lot
we
can
learn
from
that
So
can
you
share
with
me
how
you
did
that
How
did
you
know
you
had
a
business
before
you
even
wrote
a
single
line
of
code
code
So
as
soon
as
I
had
the
idea
I
set
up
a
landing
page
I
did
it
months
prior
to
even
starting
the
business
The
landing
page
was
set
up
under
a
warm
domain
So
a
domain
from
a
different
business
that
I've
already
owned
and
that
has
been
indexed
with
Google
already
I
created
a
completely
fake
demo
for
this
product
because
the
product
wasn't
there
yet
and
put
it
on
this
landing
page
I
think
it's
the
most
low
effort
way
to
validate
the
idea
because
I
wanted
to
find
out
if
people
would
actually
pay
for
this
I
knew
building
this
AI
caller
which
was
the
initial
idea
would
require
a
lot
of
effort
And
for
me
I
just
wanted
to
find
out
what
would
business
owners
pay
for
this
So
would
it
be
worth
building
It'd
be
awesome
if
you
could
actually
show
me
this
landing
page
right
here
because
I
think
this
is
super
cool
to
just
basically
not
actually
write
anything
write
any
code
and
just
purely
validate
the
idea
with
everything
being
faked
something
you
could
put
together
pretty
quickly
Could
you
actually
show
me
that
landing
page
So
this
was
the
initial
landing
page
Super
super
simple
One
H1
keyword
and
then
the
demo
on
the
right
side
and
then
a
book
demo
button
There
was
really
nothing
else
on
this
page
and
it
ranked
on
Google
with
this
So
this
was
version
one
I
wanted
to
automate
cold
calls
So
my
idea
was
okay
let
me
put
cold
called
automation
as
the
H1
keyword
So
I
went
to
Ahrefs
found
this
keyword
saw
it
has
a
search
volume
but
no
difficulty
So
I
put
this
as
the
H1
here
This
is
the
main
keyword
that
Google
will
index
And
then
I
just
put
some
like
chatty
generated
text
here
to
like
have
some
a
little
little
bit
more
text
on
the
page
Here's
the
demo
is
like
a
fake
AI
caller
demo
that
I
generated
with
11
labs
So
yeah
the
call
to
action
is
literally
just
a
calendar
link
of
mine
If
prospects
see
the
video
demo
then
they
would
usually
go
and
book
a
demo
call
after
that
And
then
I
would
chat
with
them
about
okay
okay
what
do
you
actually
need
in
your
business
So
one
of
the
key
elements
here
is
getting
this
landing
page
indexed
And
ideally
you
have
already
a
domain
that
is
online
of
a
previous
startup
of
yours
your
personal
page
whatever
a
domain
that
is
not
brand
new
Once
a
page
is
created
you
go
to
Google
search
console
and
request
the
indexing
of
that
page
That
way
you
make
sure
this
page
is
literally
indexed
within
24
hours
and
people
can
find
it
on
Google
Okay
I
mean
that's
amazing
My
question
that
I
do
still
have
is
like
how
did
you
know
it
was
validated
Was
there
a
specific
number
of
traffic
or
booked
calls
Like
what
did
that
look
like
for
you
versus
previous
apps
that
weren't
validated
I
think
the
only
way
to
validate
is
when
buyers
swipe
their
credit
card
When
we
got
our
first
Stripe
payment
of
500
before
we
even
had
a
product
I
knew
this
is
validated
and
that
happened
in
February
2024
And
I
was
surprised
there
was
even
a
company
with
a
billion
dollar
revenue
booking
a
call
with
me
For
me
that
was
a
clear
sign
That
is
insane
Nobody
else
is
doing
this
This
is
an
underserved
opportunity
We
should
do
this
right
now
because
if
I
can
rank
with
a
fake
landing
page
for
this
keyword
and
this
big
company
books
a
call
with
me
I
should
do
this
opportunity
Okay
This
is
amazing
I
love
how
you
did
this
What
I
want
to
get
from
you
is
the
validation
playbook
If
you
were
starting
over
from
scratch
with
a
new
product
right
now
what
would
be
your
playbook
to
validate
before
you
build
Step
one
have
a
job
I
think
the
best
pain
point
to
find
B2B
ideas
is
not
look
around
on
Reddit
or
something
because
business
owners
frankly
didn't
really
check
Reddit
The
best
way
to
be
in
a
business
is
having
a
job
at
some
point
of
your
life
So
having
a
job
I
think
is
actually
an
absolute
advantage
compared
to
indie
hackers
or
builders
who
never
had
a
job
because
they
don't
really
know
all
the
processes
that
happen
in
a
business
Step
number
two
set
up
a
landing
page
do
some
basic
SEO
research
go
to
Ahrefs
or
go
to
any
free
SEO
tool
search
for
keywords
that
buyers
would
search
for
Step
three
set
up
a
calendar
link
They
see
your
face
on
a
call
They
know
you're
a
real
human
They
trust
you
and
then
you
try
to
close
them
on
a
call
and
try
to
swipe
their
credit
card
while
you're
on
a
sales
call
Step
four
the
deposit
framework
Don't
say
please
pay
for
my
non
existing
solution
or
even
make
them
pay
monthly
for
something
that
is
not
there
The
better
way
is
deliver
as
much
value
as
you
can
and
give
them
a
100
refundable
deposit
offer
Say
for
example
500
you
take
down
it's
a
one
time
payment
that
you
take
and
the
buyer
gets
full
access
to
your
product
Once
it
launches
you
can
also
put
some
urgency
in
there
For
example
the
Secure
US
spot
in
the
first
launch
of
the
product
product
Also
one
big
point
go
high
ticket
If
you
go
this
route
and
do
a
call
with
a
buyer
don't
charge
them
20
or
something
Charge
them
something
serious
So
you
know
they
are
in
Nothing
validates
your
idea
more
than
someone
swiping
their
credit
card
Step
five
give
it
some
time
to
incubate
So
if
you
go
to
SEO
route
it's
going
to
take
a
little
bit
of
time
but
you
will
get
serious
buyers
because
they
search
for
a
solution
So
give
it
a
little
bit
of
time
to
incubate
I
love
how
Timo
shared
the
exact
framework
for
how
to
validate
before
building
Collecting
cash
before
writing
code
is
definitely
the
way
to
go
especially
if
you
want
to
ship
a
successful
app
as
a
solo
founder
But
when
it
comes
to
actually
building
the
app
you
might
lose
all
momentum
So
many
founders
waste
weeks
if
not
months
on
the
UI
stage
tweaking
spacing
and
buttons
and
second
guessing
every
layout
at
1am
in
the
morning
And
that's
where
Mobbin
comes
in
And
yes
they're
today's
sponsor
sponsor
but
honestly
they're
one
of
my
favorite
tools
for
getting
out
of
the
design
spiral
fast
and
building
something
beautiful
Mobbin
is
basically
a
giant
organized
vault
of
real
world
product
designs
actual
apps
actual
screens
broken
down
by
feature
flow
style
all
of
it
So
instead
of
guessing
on
how
to
design
a
pricing
page
or
an
onboarding
flow
you
can
just
see
how
the
best
apps
in
the
world
do
it
and
build
from
that
10
times
faster
Mobbin
has
personally
saved
me
hours
And
honestly
it
makes
designing
kind
of
fun
Again
just
click
the
first
link
in
the
description
If
you
want
to
check
out
Mobbin
right
now
they're
offering
starter
story
members
20
off
their
annual
pro
plan
Huge
thank
you
to
Mobbin
for
supporting
this
video
Let's
get
back
into
it
I'm
also
curious
to
hear
from
you
guys
You're
busy
building
your
business
but
I'm
sure
you're
seeing
lots
of
other
cool
ideas
you
could
be
building
right
now
What
are
some
good
ideas
that
you
think
are
worth
starting
in
2025
AI
is
super
hot
right
now
And
it
opens
up
so
many
new
opportunities
and
possibilities
that
haven't
been
there
before
but
also
opportunities
to
do
something
completely
new
and
different
ways
There
are
also
so
many
non
technical
people
who
want
to
build
with
AI
So
facilitating
that
for
them
gluing
softwares
together
or
automating
workflows
is
the
play
I
think
One
idea
from
me
lovable
for
mobile
apps
So
lovable
is
absolutely
great
for
building
simple
web
apps
landing
pages
But
I
realized
most
internet
users
are
on
mobile
and
mobile
apps
are
not
as
easy
to
build
as
web
apps
So
if
someone
can
figure
out
a
builder
like
lovable
but
for
let's
say
Swift
apps
I
think
that
is
one
of
the
biggest
opportunities
you
can
go
after
And
I
think
that
could
even
be
bigger
than
lovable
itself
which
has
like
a
billion
dollar
valuation
Okay
So
the
next
thing
I
want
to
switch
to
is
growth
Obviously
this
validation
strategy
is
a
great
way
to
get
those
first
customers
get
that
initial
demand
but
then
you
need
to
sort
of
scale
it
and
figure
out
a
growth
strategy
So
what
did
you
guys
do
for
Satter
We
basically
went
purely
inbound
We
figured
to
just
double
down
on
what
works
already
and
what
validated
the
idea
because
that's
where
our
first
customers
came
from
That
was
SEO
and
content
Once
we
launched
our
actual
website
for
Satter
ai
within
a
week
we
ranked
on
page
one
on
Google
and
now
ranked
number
one
worldwide
for
this
keyword
The
SEO
growth
came
through
three
main
strategies
First
building
free
tools
that
people
can
search
up
such
as
free
sales
script
generator
Second
log
articles
that
compare
to
other
big
tools
in
the
space
For
instance
something
like
HubSpot
alternatives
The
third
one
and
that's
a
very
underrated
one
is
definitely
YouTube
long
format
Most
of
the
customers
we
closed
came
through
watching
at
least
one
YouTube
video
before
jumping
on
the
call
YouTube
and
watching
long
format
content
by
nature
has
this
high
intent
from
the
watcher
but
then
also
creates
insane
trust
into
your
business
already
Also
it's
the
second
biggest
search
engine
after
Google
Think
about
that
Okay
Well
let's
dive
into
some
of
the
numbers
behind
the
business
I'm
curious
how's
this
business
doing
financially
What
are
some
of
the
revenue
profit
that
you
could
share
Pretty
much
exactly
10
K
last
month
We
had
higher
months
before
but
August
is
always
a
slow
month
in
B2B
We
had
around
2000
total
signups
of
businesses
We
have
focused
more
on
the
higher
paying
businesses
because
we
saw
lower
churn
with
these
So
our
paying
customer
number
is
only
38
but
therefore
these
are
like
high
value
businesses
We
also
applied
to
YC
five
times
We
got
one
interview
and
we
have
not
been
selected
yet
Also
our
channel
on
YouTube
has
600
subs
and
we
also
got
some
acquisition
offers
recently
that
we
are
weighing
Thanks
for
sharing
that
on
that
same
note
I'd
also
love
to
hear
about
your
tech
stack
How
does
this
business
run
What's
the
stack
you're
using
and
what
tools
do
you
use
to
run
the
business
We
use
Ahrefs
for
SEO
use
answer
the
public
for
YouTube
video
ideas
I
use
Zapier
to
automate
TDS
task
I
use
Beehive
for
email
automation
and
newsletters
I
use
Calendly
to
schedule
appointments
We
use
Webflow
to
host
the
landing
page
and
the
CMS
and
yourbusinessnumber
com
to
buy
phone
numbers
On
the
tech
side
we
have
a
pretty
scalable
and
straightforward
mainly
serverless
stack
It's
built
on
top
of
TypeScript
and
SvelteKit
The
database
is
a
Postgres
host
both
on
Render
and
Superbase
which
are
combined
at
around
150
per
month
We
use
Puppeteer
for
browser
automation
and
Fallback
to
open
AI
for
all
of
the
AI
stuff
We
also
use
things
like
the
Brandfetch
API
We
use
Plausible
for
analytics
It's
just
29
a
month
and
just
so
much
easier
to
use
and
better
than
Google
Analytics
in
our
opinion
For
development
we're
hosted
on
Netlify
We
use
Cursor
for
AI
assisted
coding
Cool
And
on
that
same
note
what
does
it
cost
to
run
a
B2B
SaaS
like
this
What
are
the
margins
like
The
margins
are
great
Without
ads
it's
90
plus
percent
Tried
ads
hired
some
freelancers
for
some
work
so
it's
more
down
to
like
80
percent
The
highest
cost
per
month
is
OpenAI
API
around
250
a
month
or
hiring
some
Upwork
freelancers
here
and
there
which
can
add
up
to
500
a
month
Well
thanks
for
sharing
that
The
last
question
that
I
have
for
both
of
you
is
advice
for
anyone
watching
this
channel
If
you
were
to
start
over
today
or
if
you
could
stand
on
the
shoulders
of
Timo
and
Joseph
when
they
were
just
starting
out
trying
to
figure
out
how
to
do
this
thing
online
what
would
be
your
advice
Charge
early
on
Don't
be
afraid
to
charge
because
charging
creates
urgency
and
commitment
not
only
from
you
but
also
your
customer
Go
high
ticket
It
makes
your
life
easier
Sell
to
rich
people
they
pay
better
is
what
Homozi
likes
to
say
Beautiful
Thank
you
guys
for
coming
on
the
channel
I
love
the
business
you
built
You
did
it
in
just
over
a
year
which
is
amazing
I'm
sure
it's
going
to
keep
growing
and
you
guys
are
awesome
Thanks
for
coming
on
Thanks
for
having
us
Pat
Thank
you
Thank
you
to
Joseph
and
Timo
for
coming
onto
the
channel
I
think
what
they
did
is
a
great
example
of
how
to
build
lean
successful
apps
that
might
change
your
life
If
you're
looking
to
get
started
and
do
something
similar
yourself
well
I
I
have
something
for
you
Starter
story
build
is
our
program
where
you
will
go
from
an
idea
to
a
working
app
in
less
than
two
weeks
Frankly
this
was
impossible
before
AI
but
now
with
the
right
structure
you
can
do
it
Even
if
you
have
a
full
time
job
or
no
coding
experience
just
click
the
link
in
the
description
to
start
a
story
build
If
you
want
to
learn
more
otherwise
I
hope
you
guys
enjoyed
this
episode
I'll
see
you
in
the
next
one
Peace
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