Planning on quitting your 9-5 soon? Or does the thought of being a solopreneur appeal to you? Or maybe you’ve run a couple of businesses and the thrill of being a tech boss sounds fascinating. One way to achieve these is by starting up a micro-SaaS business. But what’s a micro-SaaS business? We’ll take a deep dive into the micro-SaaS business model and give you some ideas you can start up even if you lack programming skills.
Shall we?
What’s a Micro-SaaS Business?
A micro-SaaS, as the name implies, is a small software-as-a-service tool that solves problems specific to a sub-segment of a market or niche. The beauty of micro-SaaS applications is that they can be developed and shipped within a short time (even without coding experience).
Unlike full-scale SaaS tools with multiple features and functionalities to cater to the needs of multiple teams within an organization, micro-SaaS apps focus on a sub-niche and don’t come loaded with too many features. Also, micro-SaaS businesses are usually run by a small team of up to 5 and can be managed with little capital. SaaS startups, on the other hand, require larger teams and lots of funding (many times, from investors) to run successfully.
That said, let’s explore some of the pros of running a micro-SaaS business.
Benefits of running a micro-SaaS business
Some of the benefits of building a micro-SaaS product include;
- Low barrier to entry
To set up a micro-SaaS startup, you don’t need a boatload of resources. Both technical and non-technical founders can develop their MVP (minimum viable product) within a few days using no- and low-code SaaS builder apps. Only a little capital is needed for development, and you don’t need a large team.
- Recurring revenue
With a micro-SaaS, you can build a predictable recurring income with little expenses. So you can make more profit with less overhead as more users adopt your product.
- Easy decision-making
Unlike in traditional SaaS companies where decision-making is usually slow due to many stakeholders' involvement, you can quickly take action and do what you feel is right for you and the business.
- Location independent
Not commuting to the office every day is one of the luxuries of running a micro-SaaS business – you can do so from the comfort of your home or other nice locations if you fancy the digital nomad lifestyle. Except for your laptop, most of your resources can be accessed from the cloud.
12 Best Micro-SaaS Startup Ideas
Based on some of the software and apps we analyzed on our marketplace, we've unpacked some of the most profitable micro-SaaS products you can develop.
1. Email marketing tool
Source: SMTP2GO
Emailing is one of the most important channels brands and businesses connect with their audiences. Email tools help marketers know the kind of messages that resonate with their audiences. It also saves time by helping marketers manage their email flows. These make developing a micro-SaaS email tracking, management, or analytics tool a lucrative idea.
Idea
Develop an email management tool to help service-based businesses personalize their emails and connect with leads.
MVP
Startups and service-based businesses do a lot of cold emailing. You can create a micro-SaaS to help them get data about their potential customers to create more personalized messaging. It should be able to get data such as the lead’s business, education, bio, recent awards/recognition, latest news/blog content, recent social media post, or the ones they’ve engaged with. Then it should be able to rate the user’s message based on the application of the crawled data.
Examples: TimeToReply, SMTP2GO
2. Testimonial management tool
Source: Testimonial
93% of internet users say they made a purchase decision based on online reviews. Nothing builds more trust with a brand than customers watching or reading the experiences of other customers. Testimonials are some of the most impactful social proofs businesses use to supercharge their marketing: hence, a testimonial tool is one of the most profitable micro-SaaS ideas you can run.
Idea
A testimonial tool for businesses to get reviews (texts and videos) from customers to share on their websites and social media pages.
MVP
Build a colorful testimonial template with features like branding (brand colors, fonts, watermarks, etc.), questions, messages, and ratings that businesses can share with their customers or users. Users should be able to choose which testimonial to share on their websites or social channels with a click.
Examples: Testimonial, Shoutout
3. Personal finance tracker app
Personal finance is one of the hottest niches in the fintech space, and there’s a reason why – people want financial freedom but struggle to manage and keep track of their spending. Personal finance YouTube channels are some of the most followed, which means lots of people are interested in getting their finances together.
Idea
Build a personal finance app for students to plan their finances by tracking their income and daily/monthly spending.
MVP
The personal finance app should help students save toward various goals. The goals could be for travel, holidays, birthdays, etc. The app can have a weekly/monthly reminder to save a certain amount set by the student. There can also be a budgeting tool within the app so students can keep track of their spending and set weekly thresholds.
4. Billing and invoicing micro-SaaS
Source: Invoicy
Creating invoices using Google Sheets and Excel isn’t interesting. It looks monotonous, unprofessional, and visually unappealing. Plus it can be quite a chore tinkering with some of the features if you’re not an expert.
Idea
Create visually-appealing templates for small business owners and/or freelancers to easily create professional-looking invoices and manage their finances.
MVP
Your billing and invoicing tool should have customizable templates that users can easily tweak to save time and send recurring invoices to clients. You could also add a bit of branding features like logos, colors, and fonts to make it look more professional. Also, users should be able to set invoices to automatically send at particular dates as well as track their income.
5. Micro-influencer marketing campaign tool
Source: Creator
Influencer marketing is huge and is one of the most effective ways brands increase their sales. However, only a few brands can afford celebrities and A-list influencers, making micro-influencers a hot niche as the market’s large. You can build a micro-SaaS that connects brands to micro-influencers and helps manage influencer marketing campaigns.
Idea
Build a marketplace app where businesses can find micro-influencers, manage their marketing campaigns, and get detailed analytics.
MVP
The app should have a directory of micro-influencers where users will be able to apply filters to search for influencers based on industry, location, social channels, number of followers, etc. Users can then organize and launch marketing campaigns from your platform by setting goals and metrics to measure the impact of the campaign. Also, include analytics for users to know content performance.
Examples: Upfluence, Creator.co
6. CRM for small ecommerce brands
There are lots of CRMs, so building a niche CRM for ecommerce business owners will be a great idea. An ecommerce CRM can help small ecommerce businesses manage and organize customer data such as contact information, order history, etc. This way, ecommerce brands will be able to serve their customers better.
Idea
Develop a WooCommerce or Shopify CRM for ecommerce brands to improve their marketing and sales by storing important information and tracking customer behavior.
MVP
Your micro-SaaS CRM should give ecommerce business owners access to their customer activity logs, invoicing tools, and messaging tools. The user should also be able to save customer contact and conversation history and browse through customized sales and marketing reports.
7. Resume builder
One of the best ways people sell themselves (experienced professionals and entry-level jobseekers) and their skills is by crafting impactful resumes. Writing an impactful resume is both a skill and an art form, and many people make a living out of this. Building a resume tool to help people stand out and beat ATS sounds like a great micro-SaaS idea.
Idea
Resume builder for jobseekers to highlight their skills and achievements.
MVP
Build resume templates with sections like name, contact, profile summary, work experience, education, hobbies, etc. Within the work experience, color-code sections for users to use action verbs, showcase hard skills (tools used), soft skills, impact statements, impact metrics, etc. Then add a score based on the impact of the resume.
8. Twitter content idea generator
Twitter is one of the most widely-used social networks today. Unlike Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram where people mostly share pictures and videos, Twitter has become an educational platform for creators to build their audiences and a channel for communities to debate global issues. The app’s algorithm also makes it easy for content to go viral, but many users struggle to create viral content.
Idea
Create an app that helps users generate content ideas to grow their Twitter accounts.
MVP
Build a Twitter app that can pick topical ideas from different niches and a wide range of platforms. The app should be able to search the web and pick the most viewed videos on YouTube, read/liked/shared content from blogs, and engaging content both on Twitter and LinkedIn. The app may also have an editor to help users create content and a tool (like a content scorer) to gauge its virality tendency.
9. Remote employee engagement software
Source: Appreiz
Remote work is all the buzz these days with many teams being distributed all over the globe. Developing a tool to help employers appreciate high-performing employees sounds like a great micro-SaaS idea to me. This will make employees happier and keep them more motivated and productive in their jobs.
Idea
Build an employee reward platform for employers to provide employee reviews and feedback, celebrate achievements, and reward productivity.
MVP
Create different departments and categories based on employee levels like entry- or associate-level employees, managers, etc. Add features to track employee progress, results, and achievements, and give rewards. Also, create room for integrating with other remote tools like Asana, Slack, and Microsoft Teams to streamline the workflow.
10. Habit tracking tool
Source: Habits Garden
Everyone knows that creating habits is great for leading a successful and fulfilled life, but only a few people start a habit and stick to it. There are several habit trackers out there, indicating the market is large.
Idea
Create an engaging micro-niche productivity tool for writers to adopt new writing habits and schedules and stick to them.
MVP
We’re picking the writing niche because these days, virtually everyone writes either social media content, books, application letters, etc. Users should be able to use the app to block a special time to write. But to do so, you’ll have to gamify the experience. There can also be some form of reward for consistency and an analytics tool to track progress and see days they’re failing.
Examples: Habitica, Habits Garden
11. Journaling micro-SaaS app
Not only do people love to write on social media, but they’ve also found that keeping personal notes of their thoughts and reflecting on their actions is good for their mental health. This makes creating a journal an interesting micro-SaaS idea.
Idea
Design a journal where users can write about their day and that can serve as a daily/weekly planner.
MVP
Build a journaling micro-SaaS that users can summarize their experiences using an emoji. There should also be an editor for them to describe their day in detail and a calendar tool for saving dates and appointments. You can add features to save names and pictures and create weekly planners with daily goals. Adding a feature to rate experiences with people and places could also make it quite interesting.
Examples: Punkt
12. Employee learning micro-SaaS
An organization is only as productive as the quality of employees it hires. So companies are looking for ways to train their employees and fill skill gaps, so they can reach their full potential.
Idea
A remote micro-learning software with educational content for employees to develop their professional skills.
MVP
Develop a platform where companies will be able to recommend skills like content marketing, copywriting, design, etc., to their employees. The platform can have quizzes to assess users' understanding, plus it’ll make sense to gamify the experience for a more engaging experience.
Examples: Grovo
Factors to Consider when Finding Profitable Micro-SaaS Ideas
Building a profitable micro-SaaS product is no walk in the park – even big tech companies struggle to come up with great ideas: hence, they buy smaller tech companies. Finding that big idea comes down to these major factors – the demand for the product, target audience, and business model – you can find out more about the factors for micro-SaaS startup success.
Growing market
The market you choose to develop your products for is a major factor in determining if your product’s going to be a winner or not. Developing products for the wrong market can spell the death of your product before its development while picking a growing market can see you getting customers in a short while or interested buyers should you want to exit the company – the AI and no-code builder markets are two of such growing markets.
Target audience
As stated earlier, micro-SaaS is different from traditional SaaS startups in that it has a defined audience. Having a defined audience puts you in a position with a lot less competition. For example, there are many CRMs, but you can choose to develop software for freelance content writers to draft invoices for clients. You could decide to create a library of design resources or inspiration or a tool for divorce attorneys to scale their marketing – that’s having a defined audience.
Revenue potential
There’s no point putting time, money, and human resources into a project that won’t fetch you an income unless you’re trying to build it as a non-profit. So when developing your product, consider what users will be willing to pay. Factor in both the business’s and your livelihood’s expenses when targeting a market. Then you can focus on a niche where less than 10% of the market pool can sustain you. For example, if you’re going to price your product at $10/month and you’re spending $2,500/month, you’ll need 250 customers – you’ll want to target a market where your potential 250 customers are under 10% of the market.
How to Find Great Micro-SaaS Ideas
Knowing the factors to look out for when finding a profitable micro-SaaS idea is on one end of the spectrum, knowing how and where to look is another ball game.
Here are some of the ways you can get inspiration for your first (or next) micro-SaaS idea.
SaaS marketplaces
Source: Microns
One of the first places to check when building a micro-SaaS app or software is marketplaces like the Microns marketplace. There are 100s of listings that you can draw inspiration from. Plus you may just find a micro-SaaS startup for sale that fits your idea: and instead of building one from the scratch, you could buy it at a bargain and leverage the existing customers the software already has.
App Store marketplaces
Another place to get great micro-SaaS ideas is on app stores like Google and Apple’s app stores. There are millions of ideas you can get from these places and improve upon.
Niche versions of existing large SaaS companies
Is there a CRM or email marketing software that’s not satisfying the needs of a particular niche? You can make a better and/or cheaper alternative for that specific niche.
Create a solution to your problem
Do you run a service-based business where you find it difficult to get or close leads? Chances are many other similar businesses have the same problem. When you find a strategy for getting clients, you can develop it into a product that addresses this problem.
Productized service
While this might not be a SaaS, you can modify a part of your service (where you keep getting recurring requests) into a product and sell it. You can also create a solution to your clients’ problems and turn it into a product.
Conclusion
These are endless examples of micro-SaaS ideas. Don’t forget, you don’t have to build one from the ground up: there are dozens of profitable micro-SaaS businesses, web apps, mobile apps, ecommerce businesses, etc., for sale on the Microns’s marketplace. Browse through our listings and find one that interests you or sign up, and every week, we’ll send you a list of the best micro-startups. Plus we ensure the seller offers you free 1-month post-sale support.
