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Discuss – Do AI agents deserve all the hype they are getting?

2•MicroWagie•1h ago•0 comments

Ask HN: Anyone Using a Mac Studio for Local AI/LLM?

47•UmYeahNo•1d ago•29 comments

LLMs are powerful, but enterprises are deterministic by nature

3•prateekdalal•5h ago•3 comments

Ask HN: Non AI-obsessed tech forums

27•nanocat•16h ago•21 comments

Ask HN: Ideas for small ways to make the world a better place

16•jlmcgraw•18h ago•20 comments

Ask HN: 10 months since the Llama-4 release: what happened to Meta AI?

44•Invictus0•1d ago•11 comments

Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (February 2026)

139•whoishiring•4d ago•517 comments

Ask HN: Who is hiring? (February 2026)

313•whoishiring•4d ago•512 comments

Ask HN: Non-profit, volunteers run org needs CRM. Is Odoo Community a good sol.?

2•netfortius•13h ago•1 comments

AI Regex Scientist: A self-improving regex solver

7•PranoyP•20h ago•1 comments

Tell HN: Another round of Zendesk email spam

104•Philpax•2d ago•54 comments

Ask HN: Is Connecting via SSH Risky?

19•atrevbot•2d ago•37 comments

Ask HN: Has your whole engineering team gone big into AI coding? How's it going?

18•jchung•2d ago•13 comments

Ask HN: Why LLM providers sell access instead of consulting services?

5•pera•1d ago•13 comments

Ask HN: How does ChatGPT decide which websites to recommend?

5•nworley•1d ago•11 comments

Ask HN: What is the most complicated Algorithm you came up with yourself?

3•meffmadd•1d ago•7 comments

Ask HN: Is it just me or are most businesses insane?

8•justenough•1d ago•7 comments

Ask HN: Mem0 stores memories, but doesn't learn user patterns

9•fliellerjulian•2d ago•6 comments

Ask HN: Is there anyone here who still uses slide rules?

123•blenderob•4d ago•122 comments

Kernighan on Programming

170•chrisjj•4d ago•61 comments

Ask HN: Any International Job Boards for International Workers?

2•15charslong•16h ago•2 comments

Ask HN: Anyone Seeing YT ads related to chats on ChatGPT?

2•guhsnamih•1d ago•4 comments

Ask HN: Does global decoupling from the USA signal comeback of the desktop app?

5•wewewedxfgdf•1d ago•3 comments

We built a serverless GPU inference platform with predictable latency

5•QubridAI•2d ago•1 comments

Ask HN: Does a good "read it later" app exist?

8•buchanae•3d ago•18 comments

Ask HN: Have you been fired because of AI?

17•s-stude•4d ago•15 comments

Ask HN: How Did You Validate?

4•haute_cuisine•1d ago•6 comments

Ask HN: Anyone have a "sovereign" solution for phone calls?

12•kldg•4d ago•1 comments

Ask HN: Cheap laptop for Linux without GUI (for writing)

15•locusofself•3d ago•16 comments

Ask HN: OpenClaw users, what is your token spend?

14•8cvor6j844qw_d6•4d ago•6 comments
Open in hackernews

Ask HN: If you only needed 200 customers at$49, how would you approach it?

12•OmKadam•1mo ago
Hi HN,

I’m not trying to build a unicorn or a scalable SaaS.

I’m offering a highly personalized, manual service priced at $49. My goal is very specific and limited:

Get exactly 200 paying customers. Not 2,000. Not VC-scale. Just 200.

Once I hit that, I’m happy.

Given this constraint: • What distribution channels make the most sense when volume is small but personalization is high? • Would you bias toward 1:1 outreach, niche communities, or something else entirely? • If you were optimizing for speed to first 200 sales, what would you avoid doing?

I’m intentionally keeping the scope small and realistic and would love advice from people who’ve done similar “small but profitable” launches.

Thanks — and happy to share results back.

Comments

senordevnyc•1mo ago
I’m growing a solo SaaS in a tiny niche market. In the last six months I’ve gone from zero to about $200k ARR. My average subscription price is about $250/month.

I’m not sure it’d work for your price point, but I’m running Meta ads, and then having leads schedule a call with me (no public pricing). I close them on the call (they give me their CC to start a trial). That’s worked well, though I do want to move towards a self-serve model over time.

pighive•1mo ago
Curious, what is your product?
OmKadam•1mo ago
Thank you so much mate you inspire me a lot for the day, can i know about your conversion rate ad add budget.
senordevnyc•1mo ago
$25 / day. I could scale and optimize the ads more, but the calls are the bottleneck right now
rhoque•1mo ago
How did you figure out the niche and the unmet need?
yellow_lead•1mo ago
You mean $200/mo. right?

I think you should avoid casting a wide net, i.e untargeted ads. Post or contribute to niche communities, reach out 1:1, ask friends for leads. If none of this works, you could try highly targeted ads.

OmKadam•1mo ago
Thanks for the detailed advice, Not $200/Mo, Just need 200 one time paying users $49 per user, for my digital service [Turn your Face into 60+ animated doodles and get attention improve CTR]
kingkongjaffa•1mo ago
> Turn your Face into 60+ animated doodles and get attention improve CTR

I don't understand the value prop, at least not to make me pay $49. I'm not the target audience clearly, but this seems like a mechanical, low sophistication task, why don't I just use gemini or whatever to do this for free? If I already pay $20/month for any LLM that's multi modal I can do this now already.

The asset (animated doodles) doesn't really connect me to how I'm going to get a better click through rate.

I think for this to work you need a specific niche that resonates with people more, like you have a "proven way to get a better CTR for $niche topic with this asset pack which bundles the animated doodles plus a playbook for how to use them" or something like that.

OmKadam•1mo ago
Thanks mate you cleared my view, i need to market it differently. I can understand without seeing actual product no one can predict sells. When you talk about generating with AI same as my output it will cost you around 80-120 days.

Thanks for the feedback KingKongjaffa. I'll work on hero section.

muzani•1mo ago
A specialized POS-inventory-CRM system for an offline store. Pick something - coffee, babysitting, barbers, massage parlors, sushi restaurants.

POS first because everyone has to record money. The value proposition is theft prevention, bookkeeping & taxes, etc. Inventory next because supply chains are too complex for most generic systems. Then some kind of customer retention/acquisition thing so they don't feel like it's a cost center.

The market is too red ocean for VCs to enter. Sales doesn't scale exponentially. That's your moat. I would say just tackle one American sized state, not even the big ones.

Users won't come to you. They'd go to whatever well known system is in your area. You have to go to them. Skip the online ads, TikTok, etc.

rboyd•1mo ago
Would you integrate with existing POS systems or is this a new one? If a new one do you integrate with some existing hardware for card scans?

I saw the POS systems often have developer/partner programs but at this late stage are they granting those partnerships or is this a gatekeeping system?

Do you have to sell the customer on migrating away from their existing system? How do you convince a massage parlor to migrate from Square? A sushi restaurant away from Toast?

Price?

Thanks.

muzani•1mo ago

    "Would you integrate with existing POS systems or is this a new one?"
Depends. The goal is to streamline workflow. A lot of the friction happens when recording transactions. How do you reduce that?

3 years ago, integrating with existing systems might be the smart move, but now with AI, you can build and maintain a POS from scratch faster than an integration.

    "If a new one do you integrate with some existing hardware for card scans?"
Yeah, sell it with the hardware, keep friction down. They cost as much as a phone.

Again, depends on the norm. I find in developing countries, it's typical to have the whole thing as one Android app on a card accepting device. There's cool stuff you can do with the receipt printers. If someone orders a latte with an extra shot and a croissant, you can print out a receipt and little paper things to give to the barista and the croissant guy.

    "Do you have to sell the customer on migrating away from their existing system?"
Often yes. Most can export data, and you can write scripts to import them.

You customize your product to their workflow. Like some people operate with wet hands. Salons like to track how much shampoo is used to flag theft. Education systems may track credit and attach videos of classes.

    "Price?"
Highly variable per state, sector, etc, but OP's requirement of $49/month should be fair.
satvikpendem•1mo ago
This depends entirely on your product and niche, we don't know that.
OmKadam•1mo ago
Its not a SaaS or monthly subscription product simply it is a one time [$49] fee digital service in which you can convert your face into 60+ animated doodles which will help you get attention on X & improves CTR.
csomar•1mo ago
I am working on a SaaS now and the amount of effort required to build a product for 1, 200 or 2.000 persons is roughly the same. There isn't 200 persons out of 20.000 who will accept a sub-par product and pay for it. However, once you get a few people paying for it, there are already more who you just need to discover.

Instead of 200, focus on 5 potential customers only.

leros•1mo ago
Sounds like you could target a small niche that is currently using a broader more generic product.

I'm always surprised by things like the fact there are several software solutions for managing gyms, but there are also specific solutions for rock climbing gyms, yoga studios, etc. I know a guy who builds rock climbing gym software and he's got a team of 20+ employees.

vitaelabitur•1mo ago
What does your tool/service do? Write a blog on "how to do XYZ". Use your personal blog, website, or guest post on Medium, etc.

Be helpful. Share an easy and free way to do it without using your tool/service. Then introduce your tool/service. Share its advantages and some proof that it works. Be genuine and honest, don't oversell it. Acknowledge alternative tools/solutions. Distribute it on reddit, twitter, etc.

If your blog is extremely good, Google Search will pick it up in a couple of weeks.