Re:Ask HN: How to come up with monetizable side project ideas?
by a13n on Tuesday September 25, 2018 @12:25PM
(#18067754)
Posting answers to highly targeted Quora questions is free. Launching on Product Hunt is free. Writing targeted content that ranks on Google takes time, but costs no money. Retargeting ads are cheap.
I agree that if you're trying to build a big business, you need to think hard about how you're going to get customers. But if you're just trying to make a couple hundred a month (as OP asked), it's a completely different ballgame. You just need a tiny sliver of an enormous pie.
One of the most difficult thing in a SaaS is reaching to a customer in a cost-effective manner. It's common nowadays to have a CAC of $100+. So paid acquisition channels would be impossible if your prices are low.
If you already have a community or a user-base, then probably you can make a few hundred dollars out of it. But if you are starting from scratch, I would rather suggest going for a big idea instead of a smaller one because your marketing efforts in both the case would be almost same.