SaaS Product Validation: 3 Startups, 2 Exits

Jake Stein spent six months pitching enterprise customers and got zero conversions. They loved the vision of standardized contracts but wouldn't be the first to adopt. His SaaS product validation journey across three startups reveals why validating SaaS ideas with the right buyer matters more than having the right product.

Jake shares how RJ Metrics' SaaS go-to-market took eight years before selling, how Stitch sold for $60M in just two years by applying those lessons, and why Common Paper's go-to-market strategy shifted from enterprise to startups. You'll learn why ungated free products outperform gated content for SaaS product validation.

Jake's first startup RJ Metrics raised $20M before Amazon Redshift disrupted their business. He spun off Stitch and sold it to Talend for $60 million. Common Paper now has 140 paying customers with tens of millions in deals closed through standard contracts - built on validating SaaS ideas by giving the most valuable part away free.

Key Lessons

• 🎯 Match your SaaS product validation to the buyer: Jake used his investor pitch on enterprises - they loved it but wouldn't adopt first. Early-stage startups signed up immediately.
• 📉 Losing product-market fit happens even after strong traction: RJ Metrics had $20M raised and growing metrics, but Amazon Redshift disrupted their entire architecture overnight.
• 🚀 Spin off fast-growing features for SaaS product validation: Jake extracted Stitch from RJ Metrics as a standalone product-led company that sold for $60M in two years.
• 🆓 Ungated free products beat gated content: Common Paper gives away standard contracts without requiring an email. Thousands download, a subset enters free tier, and 140 converted to paid.
• 🛠️ Start with the hair-on-fire problem: Common Paper launched with NDAs because they were simplest. Nobody cared enough. The SaaS sales contract finally unlocked demand.

Chapters

• Introduction and Jake's journey recap
• What Common Paper does and company metrics
• The RJ Metrics origin story and bootstrapping
• SaaS product validation at RJ Metrics and losing PMF
• Spinning off Stitch and the $60M exit
• Six months of enterprise enthusiasm, zero conversions
• Ungated free products as the go-to-market strategy
• Pricing model and open-source attorney committee
• Lightning round

Resources

• Full show notes: https://saasclub.io/404
• Join 5,000+ SaaS founders: https://saasclub.io/email