Charge businesses thousands to see this data

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Today’s business idea is a pretty interesting one you’ve probably never thought of. It’s organizing SaaS product pricing.

This might sound little but I’m talking $20k - $50k a pop for allowing people to see this data. How the heck would this even work and why can you charge so much?

Here’s why:
SaaS products are a 160 billion dollar industry and there’s thousands of products companies can choose from for things like email service providers, CRM platforms, logistics software, etc.

The thing about all these SaaS products is it’s kind of a black box when it comes to comparative pricing.

Why? 
Because these software companies don’t put their prices on their websites. Instead they force companies to go through demos where salespeople are pressuring them to buy their products the whole time and only give prices at the end.

This leaves businesses in the dark as to what their competitors are charging and what the other options are on the market.

Not to mention getting this data requires putting employees through demos, which is extremely time consuming and expensive.

That’s what this business would be solving. Give companies a comprehensive pricing view across software products.

Two clear-cut examples:

#1 If a company wants an email service provider, they can easily see what the options and pricing on your website. No searching and spending countless hours going through demos and searching for prices online.

#2 A SaaS company wants to see exactly what its competitors are charging.

These are the two big players you’ll sell to.

This problem is apparent - I’ll give a quick example.

When I go on G2, a reputable software reviews website, and look at email marketing service providers the first one on the list is a company called Belkins.

I’ve never heard of this company and I see there are no prices on G2, so I go to their site.

Same story there, you have to set up an appointment just to see pricing.

I’m willing to bet if I went down this list on G2, 90% of the companies would be the same. This data isn't easily accessible and that's why this business would kill.

Who would you sell this data to for $20k-$50k?
Product teams at software companies or CROs (Chief Revenue Officers) and ask “Do you know how you came up with your pricing? Here’s what your peers are pricing at.”

It’s literally their job to maximize revenue for their products and if they have insights into what competitors are pricing it gives them a leg up. That $20k price tag will look cheap.

Give them a sneak peek of what you provide. Maybe show some competitor data then make them buy a subscription to see the rest.

Logically, you’re probably thinking “Faares, how the hell am I going to get these prices?”

You gotta be sneaky!

I’d pay employees like $5 an hour (sourcing them from companies like supportshepard.com who find you talent from the Philippines) and have them sit through these demos to collect the prices at the end.

They’d have to pretend like they’re interested so you’d need to train them and maybe even come up with a fake business to look legit.

This is a dirty way to create a sizable data business making hundreds of thousands of dollars with just a few clients.

I have ¾ of the steps on how to get this business going. There’s one I’m not too sure how you would do it.

Let’s dive in:

1. Hire employees to sit through demos

Make a list of SaaS products for specific software categories using sites like G2 or Clutch.

Start niche and perfect one category, say, email marketing.

Gather every price for this category and target companies in the space that are willing to pay for competitor pricing.

For employees, check out gig economy marketplaces. You can find affordable workers for $5 - $10 an hour to sit through these demos and collect prices.

2. Create a web crawler

This is the step I'm not too sure of.

This web crawler would collect all the prices of SaaS products that aren’t locked behind demo doors.

I’m not a software engineer so this is a little out of my league but you can find relatively cheap technical workers on Upwork, Fiverr, or Replit.

I’m assuming you can go on websites like Product Hunt, G2, Capterra, and Trustpilot where SaaS products are reviewed and set your parameters to crawl those sites. Then based on certain parameters tell the crawler to look for prices by looking for “$”.

I know it's doable because I have friends who are software engineers and have done similar things. You could go the manual route, it will just take longer.

3. Build a simple database/search engine

This can be a spreadsheet with 3 columns headers:

• SaaS Category

• Product Name

• Price

On your site for paying members will be an easy to use interface where users can filter by any of the above to slice and dice the data.

As an example, if a company wanted to see the best customer relationship management (CRM) platforms they could filter by that category, and see all the products with their prices at different subscription levels.

4. Be specific with who you target

This will be the hard part. How are you going to get your site’s visitor count up?

Facebook ads work even though people say they’re over saturated.

Here’s a whole article with 15 tips on how to target business owners on Facebook.

For the cliff notes version, here’s 3 tips:

1. In the detailed targeting section include “facebook page admins” or “business page admins”. Most business owners are an admin of a facebook page

2. Use “e-commerce” or “business owners” in the interests and demographics section

3. Don’t make your ad complicated. Make it stand out. We have an iPhone notes page as our best performing ad for this newsletter. Why? Because it stands out.

The other effective way would be using G2 to find all the CROs for each product in a category you're collecting prices on.

Find these execs on LinkedIn and send them an email including a snippet of their competitor's prices demonstrating the insights your site provides.

Show the value and reel them in. To get their email format use RocketReach.

And that’s all I had on this one!

It won’t be easy and it will take time to get up and running but this is a clear pain point in the industry with companies willing to pay big money to easily see their competitor's prices.

You got this. Happy hustling! 💪

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That's a wrap ladies & gents! Enjoy the weekend :)

DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.