Mon 3 Aug · 6pm BST
S01
Weeks 1–2
Foundation
Find a problem worth solving
Most founders start with an idea. The sequence starts with an audience. Before you name a product, brand a domain, or write a line of code — you find evidence that a specific group of people has a specific complaint they'd pay to make go away.
Differentiating before you build
If your product is similar to a funded competitor, the only real difference is resources — and they have more
Pick at least 2 differentiation levers before you start: audience, price, feature scope, distribution, or integration
One product, one job, one promise — not "an SEO platform," but "index your pages faster"
Four idea patterns that print
✂ Unbundle
Take one feature from a bloated tool and make it great. One job, done perfectly.
👥 Clone + new niche
Same job, different audience. Proven demand, fresh market.
📑 Directory-first
Build the audience before the product. Directory → tool sales to that traffic.
🤖 Automation agent
Find something done manually on a computer. Automate exactly one narrow piece of it.
Social listening — where to find real complaints
Reddit threads — people complain honestly when they think nobody important is listening
X and LinkedIn — search for "I wish there was a tool that…" or "why is there no…"
Indie Hackers and Hacker News — builders documenting their own frustrations
Google autocomplete and Exploding Topics for signal on emerging pain
The pain log method: run a 7-day log of your own frustrations, then ship the top pain first
Choosing a domain and brand name
Domain should signal the one job — what it does, not what it is
Short, memorable, and say-able at a conference without spelling it out
Check availability across .com, .so, .co, and .io before you fall in love with a name
Tools this session
Reddit search
X / Twitter advanced search
Indie Hackers
Google Trends
Exploding Topics
Claude / ChatGPT for signal summarisation
Porkbun for domain availability
Gate — before Session 2
You can name one specific audience, one specific complaint, and show evidence it exists in the wild. You have a domain shortlist.
Hot seat format
Each founder presents their problem statement in 3 minutes. The room stress-tests it: is this a complaint or a real problem? Travis tears down one example live — reframes the audience, sharpens the promise, finds the differentiation angle.
Mon 17 Aug · 6pm BST
S02
Weeks 3–4
Validation
Define the solution and validate demand
Validation is proof. Likes can lie. Compliments always lie. Time and money don't. The goal of this session is to get someone to give you money — or at minimum an email — for something that doesn't exist yet.
Writing the problem/solution in one sentence
Formula: [Audience] who [specific frustration] can now [specific outcome] without [old pain]
If you can't say it in one sentence, you don't understand it well enough to build it
Live copy teardown: headline, subhead, CTA — do they all say the same thing?
The pre-launch landing page
The landing page IS the MVP — it describes the product before the product exists
One hero section, one benefit list, one CTA — nothing else at this stage
Build it in hours with Carrd or Framer — do not spend more than a day on this
Set up payment collection before the product exists — Stripe, Gumroad, or Lemon Squeezy
What counts as real validation
A Stripe payment is unambiguous — someone gave you real money
A waitlist signup with a clear "I'd pay for this" message is strong
A generic email signup is weak — don't mistake it for demand
"I love this idea" from a friend is worthless — they're being kind, not honest
The manual MVP — pretend it's software
If you can do the job manually, validate faster by doing it manually for 3 users
Charge anyway. Even a small amount. Learn what "good" looks like.
Then automate what you've already proven people will pay for
Tools this session
Carrd
Framer
Stripe
Gumroad
Lemon Squeezy
Tally for waitlist
Claude for copy
Midjourney / Ideogram for visuals
Gate — before Session 3
You have a live landing page with a payment or signup mechanism. At least 3 people have expressed real intent — paid, signed up with intent, or said "I would pay for this" unprompted.
Hot seat format
Travis rewrites one founder's landing page headline and CTA live using AI tools. The room reviews each founder's demand signal — payment vs signup vs compliment — and calls out what's real and what isn't.
Mon 1 Sep · 6pm BST
S03
Weeks 5–6
Product
Build only what the landing page promised
AI removed the build barrier. The constraint is now scope discipline. The landing page is the spec. Build exactly that — nothing more. If you cannot deliver value in the first 5 minutes of someone using it, no amount of extra features will save you.
Default MVP scope — what to skip
Skip these entirely
Dark mode · Avatars · Profile pages · Teams & roles · Complex settings · Onboarding tours · Permission systems
Build only this
One user · One job · One output · The thing your landing page described · Nothing else
AI-assisted build — the 2026 stack
Use Cursor, Lovable, Bolt, or v0 to build the core flow — describe the one feature and let the tool scaffold it
The biggest risk with vibe coding is security — run a CodeRabbit audit before you take payments
Pick 2–3 tools max and stick to them — tool-hopping kills momentum
Done beats perfect. Shipped beats planned. A live ugly product beats a polished Figma file.
Logo, colour, and visual identity in 90 minutes
Pick one typeface for your wordmark — DM Mono or similar monospace reads as technical and credible
One primary colour, one neutral — don't design a brand system, just pick something that isn't embarrassing
Ideogram, Recraft, or Midjourney for a logo mark — describe the job, not the aesthetic
Figma for layout if you're comfortable — Framer if you're not
Tools this session
Cursor
Lovable
Bolt
v0
Replit
Claude Code
CodeRabbit
Ideogram / Recraft
Figma
Gate — before Session 4
You have a working MVP that does the one thing your landing page described. A stranger can use it without your help in under 5 minutes.
Hot seat format
Travis builds a feature live with an AI tool in real time. Each founder presents their MVP scope — the room cuts it down. One founder gets a live design review: does the brand match the audience?
Mon 15 Sep · 6pm BST
S04
Weeks 7–8
Traction
Get your first 10 paying users
Don't wait for users to find you. Go find them. The first 10 are always manual. That's fine — and expected. If your product is great, users help you distribute it. So the job right now is to find the first ones who'll tell you whether it's great or not.
Product quality first — not marketing
Developers should learn product quality before they learn marketing
Focus on UX, onboarding, performance, and time-to-aha moment
Marketing is a multiplier — if the product is weak, marketing just kills it faster
If nobody is talking about you, the product isn't great yet. Fix the product first.
Where to find your first 10
The communities where you found the original complaint — go back and post the solution
Reddit, Indie Hackers, relevant Slack/Discord communities for your niche
X and LinkedIn — direct message, not broadcast
Hacker News Show HN — works well for developer-focused tools
Product Hunt — a demand spike mechanism, not a sustainable channel
The lifetime deal as a first-user mechanism
A lifetime deal (LTD) on AppSumo or Dealify gives you a burst of early users and upfront cash
Run an LTD early to validate real demand at scale — if nobody buys, you have your answer
LTD users give feedback brutally — treat them as a paid beta cohort
Cap the LTD — 50 to 100 seats max. Scarcity is real at this stage.
Test many channels — then pick one
At the start, test everything lightly — one week per channel for 8–10 weeks
Then pick the one winner and focus entirely on it. Ignore the rest.
Being average everywhere is worse than being great somewhere
Paid ads come later — unless you have a specific angle that makes them work at low cost
Tools this session
Product Hunt
Indie Hackers
Reddit
AppSumo
Dealify
X / LinkedIn DMs
Beehiiv / Substack for niche newsletters
Gate — before Session 5
At least 3 paying users. Real money in. Not friends. Not free trials. Someone who found you and paid without you explaining it to them personally.
Hot seat format
Each founder shares their first 10 user plan and current traction. Travis reviews one outreach sequence live. The room identifies the highest-leverage channel for each founder's specific audience.
Mon 29 Sep · 6pm BST
S05
Weeks 9–10
Commercial
Price it, package it, make it sellable
Most micro-SaaS founders underprice and over-feature. Pricing is positioning — what you charge signals who it's for. And a product you want to sell one day needs to look like a sellable asset, not just a running tool.
Pricing principles
Free is usually poison for early SaaS — it attracts the wrong feedback and delays reality
The floor is usually $19/month — the $5 crowd is not your friend
Better patterns: paid trial ($1–$9 then full price in 7 days), full price with refund promise, early adopter discount with clear limits
If freemium is your distribution model it can work — but only if free users actively promote you
Pricing tiers and lifetime deals
Monthly / annual / lifetime — three tiers, each serving a different buyer psychology
LTD pricing: charge what a year of your product is worth × 1.5 to 2×
When not to run an LTD: if you're pre-product-market fit and the support load would kill you
Annual pricing reduces churn and increases acquisition multiples — always offer it
What buyers look at — building for exit from day one
MRR trend — is it growing, flat, or declining? Growing beats everything else.
Churn rate — monthly churn above 5% is a red flag for most buyers
Documentation — is there a README, setup guide, and tech stack summary?
Code cleanliness — can someone else maintain it without you?
Customer concentration — if one customer is 40% of revenue, that's a risk
Writing the one-page asset summary
What it does (one sentence), who uses it, MRR, churn, tech stack, time to maintain per week
Traffic sources and SEO asset value if applicable
Why you're selling — buyers always ask, have an honest answer
Tools this session
Stripe dashboard for MRR proof
Lemon Squeezy
Acquire.com
Flippa
MicroAcquire
Gate — before Session 6
You have a published pricing page and a one-page asset summary you'd be comfortable sending to a buyer today.
Hot seat format
Founders present their pricing page — the room critiques positioning and price anchoring. Travis reviews one asset summary draft live and marks it up as a buyer would.
Mon 13 Oct · 6pm BST
S06
Weeks 11–12
Exit
Flip it — marketplace, influencer, or direct
The exit isn't the end. It's the proof of concept for the next one. Three paths to exit: list on a marketplace, reach out directly to strategic buyers, or sell to an influencer or operator who already has the audience to grow it. The third path is underused and often pays best.
Exit path 1 — marketplace listing
Acquire.com for SaaS assets with MRR — the most active buyer pool for micro-SaaS
Flippa for content sites, tools, and assets with traffic but less recurring revenue
Typical multiples: 2–4× annual revenue for a clean micro-SaaS with growing MRR
List with full transparency — buyers will find the skeletons anyway
Exit path 2 — direct outreach
Who would benefit most from owning this — a competitor, an adjacent tool, an agency?
Write a one-paragraph pitch: what it is, current revenue, why it fits their business
LinkedIn is the best channel for direct outreach to operators and product founders
10 targeted outreach messages beats a marketplace listing every time for speed
Exit path 3 — the influencer/operator sale
Find creators or operators whose audience is your exact user base
They get a tool that monetises their audience; you get a fast exit at a fair multiple
The pitch is simple: "your audience already needs this, and you don't have to build it"
Often faster and higher-multiple than marketplace — and the buyer is motivated to grow it
Due diligence at micro-SaaS scale
Revenue proof: Stripe screenshots, MRR chart, churn rate
Traffic proof: GA4 or equivalent, SEO rankings if relevant
Tech handover: GitHub repo, env variable list, third-party service accounts
Customer list: anonymised count and cohort data is usually enough at this scale
How to run the next one faster
Build a reusable stack — same auth, payments, and boilerplate every time
Document the sequence while it's fresh — your next validation will take days, not weeks
Each exit builds credibility for the next one — buyers will find you, not the other way around
Programme outcome
A live product, paying users, a pricing page, an asset summary, and a shortlist of 5+ potential buyers. Everything needed to list or outreach within 30 days of this session.
Hot seat format
Each founder maps their most likely buyer profile. Travis shares one real exit story in detail — the approach, the negotiation, the handover. The group builds a shortlist of 5 potential buyers per product before the session ends.