I Built a SaaS in 30 Days. Here’s Exactly What Happened.
SMRTR summary
A developer tool called StackTrace went from zero to $1,287 in monthly recurring revenue in just 30 days, transforming messy production logs into readable incident summaries for bleary-eyed programmers dealing with 2 AM system failures.
The creator built the solution using deliberately simple technology—Next.js, PostgreSQL, and OpenAI's API—avoiding the temptation of complex microservices architecture. Starting with an ugly one-page prototype sent to 14 developer friends, the tool gradually gained traction through user feedback rather than feature assumptions.
A transparent post on Dev.to generated over 6,000 visits in 24 hours, proving that developers respond better to honest storytelling than polished marketing. The pricing model that worked best offered a free tier with 20 monthly analyses plus a $19 unlimited pro option.
With 312 total users and 41 paying customers, the biggest lessons learned were charging from day one, building boring but useful tools, and talking constantly with users. The next goal is reaching $3,000 in monthly revenue while solving challenges like preventing AI hallucinations and reducing API costs.
SMRTR provides this summary for quick context. The original article belongs to Daily.dev.
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