Microns: New Micro Startups For Sale, Due Diligence
Hey, folks!
I am happy to write to you again ❤️
This week was pretty cool and hard. We launched on 10words, a few newsletters, and Product Hunt upcoming page 🚀
Got a lot of great people on the board 💡
Next week would be crazier because we scheduled a launch on the Product Hunt 😺
I have a lot of plans for Microns to make it a great place for next-gen entrepreneurs.
I call them "indiepreneurs".
They are developers, designers, marketers, and other people who shift their focus to become universal entrepreneurs.
P.S. I chose the cheese picture because last weekend, I with my wife visited the cheese factory 🧀
Learned how people create cheese. From the farm to the market.
Tasted Gouda, Parmesan, and Brie. Awesome experience!
👋 Welcome
Welcome to the 74 new people joining this week!
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Now let’s crack on with the newsletter 🚀
(Estimated read time: 5 minutes)
📎 Due diligence
Are you wondering what it is?
Due diligence it's just a process. Process of the investigation if the thing that you want to buy is worth their money.
It would be best if you did due diligence before buying the product.
For this, learn startup listing carefully, and schedule a call with the founder.
To do due diligence the right way, you need to ask the right questions.
Here is my list of 10 questions you should ask:
1) How many clients do you have right now? What is the main source of your clients?
Comment: By asking this question, you will understand if a startup has growth potential.
Customers, it's the approval that the business should exist.
Even free customers are important because later, you could potentially convert them into paying ones.
2) What are your churn rate, MRR, LTV, and CAC?
Comment: They are the main metrics for every SaaS business.
Churn rate — the number of customers you have lost over a certain period of time (month, year), as a percentage of the total number of customers.
MRR stands for monthly recurring revenue. It allows you to predict how much income you will receive in the future, each month.
LTV is lifetime value. The average amount of money your customers pay for the time they interact with your app.
CAC — customer acquisition cost. It shows how much it costs to acquire new customers.
I could do a separate and detailed issue on it if you say.
3) Who wrote the code and who owns it? Any issues with it?
Comment: It's important because after buying, you should maintain the codebase.
You need to understand if you could do it by yourself if it's a no-code tool.
Or you should hire a developer. As a result, additional expenses.
4) Do you have customer support service? How do you handle feedback from clients?
Comment: It says that you keep in touch with your customers.
Remember, customers are your heart and brain. Without them, you can't exist.
Therefore you should have strong customer support and respond to customers fast.
5) Can I try the product itself?
Comment: Trying the product itself will give you more understanding of the problem this product solves and how it solves it.
Moreover, you can ask additional questions on the call with the founder if you find something interesting using the product.
6) Do you grow organically or via ads?
Comment: You will learn the growth strategy set by the founder.
What techniques you can apply.
How hard it would be to grow the product in the future.
7) Do you have some automation in?
Comment: Automation is always good because it will save you tons of time.
But don't be fanatic about automating everything.
Instead, always measure if it is worth it.
8) Do you have any analytics? How do you track your stats?
Comment: Analytics is essential here.
You can always approve to your buyers your numbers.
Setting it properly will give you insights into what distribution channel performs best.
So you can increase your efforts only on things that work and remove activities that don't give you results back.
9) What are your expenses? What is the current cost to host the project? Any other monthly payments related to the project?
Comment: Expenses in tech are always low if we talk about hosting, domain, third-party services, etc.
But, there might be salary expenses or something unexpected, which could be high in price.
So always check this.
10) Who are your customers? Which business are they in? What's the typical usage scenario?
Comment: Understanding who your customers are is key to the success of every startup.
If you know your customers well, you can easily scale your startup.
As a result, you found a product-market fit.
So you can increase your revenue shortly.
😊 Next steps
After due diligence, you should analyze all the information and send a letter of intent if the asking price is good.
I will tell you how to evaluate a startup and show you an example of a letter of intent in the next issues.
Stay tuned.
😺 Launching on Product Hunt
Next week, Monday, Aug 30 at 12:00 AM PDT, Product Hunt will post Microns.
Every upvote is very important.
Please support me that day if you like the content. Thanks.
📰 Looking for new owners
Cleaning Schedule Web App
$25 in ARR
Business model: one-month free trial, then $3.99 per month
Perfect for householders
Open metrics. 148 signups and 1 paid customer
Tech: Bubble.io
Founded in 2021
Landing page: rosterbuddy.app
🔥 Asking Price: $1,500
Click here to contact the founder
Courses for Data Scientists and Analysts
£10,000 in ARR
Business model: $60 or $375 per course
Perfect for ML engineers & data scientists
130 customers
Tech: Podia, Stripe, Mailchimp
Founded in 2018
Landing page: product.peadarcoyle.com
🔥 Asking Price: £20,000
Click here to contact the founder
Pasteboard Manager for Mac, iPhone, and iPad
$9,600 in ARR
Business model: Freemium with a one-time purchase
Perfect for Mac users
9,500 customers
Tech: Swift, Swift UI, UIKit, AppKit, CloudKit
Founded in 2021
Landing page: onmyway133.com/pastepal
🔥 Asking Price: $30,000
Click here to contact the founder
💡 Wisdom from subscriber
💌 Share with a friend
If you found value in reading this issue, please consider sharing it with your dear friend.
Let me know if you have a story about selling or buying a startup.
I will cover it here so other readers could learn.
Stay awesome,
Ilya Novohatskyi