Growth & Strategy
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Short-term (< 3 months)
Last year, a potential client approached me with an exciting opportunity: build a two-sided marketplace platform. The budget was substantial, the technical challenge was interesting, and it would have been one of my biggest projects to date.
I said no.
The client came to me excited about the no-code revolution and new AI tools like Bubble. They'd heard these tools could build anything quickly and cheaply. They weren't wrong—technically, you can build a complex platform with these tools.
But their core statement revealed the problem: "We want to see if our idea is worth pursuing."
They had no existing audience, no validated customer base, no proof of demand. Just an idea and enthusiasm. Sound familiar?
In this playbook, you'll learn:
Why building an MVP to "test market demand" is backwards thinking
The distribution-first approach that actually validates ideas
When Bubble is the right tool (and when it's completely wrong)
My framework for deciding what to build vs. what to validate manually
Real examples of validation tactics that scale
Reality Check
What the startup world gets wrong about MVPs
The startup world has fallen in love with a dangerous myth: build first, validate later. Every accelerator, every startup guru, every Medium article preaches the same gospel.
Here's what they typically recommend:
Build a "simple" MVP - Usually 2-3 months of development
Launch to "see what happens" - Hope users magically appear
Iterate based on user feedback - If you get any users at all
Scale what works - The mythical product-market fit moment
Use no-code tools like Bubble - Because they're "fast and cheap"
This conventional wisdom exists because it feels productive. Building something tangible creates the illusion of progress. Tools like Bubble make this illusion even more seductive—you can literally see your idea come to life in real-time.
But here's where this falls apart in practice: your first MVP should be your marketing and sales process, not your product. The constraint isn't building anymore—it's knowing what to build and for whom.
In the age of AI and no-code, the real challenge isn't technical execution. It's distribution and validation. Yet founders still spend 90% of their time building and 10% on audience development, when it should be reversed.
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
When this potential client approached me about their marketplace platform, I saw all the red flags immediately. They wanted to spend months building something complex before proving anyone actually wanted it.
Here's what made this project particularly interesting: they were in a B2B niche where personal relationships matter. Think high-value consulting services where trust and reputation are everything. Their idea was to "Uberize" an industry that fundamentally resists commoditization.
The client's reasoning was logical on paper:
"The market is fragmented and inefficient"
"Technology can solve coordination problems"
"Bubble can build this quickly and cheaply"
But when I dug deeper with simple questions, cracks appeared everywhere:
"Who exactly is your first customer?"
"Well, there are two sides to the marketplace, so..."
"Which side will you onboard first?"
"We need both sides simultaneously for it to work."
"How will you reach them?"
"Once we build it, we'll figure out the marketing."
This is the classic marketplace chicken-and-egg problem, compounded by a "build first" mentality. They were asking me to create a complex technical solution before understanding the fundamental business mechanics.
I've seen this pattern repeatedly: entrepreneurs fall in love with the building phase because it feels like progress. But as I learned from my SaaS consulting work, the hardest part isn't building—it's getting people to care about what you built.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
Instead of taking their money to build a platform, I proposed something that initially shocked them: "If you're truly testing market demand, your MVP should take one day to build—not three months."
Here's the validation framework I walked them through:
Day 1: Create Your "Manual MVP"
I told them to create a simple landing page explaining their value proposition. Not a working platform—just a clear description of what they planned to solve. Total time investment: 4-6 hours using a simple tool like Framer or even a Notion page.
Week 1: Manual Outreach Experiment
Instead of building matching algorithms, I had them manually reach out to potential users on both sides of their marketplace. The goal: find 5 people willing to pay for the service and 5 people willing to provide it.
This revealed something crucial: the demand side existed, but the supply side had zero interest in a platform model. The service providers valued their client relationships too much to outsource lead generation to a third party.
Week 2-4: Manual Matching Process
Rather than building automated matching, they manually connected interested parties via email and WhatsApp. This "concierge MVP" approach taught them more about user behavior in one month than a platform would have taught them in a year.
The Pivot Discovery
Through this manual process, they discovered the real problem wasn't coordination—it was trust and vetting. Service providers didn't want more leads; they wanted better, pre-qualified leads from trusted sources.
This insight led to a completely different business model: a referral-based community rather than a marketplace platform. The distribution strategy became the product itself.
When We Finally Used Bubble
Only after validating the revised model manually did we discuss building. By then, they needed a simple community platform with member vetting—not a complex marketplace. Bubble was perfect for this simpler use case, and we built it in 2 weeks instead of 3 months.
Key Insight
The biggest breakthrough was realizing that their "platform" problem was actually a "trust" problem that required human-centered solutions.
Validation Speed
Manual validation took 4 weeks vs. 12+ weeks for platform development, allowing for rapid pivots based on real user feedback.
Cost Efficiency
Total validation cost: under $500 in time and basic tools vs. $20,000+ for full platform development with uncertain outcomes.
Tool Selection
Bubble became the right choice only after understanding the actual requirements—not the imagined ones from the initial concept.
The manual validation process revealed what months of platform development never could have:
Market Reality: Strong demand side (buyers) but weak supply side (service providers) for platform model
Business Model Pivot: From marketplace to vetted referral community
Time Savings: 4 weeks to validate vs. 12+ weeks to build and then discover problems
Cost Efficiency: Under $500 in validation costs vs. potential $20,000+ in development waste
The client eventually built their community platform using Bubble, but it was a completely different product than what they originally envisioned. The manual validation process had educated both them and their early users about what actually needed to be built.
More importantly, they launched with 20 pre-validated community members instead of launching to an empty platform hoping people would show up.
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
Question every building assumption: Just because you can build it doesn't mean you should
Manual first, automate later: If you can't do it manually, automation won't magically fix it
Distribution beats features: Understanding how people find and adopt your solution matters more than what features it has
Validate the business model, not just the idea: People might want your solution but not be willing to pay for it the way you imagine
Tools like Bubble work best for iteration: Use them to build version 2.0 after you understand what version 1.0 should actually be
Marketplace problems are distribution problems: The technical platform is usually the easy part
Time constraints force clarity: When you only have one day to "build" something, you focus on what really matters
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS startups specifically:
Use Bubble for workflow automation tools after validating the manual process
Start with a landing page and waitlist before building features
Focus on one user persona initially—multi-sided markets are exponentially harder
For your Ecommerce store
For ecommerce applications:
Bubble works well for inventory management tools and internal operations
Test product-market fit with basic Shopify store first
Use Bubble for custom admin panels, not customer-facing storefronts