Target the "Fortune 5 million" (small businesses with 3-500 employees) rather than consumers or enterprises
Insight from David Heinemeier Hansson
When to use
When choosing your target market for a B2B SaaS product and you want sustainable revenue without enterprise sales cycles or consumer-scale marketing budgets.
Don't do this
Chasing either consumer markets (requires millions of users for meaningful revenue) or enterprise deals (requires long sales cycles, heavy customization, and big teams to close).
5 Founders Who Did This
Target the "Fortune 5 million" (small businesses with 3-500 employees) rather than consumers or enterprises
Targeted small restaurants priced out by OpenTable and Yelp's hundreds-per-month fees plus per-reservation charges. Offered flat $100/month pricing accessible to small businesses.
Targeted the 'Fortune 5,000,000' (small businesses with 3-500 employees) rather than the Fortune 500 or consumers. Used flat-rate pricing ($12-$149/month) instead of per-seat to align with small team needs.
Chose to target the 'Fortune 5 million' (broad SMBs) instead of just YC startups despite having easy network access to tech companies
Deliberately targeted small businesses with 3-500 employees, capping pricing at $299/month unlimited. Refused enterprise customers entirely.