Launch a Micro-SaaS MVP in 90 Days

Assumptions

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  The founder can reach at least 8–12 freelance professionals in the target niche for 30-minute problem interviews within the first 2–3 weeks, and at least 10 of them will agree to beta test later.
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  The target problem is a high-frequency scheduling pain for freelancers (e.g., booking calls, client sessions, or discovery meetings) that is painful enough to justify paying for a lightweight tool.
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  A narrow MVP can be limited to one primary scheduling workflow without needing a full calendar suite, team scheduling, or advanced routing rules.
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  Stripe can be used for the founder’s business setup, country, and product category without requiring special approval, tax registrations, or alternative payment rails.
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  The founder already has the technical skills to build and deploy the MVP solo, including basic frontend/backend work, auth integration, and Stripe integration.
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  The product can be validated and launched using simple web-only pages; no mobile app, browser extension, or native desktop client is required for initial adoption.
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  Product Hunt and Reddit will be viable acquisition channels for this audience, and community rules will allow a launch post or discussion without requiring a different go-to-market motion.
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  The MVP can be tested with a manually onboarded beta group, so full automation, support tooling, and self-serve onboarding are not required before launch.
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  There is no need for custom legal review beyond standard terms/privacy basics for a simple scheduling SaaS that stores user account data and calendar-related metadata.

Constraints

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  The build scope must fit roughly 15 hours per week for 90 days, so the plan has to stay under about 180–200 total founder hours and avoid parallel feature work that does not unblock validation or beta use.
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  Total non-founder spend must stay within $500, so the plan cannot rely on paid ads, premium tooling stacks, contractors, or expensive third-party APIs unless something else is removed.
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  Auth and payments are gating dependencies: beta access, launch readiness, and monetization must not depend on custom billing logic until Stripe checkout/subscriptions are working.
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  Validation interviews and the landing page must happen before heavy feature development, because a weak interview signal would change the product direction or cancel the build path.
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  The MVP must remain simple enough to ship without calendar-provider edge cases, complex sync conflict handling, or enterprise permissions, otherwise the timeline breaks.
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  Any beta cohort must be recruited before launch assets are finalized, because feedback from real users is required to decide which scheduling workflow to keep.
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  Product Hunt launch timing is a fixed external dependency that requires a polished demo, social proof, and a working signup/billing path before launch day.
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  Reddit promotion must be tailored to subreddit rules and may require different copy, proof, or timing than the Product Hunt launch, so it cannot be treated as one generic announcement.
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  If the target users already use incumbent scheduling tools effectively, the plan must shift from feature-first building to sharper differentiation or niche positioning before coding more.