The SaaS Idea Funnel: Filter 100 Concepts Down to 1 Winner

Most founders approach SaaS ideas backwards. They fall in love with a single concept, build it for months, then wonder why nobody cares. The successful ones do something different: they start with dozens of ideas and systematically eliminate the weak ones until only the strongest remains.

This isn't about finding the "perfect" SaaS idea. It's about applying a ruthless filtering process that removes emotional attachment and focuses on what actually matters: market demand, execution feasibility, and revenue potential. By the end of this article, you'll have a repeatable framework for evaluating any number of SaaS ideas and confidently choosing the one worth your time.

Why Most Founders Waste Months on the Wrong Ideas

The average developer or entrepreneur generates 3-5 SaaS ideas per month. That's 36-60 concepts per year. Yet most people build the first idea that feels exciting, ignoring the 59 others that might have better market fit.

The problem isn't lack of ideas—it's lack of a systematic evaluation process. When you treat idea selection as a gut feeling rather than a funnel, you optimize for excitement instead of viability. The result? Six months of development on a product nobody wants.

Successful founders like Pieter Levels, Tyler Tringas, and the teams behind products like Canny and Baremetrics all describe similar processes: generate many ideas, filter aggressively, validate quickly, then commit fully. They don't build the first thing that sounds cool. They build the thing that survives the gauntlet.

As we covered in SaaS Ideas vs Execution: Why Your Concept Matters Less Than You Think, execution beats novelty every time. But even perfect execution can't save a fundamentally flawed idea. That's why the filtering process matters.

Stage 1: The Collection Phase (Target: 50-100 Ideas)

Before you can filter, you need volume. Your goal in this phase is to generate 50-100 raw SaaS ideas without judgment. Don't evaluate yet—just collect.

Where to Source Ideas Systematically

Method 1: Reddit Pain Mining

Spend 30 minutes daily in subreddits like r/Entrepreneur, r/smallbusiness, r/freelance, r/marketing, and industry-specific communities. Look for phrases like:

• "Does anyone know a tool that..."
• "I wish there was software for..."
• "Currently using X but it doesn't..."
• "Paying way too much for..."

Our guide on Reddit to Revenue: How to Extract Profitable SaaS Ideas from Online Communities provides detailed tactics for this approach.

Method 2: Job Board Analysis

Every job posting reveals a problem the company can't solve internally. Browse Indeed, LinkedIn Jobs, and AngelList for roles like "Data Analyst," "Operations Coordinator," or "Customer Success Manager." Ask: what manual work could software automate?

We explored this thoroughly in SaaS Ideas from Job Boards: Finding Opportunities in Hiring Pain.

Method 3: Your Own Workflow Audit

Track every repetitive task you do for one week. Every spreadsheet you update, every manual data entry, every copy-paste operation. These personal frustrations often represent broader market problems.

Method 4: Support Ticket Analysis

If you work at a company, request access to support tickets. Each complaint reveals a gap in existing solutions. Even if you don't have direct access, check Twitter for "@companyname + problem" searches to see what users complain about.

Method 5: "I'm currently paying for X but..." Searches

Search Twitter, Reddit, and Indie Hackers for this phrase. People actively paying for solutions but expressing frustration are your ideal target market.

The Collection Spreadsheet

Create a simple spreadsheet with these columns:

• Idea: One-sentence description
• Source: Where you found it
• Target User: Who has this problem
• Current Solution: How they solve it today
• Initial Gut Score: 1-10 rating (ignore this later, but capture initial intuition)

Spend 2-3 weeks filling this spreadsheet. Set a target of 50-100 ideas. This might seem excessive, but volume is your competitive advantage. Most founders never get past 5 ideas.

Stage 2: The Quick Filter (Target: 20-30 Ideas)

Now you have 50-100 raw ideas. Time for the first aggressive cut. This stage takes 1-2 hours and eliminates 60-70% of your list.

The 8 Instant Disqualifiers

Remove any idea that matches these criteria:

1. Requires Regulatory Approval or Licensing

Healthcare diagnostics, financial advice platforms, legal document generation—these require specialized certifications and expose you to significant liability. Unless you're already in these industries, skip them.

2. Needs a Two-Sided Marketplace to Function

Marketplaces require simultaneous supply and demand. You can't launch until you have both. This creates a chicken-and-egg problem that kills most solo founders. Save marketplaces for your second or third venture.

3. Depends on Unproven Technology

If your idea requires breakthrough AI capabilities, blockchain adoption, or VR/AR hardware proliferation, you're betting on the future. Build for today's technology, not tomorrow's promises.

4. Targets Consumers Who Don't Pay for Software

Consumer SaaS is brutally competitive and requires massive scale. Unless you have a clear path to millions of users, focus on B2B. As we discuss in B2B SaaS Ideas: 25 Problems Businesses Will Pay to Solve, businesses pay for pain relief.

5. Requires Enterprise Sales Cycles

If your target customer needs legal review, procurement approval, and 6-month implementation, you're building an enterprise product. These work, but they require funding and patience. For bootstrapped founders, target SMBs who can buy with a credit card.

6. Solves a Problem You've Never Experienced

You might think restaurant owners need better inventory management, but if you've never worked in a restaurant, you're guessing. Stick to domains where you understand the nuance. Check out SaaS Ideas from Your Own Workflow: Turn Daily Frustrations Into Products for why personal experience matters.

7. Already Has a Dominant Free Solution

Competing with free is possible but requires 10x better execution. If Google Sheets, Notion, or Airtable already solve this problem adequately for free, you need a very specific angle to win.

8. Requires Ongoing Content Creation or Moderation

Ideas like "Yelp for X" or "community platform for Y" require constant content moderation and community management. These don't scale with your time and quickly become jobs rather than products.

After applying these filters, you should have 20-30 ideas remaining. If you have fewer than 15, your initial collection wasn't broad enough—go back to Stage 1.

Stage 3: The Market Validation Filter (Target: 8-12 Ideas)

Now comes the research phase. For each remaining idea, spend 30-60 minutes answering these questions:

The 5 Market Validation Questions

Question 1: Can I find 100 people discussing this problem online?

Search Reddit, Twitter, Indie Hackers, and niche forums. If you can't find active discussion about this pain point, it might not be painful enough. Look for:

• Multiple threads with 20+ comments
• Recent posts (within 6 months)
• Emotional language ("frustrated," "hate," "waste," "terrible")

Question 2: Are people currently paying for inadequate solutions?

The best validation is existing spend. Search for:

• Competitors (even bad ones prove market demand)
• Adjacent tools people hack together
• Freelancers or agencies selling manual solutions
• Job postings for people to do this manually

If nobody pays for anything related to this problem, you'll need to create a market from scratch—exponentially harder.

Question 3: Can I reach these users through specific channels?

List 3-5 specific places your target users congregate:

• Subreddits with 10K+ members
• Facebook groups
• Slack communities
• Industry conferences
• LinkedIn groups
• Niche job boards

Vague answers like "marketing professionals" don't count. You need specific, accessible communities.

Question 4: What's the frequency of this pain point?

Daily problems command higher prices than monthly problems. Monthly problems beat quarterly ones. Rate your idea:

• Daily: Strong candidate
• Weekly: Good candidate
• Monthly: Possible but harder
• Quarterly or less: Skip it

Question 5: Can I articulate the ROI in one sentence?

If you can't explain the value in clear terms ("Saves 5 hours per week" or "Reduces customer churn by 15%"), your target users won't understand it either. Practice your one-sentence value prop.

Eliminate ideas that fail 2 or more of these questions. You should now have 8-12 strong candidates.

Stage 4: The Execution Reality Check (Target: 3-5 Ideas)

This is where many founders deceive themselves. An idea might have perfect market validation but be impossible for you specifically to execute. Be brutally honest.

The 6 Execution Feasibility Criteria

1. Technical Complexity: Can You Build an MVP in 4 Weeks?

With modern AI tools like Claude, Cursor, and v0, technical complexity has dropped dramatically. But some ideas still require months of development. Our article on AI SaaS Ideas: 30 Apps You Can Build with Claude & Cursor shows what's now possible quickly.

Rate your idea:

• Simple CRUD app with forms and dashboards: 1-2 weeks
• Integration with 2-3 APIs: 2-3 weeks
• Real-time features or complex algorithms: 3-4 weeks
• Machine learning or advanced AI: 4+ weeks

If you can't reach a testable MVP in 4 weeks, the feedback loop is too slow for bootstrapping.

2. Integration Dependencies: How Many Third Parties?

Each integration adds:

• Development time
• Ongoing maintenance
• Points of failure
• API costs

Ideas requiring 5+ integrations are risky for solo founders. Aim for 0-3 critical integrations.

3. Data Acquisition: Where Does the Data Come From?

Some ideas sound simple until you realize they require:

• Proprietary datasets you don't have
• Web scraping that violates ToS
• User-generated content before value exists
• Real-time data feeds with expensive licensing

If your product requires data you can't easily access, eliminate it.

4. Customer Support Load: Can It Run While You Sleep?

Estimate support needs:

• Self-service only: Ideal
• Email support, async responses: Manageable
• Live chat expected: Challenging solo
• Phone support required: Eliminate

As covered in SaaS Ideas for Developers Who Want to Work Solo in 2025, solo founders need low-touch products.

5. Pricing Clarity: Can You Charge $50-500/Month?

The pricing "dead zone" is $10-20/month. Too cheap to matter, too expensive for impulse purchases. Your idea should justify either:

• $50-100/month (clear time savings)
• $200-500/month (clear revenue impact)

If you can't justify at least $50/month, the unit economics probably don't work for bootstrapping.

6. Sales Complexity: Can Users Self-Serve?

Rate your required sales motion:

• User signs up and starts using immediately: Ideal
• User needs 30-minute onboarding video: Acceptable
• User needs 1-hour implementation call: Challenging
• User needs custom setup and training: Eliminate

After this filter, you should have 3-5 ideas that are both market-validated and execution-feasible for your specific situation.

Stage 5: The Competitive Landscape Analysis (Target: 2-3 Ideas)

Competition isn't bad—it validates demand. But you need a defensible angle.

The Competition Framework

For each remaining idea, map the competitive landscape:

Direct Competitors

• List 3-5 products solving exactly this problem
• Note their pricing
• Read their reviews (G2, Capterra, Reddit)
• Identify common complaints

Indirect Competitors

• What do people use today? (Often spreadsheets or manual processes)
• What free tools partially solve this?

Your Differentiation Angle

You need one of these:

• Vertical specialization: Same tool, specific industry ("Mailchimp for real estate agents")
• Simplified alternative: Remove 80% of features, reduce price 50%
• Integration focus: Works seamlessly with specific stack
• Better UX: Solve same problem with 10x better interface
• Different business model: Productize what's currently a service

The Competition Sweet Spot

Ideal scenario:

• 2-5 competitors (proves market demand)
• All charging $100+/month (proves willingness to pay)
• Consistent 3-star reviews mentioning same problems (opportunity for differentiation)
• No dominant player with 80%+ market share

Red flags:

• Zero competitors (might mean no market)
• 20+ competitors (saturated market)
• One dominant free player (Google, Microsoft)
• Recent $50M+ funding round by competitor (they'll outspend you)

Eliminate ideas where you can't articulate a clear, defensible differentiation. You should now have 2-3 finalists.

Stage 6: The Validation Test (Target: 1 Winner)

You're down to 2-3 strong ideas. Before committing to one, run these lightweight validation tests.

Test 1: The Landing Page Test (1 Day)

Create a simple landing page for each idea:

• Clear headline describing the benefit
• 3-4 bullet points of key features
• Email signup for early access
• Pricing indication (even if not final)

Use v0.dev, Carrd, or a simple HTML template. Don't overthink it.

Spend $50-100 on targeted ads (Reddit, Facebook, Google) or post in relevant communities. Track:

• Click-through rate
• Email signup rate
• Questions people ask

Goal: 20-30 email signups in one week. If you can't get this, the messaging isn't resonating.

Test 2: The Manual MVP Test (1 Week)

For your top idea, offer to solve the problem manually for 5 people. Post in relevant communities:

"I'm testing a new solution for [problem]. For the next 5 people, I'll do this manually for free for one month to understand the workflow. Interested?"

This accomplishes three things:

• Validates people actually want this
• Teaches you the real workflow
• Creates your first potential customers

If you can't find 5 people willing to try even a free manual version, the problem isn't painful enough.

Test 3: The Willingness to Pay Conversation (3-5 Calls)

Talk to the people from Test 2. Ask:

• How do you solve this today?
• What does it cost (time or money)?
• What would make you switch?
• What would you pay for a solution?

Listen for:

• Specific dollar amounts ("I'd pay $100/month")
• Current spend ("We pay $500/month for X but it doesn't do Y")
• Urgency ("I need this yesterday")

If 3+ people indicate willingness to pay your target price, you have a winner.

For more on this process, see The SaaS Idea Validation Playbook: 6 Tests to Run Before Building.

The Final Decision Matrix

You should now have clear data on 2-3 ideas. Use this scoring matrix:

| Criteria | Weight | Idea A | Idea B | Idea C | |----------|--------|--------|--------|--------| | Market demand evidence | 25% | 1-10 | 1-10 | 1-10 | | Execution feasibility | 20% | 1-10 | 1-10 | 1-10 | | Revenue potential | 20% | 1-10 | 1-10 | 1-10 | | Competitive differentiation | 15% | 1-10 | 1-10 | 1-10 | | Personal interest | 10% | 1-10 | 1-10 | 1-10 | | Validation test results | 10% | 1-10 | 1-10 | 1-10 |

Calculate weighted scores. The highest score is your winner—unless your gut violently disagrees. If it does, you probably didn't weight the criteria correctly for your situation.

What Happens After You Choose

Picking the idea is 20% of the work. The other 80% is execution. But you've now done something most founders never do: systematically evaluated dozens of options and chosen based on data rather than excitement.

Your Next 30 Days

Week 1: Detailed Planning

• Map user workflows
• Design database schema
• List required features for MVP
• Set success metrics

Week 2-4: Build MVP

• Focus on core workflow only
• No nice-to-haves
• Use AI tools to accelerate development
• Test with your manual MVP users

Week 5: Launch to Validation Group

• Onboard your 5 manual testers
• Gather detailed feedback
• Fix critical bugs
• Refine pricing

For more on rapid execution, check out Building a Micro SaaS in One Week: Why Speed Matters.

The Anti-Pivot Commitment

Here's the hard truth: you'll be tempted to pivot when things get difficult. You'll see other opportunities and wonder if you chose wrong.

Don't.

You've done the work most founders skip. You've validated demand, confirmed feasibility, and tested willingness to pay. The idea isn't the problem—execution is the challenge.

Commit to 6 months of focused execution before even considering a pivot. Most "failed" ideas actually failed because the founder gave up after 6 weeks.

Common Mistakes in the Filtering Process

Mistake 1: Skipping the Volume Phase

You can't filter 5 ideas down to 1 winner with confidence. You need 50-100 raw concepts to find the gems. Most founders quit at 10 ideas because collection feels tedious. Push through.

Mistake 2: Letting Excitement Override Data

Your most exciting idea is probably wrong. Excitement comes from novelty, but novelty doesn't predict market demand. Trust the process, not your gut.

Mistake 3: Ignoring Personal Constraints

A great idea for someone else might be terrible for you. If you hate customer support calls, don't choose an idea that requires them. If you're not technical, don't choose something requiring complex algorithms. Honest self-assessment matters.

Mistake 4: Filtering Too Quickly

Each stage should take time:

• Stage 1 (Collection): 2-3 weeks
• Stage 2 (Quick Filter): 2 hours
• Stage 3 (Market Validation): 1 week
• Stage 4 (Execution Check): 3 days
• Stage 5 (Competition): 3 days
• Stage 6 (Validation Tests): 2 weeks

Total: 4-5 weeks. If you're doing this in a weekend, you're not doing it right.

Mistake 5: Choosing Based on Existing Skills

Don't limit yourself to ideas matching your current skillset. With AI development tools, technical complexity has dropped dramatically. Choose based on market opportunity, then learn what's needed.

For more on common pitfalls, see 7 Mistakes Everyone Makes When Choosing SaaS Ideas (And How to Avoid Them).

Real Examples: The Funnel in Action

Case Study: From 73 Ideas to $8K MRR

A developer I spoke with (who requested anonymity) shared his process:

Month 1: Collection

• Generated 73 ideas from Reddit, his job, and industry forums
• No filtering, just documentation

Month 2: Filtering

• Quick filter eliminated 48 ideas (regulatory issues, marketplace requirements, consumer focus)
• Market validation removed 15 more (no evidence of demand)
• Execution reality check eliminated 6 (too complex or required phone support)
• Left with 4 finalists

Month 3: Validation

• Created landing pages for all 4
• One got 3x more signups than others
• Ran manual MVP test with 8 people
• 6 of 8 said they'd pay $79/month

Month 4-6: Build and Launch

• Built MVP in 5 weeks
• Launched to validation group
• First paying customer in week 7
• $8K MRR after 6 months

The key: he didn't fall in love with his first idea. He let the data guide him to the strongest opportunity.

Tools for Running Your Funnel

Idea Collection

• Notion or Airtable: Organize your idea database
• Reddit Keyword Alerts: F5Bot or TrackReddit for monitoring phrases
• Twitter Lists: Organize target users into lists for monitoring

Market Research

• Google Trends: Validate search volume for problem keywords
• BuiltWith: See what technologies companies use
• SimilarWeb: Estimate competitor traffic
• G2/Capterra: Read competitor reviews for pain points

Validation Testing

• v0.dev or Carrd: Quick landing pages
• Mailchimp or ConvertKit: Email list management
• Calendly: Schedule validation calls
• Loom: Record product demos

Development

• Claude + Cursor: AI-assisted development
• Supabase: Backend and database
• Vercel: Hosting and deployment

Your Action Plan: Start Today

Here's your week-by-week roadmap:

This Week

• Set up your idea collection spreadsheet
• Identify 5 sources for idea generation
• Set a goal: 20 ideas by end of week

Week 2-3

• Continue collection to 50-100 ideas
• No filtering yet, just volume

Week 4

• Apply quick filters
• Run market validation research
• Narrow to 8-12 ideas

Week 5

• Execution reality check
• Competitive analysis
• Narrow to 2-3 finalists

Week 6-7

• Run validation tests
• Make final decision
• Start detailed planning

The founders who win aren't the ones with the best first idea. They're the ones who systematically evaluate many ideas and choose the strongest. You now have the framework to do exactly that.

Start collecting ideas today. Your winner is somewhere in the next 100 concepts you document. The only way to find it is to start the funnel.

For more strategies on finding and validating opportunities, explore our complete guide on How to Find Profitable SaaS Ideas: 7 Proven Methods for 2025.