SaaS and indie hacking is the practice of building, launching, and growing software products as a single founder or small team. The category sits at the intersection of engineering, marketing, customer support, and finance — every founder ends up doing all four whether they want to or not. Public communities (Indie Hackers, MicroConf, Twitter/X #buildinpublic) have made the playbook unusually transparent for an industry that used to keep growth tactics private.
The technical stack for a small SaaS in 2026 has converged: a TypeScript or Python backend, Postgres, Stripe for payments, a React or Vue frontend, deployed to Vercel / Render / Fly.io. The differentiator is rarely the tech. It's distribution: SEO, content marketing, paid acquisition channels, retention loops, and the willingness to do customer development calls in the first six months.
What you'll work with in these 18 courses
- Idea validation: customer interviews, landing-page tests, pre-orders
- Pricing: free trial vs freemium vs paid-only, B2C vs B2B economics
- Stripe integration: subscriptions, metered billing, tax compliance
- Marketing: SEO content, cold outreach, paid ads, partner programs
- Onboarding: activation events, time-to-value, churn signals
- Operations: customer support, status pages, billing disputes
