Business & LegalAdd a premium tier based on what customers ask for
From agency burnout to $4k MRR
Don't guess what people will pay for. Wait for them to tell you. Mircea never planned SingleFax's lifetime number. Customers asked for it by email, he built it in an afternoon (first at $99, now $97 Basic / $147 Pro), and it became a significant revenue stream. The best product roadmap is your inbox.
Related advice
MirceaSell relief from a specific, escalating, dated risk
Renzi's buyers are not shopping for software, they are afraid of ANAF, and the product sells relief from that fear. A specific, escalating, time-bound risk (a tax deadline with growing penalties and a tax authority that now sees your bank and your Airbnb income) is one of the strongest reasons a person ever buys anything. When your product removes a concrete, dated consequence, make that consequence the center of the pitch. People act on a clear, looming risk far faster than on a list of conveniences, and the more real and imminent the risk, the smaller the price feels.
MirceaLocal regulatory knowledge is a moat competitors lack
Renzi is hard to clone from outside Romania because its value is wired to local tax rules, deduction rates, and the quirks of ANAF's portal. Deep, country-specific regulatory knowledge is a real barrier: a larger foreign competitor cannot easily acquire it, and a generic global tool cannot match the precision. A market that looks too small or too local to bother with is often exactly the one a solo builder can own, because the same narrowness that caps the size keeps the giants out. Local and regulated is not a limitation, it is a moat.
MirceaCharge to unlock a received fax
SingleFax charges $0.99 to send. On the receive side, a lifetime or 30-day number is not a free mailbox. If the wallet cannot cover $4.99, the inbound fax is stored as held: the owner gets an envelope email with no PDF, and the dashboard locks the file until they top up or pay the $4.99 release. That keeps the no-subscription promise and still monetizes receive. Occasional-use products die when receive is either free forever or hidden behind a monthly plan. A one-time unlock is the same shape as the original send: a document, a deadline, a card. Price the page that holds the file, not a seat that lasts all year.
MirceaAnchor your price against the cost of the problem
When your product removes a specific, expensive risk, price it against that risk, not against competitors or hours saved. Renzi's homepage leads with "one ANAF fine costs as much as two years of the app." The honest version of that math is not the modest statutory fine but the full exposure it stands in for: retroactive tax on undeclared rent, daily interest and penalties, and the tax authority's own estimate of what you owe. Against a number that large, a subscription of a few tens of lei a month is a rounding error, and the pricing objection mostly disappears. Find the worst outcome your product prevents, do that math out loud on your landing page, and let it dwarf your price.
Extracted from
The $5 Fax: How a Weekend Project Became a Micro-SaaS