Ultimate Lifetime Deals Buying guide for SaaS, WordPress & Other softwares

We look for Lifetime Deals to save monthly/yearly recurring bills for the business tools and founders launch lifetime licenses to attract traction from the interested users as well as to raise some early investments.

It would have been great in an ideal scenario but upside-downs are happening for various reasons like a Business failure, Business takeover, Over promising, Founder’s bad intentions, etc.

We look for trusted SaaS platforms (AppSumo,PitchGround, Dealify etc.) so that they bring us quality deals.

Ideally, Lifetime Deal platforms should take care of the below steps (vetting a deal). But as the number of deals they bring is increasing (Quality vs Quantity), the chance for a bad deal is also increasing. Hence we need to cross-verify the same.

Here we discuss the ways to vet a deal before purchasing it. Do not forget to check the list of the Black Friday Lifetime Deals on SaaS and WordPress plugins & themes.

Founder history

You need to dig a bit about the founder to understand his vision, ethics and background. This can be done with the help of platforms like ProductHunt, Capterra, G2Crowd, and Social media groups about Lifetime Deals.

Company history

Learn about the management behind the product/service, when they started, how are they growing, what is their mission, what is their other products, what is the revenue model etc. So that you can guess whether the company is going to sustain and support you in the long or not.

Team

Questions to ask:

• How many people are behind the product?
• Is there a dedicated team for this product or service?
• What is the usual turn-around-time for the support?
• Are they listening to customers?

Financing

Companies will be in different stages like Self-funded, MRR (Monthly recurring revenue) if it is established from the last few years, or funded by investors. So it will be good if we know this.

Some even invest the money from other products they own. Ex: Sofly team is developing Oxygen Builder (WordPress) with the help of their other established products.

Knowing their finances helps us to invest in their product confidently.

Questions to ask:

• What is their main stream of revenue?
• How much is invested?
• Who invested?

Roadmap

The roadmap is very important in-case of Lifetime deal offers, because most of the time, Products are sold based upon the future plans rather than just the existing features.

Most of the SaaS founders put up their roadmap available for the public. Go through it and understand their vision.

Check whether their roadmap is inline with your business plan or not? If it is then it is good.

If the team is customer-centric they will change the roadmap according to the customer feedback and requests.

Documentation, Tutorials & Support

This is very crucial, especially during the initial stage. As you’re just getting started with the tool, you may not be aware of the product UI and functionality.

Pricing

Compare the price with the similar softwares in the market.

Yearly vs Lifetime

Usually, I prefer the deals with lifetime pricing up to double (sometimes triple) to their yearly plan not more than that.

Ex: if the yearly plan costs $139 it is ok if the lifetime deal cost range is $280 ~ $350.

Best Practices

I go through this steps in the process of purchasing a software license.

1. Requirements – Write down what you need, do not get into FOMO, similar tools (or even better) keep coming into the market.
2. Research – look for honest reviews and discussions before even trying, so that you can save your valuable time. Join the below mentioned groups for the research.
3. Trial – Using the trial version is highly recommended as the LTD platforms are restricting the refunds. You need to raise a manual request in-case of a refund. StackSocial does not issue refunds if the code is redeemed.
4. Put the tool into work – Put the tool into work immediately so that you can request a refund in-case the SaaS doesn’t solve your problem, before the refund period (which is usually 14 days).

Beware of

Certainly, there are some shady practices being done by Founders (not really but they call themselves so), like making a SaaS tool out of the Codecanyon script or Github project, forking other tool, getting fake reviews or incentivising for 5 star reviews.

Codecanyon SaaS

Condecanyon is a popular marketplace for Code scripts (PHP scripts, HTML, Python etc.), WordPress plugins, etc.

People are buying/copying the scripts from there and marketing them as SaaS tools. I do not have any issue if they add more value to it, apply their vision, including their support after getting the code from the above sources.

Recently, the above trend is rising among the SaaS Lifetime Deal world.

But some of these founders want to make real quick money with other’s code (These people fully dependent upon the other developer’s support) t in the name of Lifetime Deal and vanish after the refund period is over.

Here is the exact post/thread from the LTDSpot Facebook group (See in the Credits)

How to navigate the LTD market and stay away from fake SaaS?

Originally I posted in my group but sharing here as its an important topic specially since sites like Appsumo have stopped doing any due diligence.

Lately i have been seeing many so called ‘SaaS founders’ picking up scripts from codecanyon or github and then repurposing them to make it look like a shiny little SaaS!

I wanted to make a dedicated post on this issue because i have been seeing many garbage products taken straight from codecanyon and pushed onto buyers who don’t know any better, lets stop this madness!
Many deal sites actively engage in promoting these shitty SaaS and its super unethical to say the least. You will see example of some of the Codecanyon SaaS deals on various deal sites

Remember this quote
“People who compromise their Integrity for money end up with neither”

Red Flags to look for in SaaS deals

• Prices are cheap AF, and they offer too much for too little.
• History of the founder, check the founder’s behavior, and how he acts when confronted. Small things giveaway the larger picture.
• You will usually see many similar SaaS floating around with just a little change in branding, that’s a big red flag.
• Stay away from repeat offenders, some of the examples are Popnetmedia, 90% of JVzoo founders
• History of the deal site, most deal sites just care about sales and commissions.

Here’s what’s everything wrong with “Codecanyon SaaS” and why you should avoid it

• Users who end up buying these “Codecanyon Saas” LTDs are left with no support and updates
• In most cases, the company goes bust as soon as the LTD money stops flowing.
• Genuine founders have a hard time selling their SaaS because of the trust issues created by these garbage products.
• It’s a lazy way and not sustainable.
• 95% of the SaaS founders who use this approach are just trying to make a quick buck and shut shop later.
• Here are some of the examples of SAAS apps which are running around just using Codecanyon Source Code

You can find all Codecanyon SaaS scripts here:
https://codecanyon.net/category/php-scripts?term=saas

P.S: I will be updating this thread with more links, you can drop a link in the comments section and i will add it to the post!

P.P.S: This is just to make the buyers of LTD more aware, do your own research before you buy something, most deal sites don’t bother.

Fork/Copy/White label

GitHub is a free open-source project directory. There are tons of applications with the open-course codes available in the GitHub. People are grabbing the code from there and marketing it as another product.

Some even copy the entire product, they just change the name.

And there are people using the White Label concept to make fool out of LTD buyers. Some SaaS/Products offer white-label features for agencies. The white-label plans are for agencies to serve their customers with their own brand and people are using it to resell it as if it is their own product.

Fake Reviews

Recently, seen a trend rising on SaaS platforms, that is Founders are asking their customers to leave a review to get extra licenses of the tool for free. It is obvious that they expect 5 start reviews.

If they ask for normal review then it would have been ethical but few of them are directly asking for 5 star review, which is a shady practice.

How to Spot a Fake Review?

• One-deal reviews are obviously fake.
• But, most sumolings usually give 5 tacos for every deal they buy.
• So, how can we know if a review is genuine?
• Well, I read the long ones with the pros and cons. If they just wrote, “this is such a great product…blah blah blah my business sentimentality..blah blah blah it saved me so much money without prior knowledge that they have used it for x amount of months/years/time besides the one day it came out.” That stuff is not a review, it’s your diary.
• I don’t trust any review from accounts that are less than six months old. 
• I always go through the questions and answers. The responses from the founders give great insight into purchasing or passing the deal.
• Be Skeptical about the reviews from accounts with 1 or 2 deals bought.

Business is on sale

Recently encountered a situation, where they are selling lifetime liceneses to customers while they put their business for sale on other platforms.

There is recent proven-ly deal is listed on Appsumo & Dealfuel (not sure if it’s selling on other deals website) is for sale on platform Indiemaker for $24k and Whobal

https://appsumo.com/provenly/
https://www.dealfuel.com/…/provenly-social-proof-widget/

Proven-ly SaaS Sell OFF listing

https://indiemaker.co/listings/proven-ly
https://whobal.com/businesses/provenly-social-proof-and-notification-widget

Credits: Karthik Sharma from the LTDSpot community.

Hype from Affiliates

Most of the products are being marketed by Affiliates. Most of the Affiliates provide the features & details of the product in their own way. As usual, the promotions contain a lot of hype from the affiliates.

You need to go through it and understand the limitations of the product before jump-in. LTD communities help you to decide

Tips from the LTD family

Saurabh Chauhan, BlogBing & GetKeywords

Here are a few points I take care of.

Check if the recurring product cost is acceptable for the long-term. I mostly avoid products, which have ongoing third-party API costs and selling thousands of deals constantly.

I mostly wait for 15-20 days before buying any deal, so people can review the product. As well we can understand founder behavior towards bugs, roadmap & communication. I bet more on founders than products.

I mostly avoid products in LTD from first-time founders. As if you don’t have experience in this industry, It’s easy to get diverted when you get a huge amount of money from the LTD. And that’s a danger sign always.

I avoid products where the founder is hiding behind the marketing & sales team ( Except they are too huge with 50+ team members ). Because if the founder doesn’t care to communicate with the people betting on them, it’s tough to expect a long-term win-win situation.

And the golden rule, I don’t buy anything if I have no use-case of the product as of now. No investment, as there are a huge number of products jumping into the LTD market constantly.

These are few points I can think of ❤

Sky Yap, LTD community member

So yup that’s what I do usually.

research and try their softwares. I avoid any software that offer $1 trial. If you are Ahrefs, then you can do so. If not, you must fire your marketing person.

check out groups. Maybe someone in the community has some issues with the founders. Then we can know whether the LTD is legit or not.

platforms. I avoid some platforms that don’t have good customer service or reputation. But this one is risk and reward. Calculate your risk and only buy when you really feel it is a great product.

don’t buy roadmap. I get screw up by roadmap most of the time. Buy the things that you need and calculate the Roi comparing with some subscription basis SaaS. Some LTD offers good promise but ended up deliver shit.

the transparency as well as the communication. If the founder didn’t disclose their MRR or go-to-funding strategy. They are shit and yup, they have no MRR and will probably launch another round of LTD.

utilize your 60days refund. I refund a lot as most team reveal their weakness within 60 days. Those are just hype-up software that you will never use. Refund it within 60days and only pay subscription.

and the most extreme way is schedule a meeting with the founder team. Interview them or register a demo session. Ask more questions and then post to this group and ask for feedback. Give and take. You will definitely see the community help you in deciding whether you should buy this LTD or not.

for reselling, yup. Although it is against the terms and conditions most of the time but it is necessary as it can recover the cost.

f off FOMO and love open source. Utilising open source can really save you a lot of time.

last one, company research as well as founder team research. Domain checking. Demo. Company setup location. Founder nationality. Founder background. And all those research should be done so you have a grasp on whether the founder is worth your investment or not.
Lastly, treat your money as an investment to SaaS company. You are like a venture capital who invest in software. You are SoftBank but smaller amount of money. Invest wisely, I am sure you are going to profit and get plenty benefits from this LTD community.

Vigneswaran Ramu, Experienced LTD Buyer

Well the best you can do is wait till the last day to buy. Atleast u will have some time to refund. Most of the time we will se the true nature of a software/saas within the first few months after the end LTD.And from personal experience, i would say dont max stack any LTD. Unless u know its something established and really good like Amelia. Buy 1 code and test it out. If that fulfils all your need, then even if they dont come up with a update often, atleast u will have something that u can use at any time. Unless of course they go out of business

Mohamed Ali, DigitalThink

I look at price first and then History of the developer if I can find it, the need for the tool in my stack, if I can make my money back using the tool, perceived value …is it rare tool, simplicity, UI, customer support and monthly pricing vs LTD to justify purchase, uniqueness ( no other tools doing the same ) , generosity of the deal giving good limits or not , whitelabel and sub-accounts

Grace Sari, LTD community expert

i’d say test it, see if it fits your workflow in at least coming 6-12 months, if not immediately?Do not blindly follow reviews ( as many are incentivised). I personally stopped following too many reviews. yes its good to have, but not an influencer in my purchase decision anymore Watch roadmap, founder behaviour during and after launch period ( preferably refund period too)… talk to your friends who use it… ok more will flow in as I remember

Albert Tan, DownloadSilo

Buying LTD is like buying a lottery. Sometimes you strike gold and most of the times you strike shit or less shitty deals. Even reputable founders could end up closing shop for whatever reasons. Due diligence needed as suggested by all in this thread. Happy buying, refunding, reviewing, shelfing, etc.

Ken Moo, Content Loop Digital

Sharing from experience:

1. Don’t buy if you don’t see yourself using it in the next 12 months. (better still, 3 months)
2. Buying to keep on the shelf, and reselling later to recover cost is a bloody waste of time. So don’t give in to fomo.
3. Resist the urge to buy immediately. Seat on it for a few weeks.
4. If the provider uses intercom, it gives me some confidence that they may already have MRR.
5. Don’t believe 5 star reviews. Filter and go through 1-3 taco reviews.
6. If you have a SEO tool, check their organic traffic and seo efforts. If a site already has good traffic, the tool can probably last for a long time. (e.g. wishpond)
7. Find out founder’s intent. Is it to raise cash? (not so good). Is it to get user feedback? (awesome). Gain market share? Gain user base? Boost numbers for seed round?
8. Learn their plan to get MRR after LTD. Some founders have no clue. THey launch and die.

Good luck!

Reginald Chan, Founder @ Serverstack.io

Here’s what I personally think.
1. Get from reputable source.
2. If buying resell codes, check the person’s profile
3. If doing transaction via PayPal, ask for invoice (you can get buyer’s protection with invoices)4. Always use credit card as you can easily dispute payment.
5. Ignore roadmaps but they are good (cos anyone can just create roadmaps)
6. Buy because you need, not just your friends get it
7. Define usability of it (imagine) after 12 monthd

Source: Alston Antony Group

Bad deals from the past

P.S: The below list is curated from the Private communities, these are NOT our opinion. We do not intended to degrade any Software product owner in any way, We just want to present the information to the buyers.

Contact us with details if you you think your product is listed wrongly here.

Lifetime Deal discussion communities

There are few honest deal discussion groups on Facebook. Group admins bring the founders into the groups for direct interactions, webinars, FAQs, and much more.

Some of them even launch private deals for the communities.

Below are the few top communities I am part of.

• Our Community
• Alston Anthony Group
• LTDF
• VoviLTD
• Martech Forums
• Pabbly group
• LTDSpot

I recommend joining the above all groups for better understanding and private launches.

Resources & Credits

I have curated the above list from the experiences shared in the above Facebook communities along with our own experience.

• VoviLTD thread
• Martechwise thread
• LTDHunt thread
• Martechwise thread
• Alston Antony thread
• LTD thread in Alston Antony group

All the best with your business endeavor.
What do you think of the guide? Comment below.