Is a unified chat CRM too broad for a first SaaS? Looking for validation advice
Concept illustration for the CRM idea I’m researching.
I’m a beginner SaaS builder currently working on a unified chat CRM. The idea is to bring customer conversations from different channels into one place and help businesses keep track of contacts and follow-ups.
As I work on it, I’m questioning the business side: am I solving a problem people would pay for, or building something that existing tools already handle well enough?
I chose this direction because conversations and follow-ups seem closely connected. But that is still an assumption I need to test. Having messages in one dashboard might be convenient without being a strong enough reason for a business to buy another subscription.
The decision I’m trying to make is whether to continue with a broad unified inbox or narrow the product to one customer group and one important workflow.
For example, I could investigate businesses that sell through chat, small agencies handling conversations for clients, or teams that need a better way to track enquiries. These are possible research directions, not customer segments I’ve already validated.
Before going further, I want to understand how to research this properly.
My initial research plan would be to:
Choose one potential customer group and learn how they currently handle conversations and follow-ups.
Ask about recent problems, their existing tools, and any workarounds they use.
Compare those workflows with competing products and look for recurring gaps in user reviews.
Test a small prototype around one problem before committing to a larger feature set.
For people who have built, bought, or used a shared inbox or chat CRM, I’d appreciate your perspective on three questions:
Where do existing tools still fall short in your actual workflow? A specific example would help me more than a feature wishlist.
How would you improve this research plan? In particular, how would you distinguish polite interest from a problem someone would pay to solve?
As a first-time builder, what would make you narrow this idea, continue with it, or choose a different SaaS niche?
I’m open to finding out that the idea needs to change. I’d rather learn that through research now than spend months building around the wrong assumption.
If you’ve been through a similar decision, what evidence helped you choose your direction?
Replies
the different custmer groups you mentioned could have completely different problems. I’d probably interview a few businesses from each group first and look for which conversations contain the most frequent and expensive pain.
@rahul_manjhi1 One thing I’d track during interviews is whether people have already spent money or time solving the problem. Existing workarounds are often stonger evidence to me than someone saying they would like a better tool.