Sometimes a Small Software Feature Can Be the Entire Product

When people think about building a software company, they often imagine something massive. Hundreds of features. Complex dashboards. Large development teams. Years of engineering. At Jarbly Venture Labs, we sometimes look in the opposite direction. What’s one small thing people wish their existing software could do—but can’t? That single missing feature can sometimes become a product of its own.

The Idea Behind Video Popup

One example from our venture development work is Video Popup. The underlying concept was simple: What if a website owner wanted an easier way to display video through a popup experience on their website? It didn’t need to become a giant website builder. It didn’t need its own CRM. It didn’t need hundreds of unrelated marketing features. It needed to solve one specific problem. That’s an important product-development lesson. Sometimes a feature doesn’t need to be part of someone else’s software. The feature can be the software.

We Look for Missing Features

Think about the software you use every day. How often have you thought: “I wish this could just do _____.” That’s interesting to us. Maybe your CRM is great, except it doesn’t automate one particular process. Maybe your ecommerce platform works well, but doesn’t present information the way you need. Maybe your website needs one specific interactive feature. Maybe your employees repeatedly export information from one platform, manipulate it somewhere else and upload it back. Maybe you use a complicated $500-per-month platform primarily for one function. Those frustrations can reveal product opportunities.

Feature → Product → Micro-SaaS

Imagine thousands of businesses have the same small problem. You build a lightweight piece of software that solves it. Then instead of developing an enormous platform, you charge: $9/month $19/month $49/month or whatever pricing makes sense for the value being delivered. Now consider the economics. 1,000 customers paying $19 per month is: $19,000 in monthly recurring revenue. 10,000 customers would represent: $190,000 in monthly recurring revenue. Not every product will achieve that scale, of course. But the principle is important: A relatively small piece of software can address a relatively large market.

Small Software Can Also Be Easier to Validate

There’s another advantage. Building less can allow you to test the core idea faster. Instead of spending a year building an enormous platform, you may be able to determine: Does the problem actually exist? How many people have it? Will they pay to solve it? What is the minimum functionality necessary? Can we integrate into the software they already use instead of replacing it? If customers respond, you can continue building. If they don’t, you’ve potentially learned that before committing significantly more capital.

You Don’t Always Need to Replace the Existing Platform

This is one of the most interesting opportunities in software. Suppose millions of people already use a major platform. You don’t necessarily need to compete with that platform. You might build something that makes the platform better. An extension. A plugin. An integration. An analytics layer. An automation. A specialized dashboard. A workflow. A missing feature. An API layer. The existing platform can potentially become part of your distribution opportunity rather than your competitor.

We Can Build Micro-SaaS for Existing Businesses Too

This thinking isn’t limited to entrepreneurs looking to start software companies. An established company might tell us: “Our employees have to do this annoying five-step process every day.” That could become a small internal application. Then we ask: Do other companies in your industry have the same problem? If they do, the internal application could potentially become a commercial micro-SaaS product. The pathway becomes: FRUSTRATION → FEATURE → SOFTWARE → INTERNAL TOOL → SaaS

Don’t Start With 100 Features

Start with the problem. What is unnecessarily difficult? What are people repeatedly doing manually? What’s missing from software they already pay for? What requires three different tools when it should require one? What do customers constantly request? What little feature would save someone 20 minutes every day? That’s where we look. Because the opportunity doesn’t always need to be: “Let’s build the next giant technology company.” Sometimes it’s: “Let’s fix this one annoying thing.” And if enough people have that same annoying problem, you may have found a business.

What’s the Feature You Wish Existed?

At Jarbly Venture Labs, we identify small software opportunities, develop the concept, determine the minimum viable product and explore whether they can become internal tools, standalone products or recurring-revenue SaaS businesses.

Tell Us the Feature You Wish Existed

Have you ever found yourself saying: “I wish there were a tool that just did this…” Tell us what “this” is. We can explore whether that missing feature should become the entire product. ONE PROBLEM → ONE FEATURE → ONE PRODUCT → RECURRING REVENUE Jarbly Venture Labs We Build Ideas Into Businesses.