Startup Canvas: SaleHay

Part 1: Product Strategy

1. Vision To become the default infrastructure for B2B performance marketing and affiliate management in Southeast Asia, turning every business's customer base into a scalable sales force.

2. Market Segments

• Segment 1: SME/Mid-Market Brands (Retail, Education, SaaS, Clinics, B2B Services)
  • JTBD (Jobs-to-be-Done): Scale sales without paying unpredictable, high upfront ad costs; manage hundreds of collaborators (CTV) easily and transparently.
• Segment 2: Affiliate Partners / KOCs / CTV
  • JTBD: Find reliable, high-commission products/services to promote; get paid accurately and on time without disputes.
• First segment breakdown: Focus on high-ticket service sectors (Clinics, Real Estate, B2B SaaS) because they suffer from the highest CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost) on traditional ad platforms and have high LTV (Lifetime Value).

3. Relative Costs

• Value-Driven System: SaleHay optimizes for unique value—comprehensive last-touch tracking, automated multi-tier payouts, and white-label ORG portals—rather than competing purely on price. It is positioned as an enterprise-grade growth engine that is accessible to SMEs.

4. Value Proposition

• For Brands (ORGs):
  • What before: Manual tracking via Excel, disputed payouts, high CAC from Facebook/Google Ads.
  • How: Automated tracking (Pixel/CAPI/Cookies), structured Payout Batches, native Affiliate Portal.
  • What after: Predictable CPA (Cost Per Action), a scalable private affiliate network, zero manual reconciliation.
  • Alternatives: Traditional Affiliate Networks (e.g., Accesstrade, which takes a massive cut and owns the affiliates), manual tracking (slow and error-prone), or generic SaaS (PostAffiliatePro, which is hard to use and not localized). Our unique value: Localized for VN/SEA workflows, native private ORG portals, and a transparent SaaS pricing model.

5. Trade-offs

• We will NOT build an open marketplace where Affiliates can see all brands at once. We build infrastructure for brands to own their private affiliate networks.
• We will NOT focus on B2C low-ticket e-commerce dropshipping. We focus on high-LTV sectors where relationship-driven referrals matter.

6. Key Metrics

• North Star Metric: Total GMV (Gross Merchandise Value) driven through Affiliate Links.
• OMTM (This Quarter): Number of Active Referrals (successful conversions) per Active ORG.

7. Growth

• Product-Led Growth (Virality): ORGs invite their best customers to become Affiliates. Affiliates share links to End Users. The SaleHay branding on the affiliate portal naturally attracts other business owners to set up their own ORG portal.
• Sales-Led Growth: Direct outbound/inbound marketing to high-LTV industry clusters.

8. Capabilities

• Deep technical expertise in high-accuracy tracking (Cross-device, CAPI, Server-side tracking).
• Advanced payment batching and database transaction logic.
• UI/UX excellence for both Admin (Brand) and Affiliate portals.

9. Can't/Won't (Defensibility)

• Existing Affiliate Networks (Accesstrade, Ecomobi) won't pivot to this model because it cannibalizes their marketplace business model (they want to own the network, not give it to the brand).
• Generic global SaaS tools can't easily replicate the deep localization, familiar UI/UX patterns, and local payout structures needed in the SEA market.

Part 2: Business Model

10. Cost Structure

• Cloud Infrastructure: Serverless architecture, Edge networks, Vector databases.
• R&D & Engineering: Core tracking engine, security, API development.
• GTM & Customer Success: Onboarding high-value ORGs and ensuring they launch their affiliate programs successfully.
• Scalability: Serverless architecture ensures infrastructure scales linearly and profitably with usage.

11. Revenue Streams

• SaaS Subscription (Core): Tiered monthly/annual fees for ORGs to use the platform (B2B SaaS model based on features or active affiliates).
• Transaction/Volume Fee (Future Expansion): Small percentage on successful payouts processed directly through the platform's API gateways.

Validation & Next Steps

• Hypothesis 1: Brands are experiencing ad-fatigue and are willing to pay a SaaS fee to own their private affiliate network rather than giving up 20-30% to public affiliate marketplaces.
• Experiment 1: Pitch the private-network concept to 10 current agency/clinic founders and track conversion to beta usage.