10-week live cohort - Bootstrapped SaaS founders
Build the Growth Engine Your SaaS Is Missing. You're It.
In 10 weeks: a positioning you can say in one sentence, a content channel publishing in your voice, an email list capturing demand, and a repeatable path from content to pipeline - without hiring a marketer. About 5 hours a week, with AI running the production line.
12 seats. Application only. Starts September 8, 2026.
7 figures
Bootstrapped SaaS revenue, grown on content - not paid ads or a sales team.
21K+
YouTube subscribers built from zero in about 14 months, in public.
8 years
Running the business while doing its marketing. Still in the arena.
12 seats
In the Founding Cohort. Every application read by Craig.
I've built this engine twice. The third build happens live, during the cohort.
This isn't a marketing course from a marketer. It's the exact engine I used to grow a bootstrapped SaaS to seven figures, then used again to build an audience from zero - and during the cohort, I'm running the same weekly playbook you are, on my own channels, with my numbers on the same scoreboard.
Castos
My seven-figure podcast hosting SaaS. Grown on content, SEO, and podcast distribution - the original founder-led engine, before it had a name.
@thecraighewitt
A YouTube channel built from zero to 21K+ subscribers in about 14 months, while running Castos - powered by an AI-assisted production system, not a content team.
The live lab
During the 10 weeks, I run the same weekly system on my own channel - building my Instagram from zero, in public. Same engine, different platform, because my buyers scroll a different feed than yours. You see my posts, my numbers, and my misses - every week.
Your product isn't the problem. Nobody knows you exist.
You built something people pay for. That was supposed to be the hard part. But growth is referrals and word of mouth - which means growth is luck - and every option for fixing it seems to cost money you don't have or time you can't spare.
- 01You've watched a worse product win a deal you should have won - because their founder is everywhere and you're invisible.
- 02Paid ads eat cash before they work. An agency wants $5K a month to learn your business. A marketing hire is $100K a year you would still have to manage.
- 03You've tried posting before. Six posts, no traction, quiet quit.
- 04You have strong opinions about your market that have never left your head.
- 05Marketing is permanently last on the founder to-do list, and the pipeline shows it.
- 06Every month without a channel is compounding you never get back.
"Distribution is the moat. Product is easy - distribution is hard. And the cheapest distribution a bootstrapped SaaS will ever own is the founder's own voice."
Craig Hewitt
Founder, Castos
Teaching from the operator's chair - running the same weekly playbook you are, in public, for all 10 weeks.
I bet my company on content once. It worked. Then I did it again.
I'm Craig Hewitt. I spent 8 years bootstrapping Castos, a podcast hosting SaaS, to seven-figure revenue. No ad budget. No sales team. The growth engine was content - SEO, a podcast, an audience that trusted us before they ever hit the pricing page.
Then I started over on purpose. In about 14 months I built a YouTube channel from zero to 21,000+ subscribers, while still running Castos. Not because I'm a natural on camera - because I built a system: positioning, a production line, a publishing cadence that doesn't depend on motivation.
Here is what changed since I first did this: AI collapsed the cost. The content operation that used to take a team - research, drafts, repurposing, distribution - now runs in about 5 hours a week. The playbook was always powerful. It just used to be too expensive for one person. Not anymore.
This cohort is that playbook, installed in your business. And I'm not teaching from old wins - during the 10 weeks I'm running the same weekly system myself, building a new channel from zero. My scoreboard sits right next to yours.
The Founder Channel: a five-stage engine, built in order.
This isn't 'post more.' It's a system, and the order matters. Skip positioning and the content is noise. Skip capture and your audience belongs to an algorithm. Skip conversion and it's a hobby.
Positioning
One sentence, one buyer, one enemy. The thing only you can say because you've lived it.
Channel
ONE platform, picked by where your buyers actually scroll. For most B2B SaaS founders: LinkedIn, with X as the echo. Camera not required.
Content system
An AI-powered production line in your voice - idea bank, drafting workflow, weekly batch. 3-5 posts a week at about 5 hours, sustainably.
Capture
A lead magnet and an email list, so attention becomes an asset you own instead of a feed you rent.
Conversion
A repeatable path from content to conversation to pipeline - proof posts, honest asks, and DMs that don't feel gross.
Where AI fits: inside every stage, running the production line. Never as the subject. The curriculum is positioning, distribution, and conversion - skills that outlive whatever tool is trending this month.
What Week 10 looks like
Not a strategy deck. Not a content calendar you abandon in November. A live engine with receipts: six assets, each built in a specific week of the 10-week plan below.
Where you are now
- Growth = referrals, luck, and hope
- A positioning you explain differently every time
- Posting sporadically, then quietly quitting
- No email list, or a dead one
- Strong opinions, zero distribution
- Marketing last on the founder to-do list, always
Where Week 10 leaves you
- Positioning locked - one sentence, pressure-tested
- 25+ pieces published and a cadence you've sustained for 8 straight weeks
- An AI production line documented - about 5 hours a week
- Email capture live, first subscribers on the list
- First qualified conversations booked from content
- A 90-day scaling roadmap built on your real funnel math
The six assets you walk out with
Positioning locked
Built in Week 1
A one-sentence answer to "why you," a named buyer, and a point-of-view content thesis - written down and pressure-tested by the group.
A live channel with 25+ published pieces
Live in Week 2, growing through Week 10
Not a plan to publish - a publishing habit with receipts, sustained for 8 weeks on the platform where your buyers already are.
Your AI production line, documented
Built in Week 3
Idea bank, drafting workflow in your voice, repurposing chain. The reason this costs 5 hours a week instead of 20.
Email capture, live
Built in Weeks 5 and 8
Lead magnet, landing page, and welcome sequence - with your first subscribers already on the list.
First qualified conversations from content
Booked from Week 7 on
Plus the conversion playbook that produced them - proof posts, ask cadence, DM transitions - so you can repeat it.
A 90-day scaling roadmap
Built in Weeks 9-10
What to double down on, where your funnel bottleneck is, and when YouTube or SEO earns its slot as channel #2.
Publishing starts Week 2. Not Week 5.
The #1 way founders fail at content is polishing positioning for a month and never shipping. So shipping is pulled forward and polish is deferred - on purpose. Every week has one artifact, and every call opens with the scoreboard.
The goal
Content to Pipeline
By demo day: a live channel in your voice, an owned email list, and your first qualified conversations booked from content - plus the system that makes all of it repeatable.
Phase 01
Position & Publish
Weeks 1-4. Lock the message, get live, build the machine that keeps you live.
Week 1 - Positioning
Narrow until it hurts: one sentence, a named buyer, and the 3-5 things you believe your market needs to hear.
Week 2 - Channel live
Profile rebuilt around the positioning. First 3 posts published. Imperfect is the assignment.
Week 3 - The production line
Build your AI-powered content system: voice capture, idea bank, drafting workflow. 3-5 posts a week at about 5 hours.
Week 4 - Formats & feedback
Read two weeks of real data. Pick your 2-3 core formats and double down on what lands.
Phase 02
Capture & Convert
Weeks 5-8. Turn attention into an owned list, and the list into conversations.
Week 5 - Capture
Lead magnet and landing page live. Attention starts becoming a list you own.
Week 6 - The engagement engine
Build your Target-100 - buyers, peers, amplifiers - and a daily 20-minute routine. Distribution is a contact sport.
Week 7 - Conversion
Proof posts, honest asks, and DM transitions that respect everyone involved. First qualified conversations booked.
Week 8 - Email
Welcome sequence live, first weekly send out. Your anti-algorithm insurance policy.
Phase 03
Prove & Scale
Weeks 9-10. Honest numbers, the double-down call, and demo day.
Week 9 - Funnel math
An honest dashboard: content, followers, subscribers, conversations. Find your bottleneck and make the double-down call.
Week 10 - Demo day
Present your engine and your numbers to the group. Leave with your 90-day scaling roadmap.
Designed so you ship. Not so you spectate.
Most content programs die the same death: everyone's excited for two weeks, then a busy week hits and the habit quietly ends. This program is built directly against the failure modes.
The public scoreboard
One row per founder - posts shipped, subscribers, conversations booked. Reviewed at the top of every call. It measures shipping, not virality: nobody judges small numbers, but blanks are visible.
Weekly hot-seats
12 founders max means you're in the hot-seat regularly - real feedback on your actual posts and positioning, not hiding in a webinar audience of 200.
Shipping pulled forward
You publish in Week 2, before you feel ready. The founders who fail at content are almost never the ones who shipped ugly early - they're the ones who planned beautifully forever.
The guarantee
Ship the work for 10 weeks - if you don't have a live engine and your first conversations by demo day, I coach you 1:1 until you do.
What you might be thinking
"I've tried posting before. Nothing happened."
You tried publishing without an engine - no positioning, no production system, no engagement routine. Six brave posts into the void, then silence. The order of operations is the product here.
"I don't have time to do marketing."
The production line is designed to a 5-hour weekly budget, and AI does the heavy lifting. If your engine takes 15 hours a week, we built it wrong.
"I'm not a writer, and I'm not good on camera."
Camera isn't required - the default channel is text-first. And Week 3 exists specifically to capture your voice from your own calls, docs, and opinions, so drafts sound like you instead of LinkedIn soup.
"Isn't this just personal branding?"
No. You're not building a persona - you're building a channel: an owned asset that produces pipeline. The measure of success isn't followers. It's qualified conversations with buyers.
"Why not just run ads or hire an agency?"
You can - for $5K+ a month, in someone else's voice, and it stops the day you stop paying. A founder channel costs about 5 hours a week and compounds. The worse products beating you today are winning on exactly this.
"AI content all sounds the same."
Bad AI content does - it's drafted from nothing, in nobody's voice. Yours gets drafted from your transcripts, your opinions, and your receipts. AI runs the production line. You stay the point of view.
A small room of SaaS founders who will actually ship
The Founding Cohort is deliberately narrow: bootstrapped SaaS founders, application only. Dense hot-seats beat broad ones.
This is for you if
- You're a bootstrapped SaaS founder doing roughly $100K-$2M ARR.
- You are the marketing department - and you know it's not working.
- You have opinions about your space you've never published.
- You can commit about 5 hours a week for 10 weeks, publishing under your own name.
- You've watched founder-led companies win deals you should have won.
This is not for you if
- You're pre-revenue. Build the product first.
- You have a real marketing team already. You need a different program.
- You want done-for-you content. The engine only works in your voice.
- You want to stay anonymous. A founder channel requires the founder.
Founding Cohort pricing
The founding price is $2,000 because you're the case studies - a documented case study (with your sign-off) is part of the deal. Cohort 2 runs at $3,500 with your receipts on this page. This is the lowest this program will ever be.
Founding Cohort
The full 10-week engine build, live with Craig.
$2,000
one-time - founding cohort only
- 10 weekly live calls: scoreboard, teaching, hot-seats
- The full five-stage engine build, Weeks 1-10
- The AI production line: templates, workflows, and voice-capture system
- Public scoreboard and weekly accountability
- Private cohort group for async feedback between calls
- Demo day + your 90-day scaling roadmap
- Founding-member case study agreement (why the price is this low)
The guarantee, plainly: ship the work for 10 weeks - if you don't have a live engine and your first qualified conversations by demo day, I coach you 1:1 until you do. What I won't promise is a revenue number. Audiences compound on a 6-18 month curve; what you build here is the engine, running, with first proof.
Everything else you're wondering
What's the time commitment?+
About 5 hours a week: the 60-minute call, a daily 20-minute engagement routine, and your weekly content batch. The production line gets built in Week 3 specifically to keep it at 5 hours instead of 20.
Which platform will I build on?+
One channel, chosen in Week 1 based on where your buyers are. For most B2B SaaS founders that's LinkedIn, often paired with X. YouTube and SEO are taught as your post-program second channel - they compound too slowly to produce conversations inside 10 weeks, and I'd rather be honest about that than sell you a promise the calendar can't keep.
Do I need to be on camera?+
No. The default channel is text-first. If you want to add video later, the positioning and production system transfer directly - that becomes a channel #2 conversation in your 90-day roadmap.
Is this an AI program?+
No, and that's deliberate. AI runs the production line inside the engine - drafting, repurposing, research - and we build that system together in Week 3. But the curriculum is positioning, distribution, and conversion: skills that will outlive whatever tool is trending this month.
My SaaS is product-led. What does "qualified conversations" mean for me?+
We define your conversion event in Week 7 based on your motion: demos booked for sales-led, trials and activations attributable to content for product-led. The engine is the same; the last mile is yours.
What if I'm not a SaaS founder?+
The Founding Cohort is SaaS founders - it keeps the hot-seats dense and the examples relevant. If you're adjacent (productized services, dev tools), apply and say so. I read every application.
Is it live or self-paced?+
Live. One 60-minute call a week for 10 weeks, recorded if you miss one. But the value is the rhythm and the room - this is group coaching, not a course.
When does it start?+
The Founding Cohort starts September 8, 2026 and runs through demo day on November 13 - done before Thanksgiving. Applications close September 4 or when 12 seats fill.
Stop being the best-kept secret in your market.
The Founding Cohort is 12 SaaS founders, application only. The form takes about 5 minutes - it asks about your business, how customers find you today, and one opinion you hold that most of your market would push back on. That last question matters most.
I read every application myself.