SaaS Strategists,

Many of you overthink what goes into building and launching a successful app or a platform.

Building, securing, launching, marketing, analytics, SEO, content…

And all your efforts still might go down the drain.

So you don’t even start. I know the feeling since I’ve been there.

What if I told you that you can leverage an existing audience from day 1?

Today, I’ll give you 7 platforms you can build FOR, so you don’t start big, but rather small and build your way up.

Let’s dive right in. 👇

The most underrated SaaS growth channel in 2026 isn’t SEO, GEO, or ads.

It’s App Marketplaces. 🛍️

Let me explain:

I started using Grammarly after discovering their Chrome extension.
I started using Typeform after stumbling on their Slack integration.

I didn't visit their homepage first.

I found them while working inside another tool.

This is the most underrated growth channel in SaaS right now.

Here are 7 marketplaces you should be building for in 2026:

138,000+ extensions are available, but most have fewer than 1,000 users.

That's your opportunity.

Build a lightweight extension that solves one specific problem, and you're discoverable the moment someone searches for a solution.

Don’t start by building a full-on SaaS right away and trying to grow through SEO.

Just leverage where the users actually are.

This is how I started using Grammarly.

Clearbit tracked their Zapier users and found they churn 20% less than average.

Getting listed means appearing in searches alongside every tool your customers already use.

One integration = thousands of landing pages working for you.

People spend 90+ minutes per day inside Slack.

When your product lives where people work, adoption becomes frictionless.

Your app becomes part of their workflow, not another tab to remember.

The open-source automation space is exploding.

n8n's & Make’s community is one of the most active in automation, with developers building custom nodes and templates every month.

If you want to reach technical users and power builders, this is where they live.

I’ve recently shared my Claude skills library for founders.

It got 165 stars on GitHub, and it’s the #1 Google result when people search “founder skills”. 🌟

My viral-hook-creator skill alone has 562 installs, not counting 15 others.

I simply leveraged the Claude skills marketplace and created skills for AI that boost productivity and help founders market their products better.

Skills.sh or Clawhub.ai are trending right now, and you can catch it while it’s still hot! 🔥

$30 million+ in marketplace transactions annually.

Most SaaS founders think GitHub is "just for developers."

Wrong.

DevOps, security tools, project management, documentation are all discovered here.

If your tool touches any part of the developer workflow, you're missing out.

This one's a sleeper hit.

Raycast is a productivity launcher replacing Spotlight on Mac, and it’s growing exponentially.

You can build an app for it and instantly jump off, as they only have around ~2,000 extensions at the moment.

And the best thing is - Almost nobody is building for this marketplace yet compared to Chrome or Zapier.

All of these tools do the marketing for you.

It goes to their advantage if you’re building for their platform, and if the users are using your extension on their platform as well.

It’s a win-win scenario.

The formula for winning user acquisition in 2026 isn’t digging where everyone else is, it’s finding a completely new goldmine. 💎

And I’ve just helped you find it.

The next time you try to build a new startup, consider building a plugin, an extension or an app instead.

I’ll catch you in the next one.

Ognjen Gatalo

Chief SaaS Strategist ☁