Hey Michael, awesome piece! When I started my first company [that made serious revenue relative to other projects], I didn't spend any money until we actually had sales. Getting to product-market fit took awhile for us, as growing the brand and reputation just took time, but now it's an awesome machine that churns well with some spurts of oil here and there.

I think you're spot on with the half-baked, v1, imperfect solution. Currently trying to do the same with a new startup (https://getbeau.com). Our v1 didn't do it for us, but we listened to the recurring feedback and just relaunched our v2 and are continuing to validate that the problem we solve for our customers is a serious (albeit first-world) problem.