Founders directory
How we list founders
The rules behind every profile in the founders directory: who gets listed, which sources count and how they are labelled, how the Build Score works, when the data was collected and how to get a profile corrected or removed.
Who gets listed
The founders directory lists people who build software products in public. A founder is listed only when all of this is true:
- They run at least one live software product with a working website.
- A public, linkable source shows at least $500 a month in recurring revenue for one of their products: MRR as reported, or ARR divided by 12. Total revenue and one-time sales are shown when sourced, but don't count toward this rule.
- The source is something anyone can open: the founder's own post or X bio, a public revenue page on TrustMRR, or a published article or interview.
Follower counts don't decide who is listed. Where we have it, a profile shows the exact follower count read from the founder's public X profile (last read November 1, 2026); it is available for every listed founder.
How revenue is shown, and the three kinds of source
Every figure is shown as it was reported, with the date it was reported, a link to the source and a label for the kind of source. We never estimate, round up or fill in revenue, and a figure without a source is never published. The kind is decided by the link itself:
- Verified by payment provider via TrustMRR: a product page on TrustMRR. TrustMRR reads the figure from the payment provider (such as Stripe) rather than taking the founder's word. 90 of the 151 figures in the directory (60%).
- Self-reported by the founder: a post or bio on the founder's own X account (or a post of theirs elsewhere). Nobody has checked these against payments. 59 figures (39%).
- Other public source: anything else, such as an article or a post by another account (TrustMRR's own X account counts here, not as a verified page). 2 figures.
Verified and self-reported figures count the same for the $500 rule and the Build Score; the label is there so you can weigh them. A source can be out of date, which is why each figure carries its own date and why corrections are quick.
What a profile contains
Only public, professional facts: name, X handle, products, country if the founder states it publicly, when they started building in public if they have said, whether they build solo, sourced revenue reports, a timeline of launches and milestones, and recent posts. The photo is the founder's public X profile picture, stored on our site; ask and we'll take it down. Summaries of posts are written by us, with a link to the original; we don't copy post text. Posts from X load only when you click to show them.
We never publish home addresses, age, family, health or anything private, even if it appears somewhere public.
How profiles are researched, and when
We find founders and their public posts with AI-assisted search, then check the sources before a profile goes live: the product site has to load and match the founder, and every revenue source has to open and show the stated figure. Claims that fail are dropped.
There is no fixed refresh schedule. Data is collected in batches, and each kind of data shows its own date instead of one "last verified" date for the whole profile. In the current data:
- X posts, timelines and self-reported figures were collected up to October 29, 2026.
- TrustMRR pages (verified revenue and sale listings) were last read on November 1, 2026. Each figure also shows when TrustMRR last synced it with the payment provider.
- Follower counts were last read on November 1, 2026.
- The newest revenue figure in the directory was reported on November 1, 2026.
Every profile lists these dates for its own data at the bottom of the page.
Verified revenue and sale listings
Affiliate relationship: Sell Micro SaaS is a TrustMRR affiliate, so links to trustmrr.com are affiliate links. It doesn't change who is listed, how the Build Score is worked out or which source a figure is labelled with; the rules on this page apply the same way to every founder.
When a product has a public TrustMRR page, we also show what that page publishes: current MRR, revenue for the last 30 days, the last 12 months and all time, active subscriptions and MRR growth. If the product is listed for sale there, we show the asking price, revenue multiple and offers from the listing. Every one of these figures links to the TrustMRR page it came from and shows when it was last synced.
Categories, followers and country
Each founder has one category for their main product. A country is shown only when the founder states it: in their bio, their posts, or an X location that names a country. A city on its own is never turned into a country, and a company's registered country is never used as the founder's. Most founders don't state one (18 of 100 do), so the country filter and country pages only appear where there are founders to show.
Which pages appear in search engines
A profile is only offered to search engines when it has at least 1 live product, 3 sourced timeline items and an evidence rating above low. Thinner profiles stay on the site but are marked noindex until they are filled in. Topic, country and revenue-band pages are only built once they have 5 founders, and the exits and "this week" pages are only indexed and linked once they have 5.
Each product has one page. A product run by two listed co-founders has a single page naming both (6 products today). Product pages stay on the site for visitors but are noindex: the founder's profile is the page offered to search engines, and it covers every product they run.
The Build Score
The Build Score ranks founders on the leaderboard. It runs from 0 to 100. Revenue, consistency, products and longevity come from the profile's public sources; evidence quality is our own rating.
| Part | Points | How it's scored |
|---|---|---|
| Reported revenue | 35 | Best sourced MRR (or ARR / 12), verified or self-reported: $50K+ = 35, $10K+ = 30, $5K+ = 24, $2K+ = 18, $500+ = 10. |
| Shipping consistency | 25 | 5 points per sourced milestone dated in the 90 days before the score is calculated (up to 15), plus 10 for 3+ posts in the profile's latest weekly snapshot of X posts or 5 for 1-2. The snapshot counts until the profile is researched again, however old it is. |
| Products | 15 | Live products with a website: 3+ = 15, 2 = 10, 1 = 5. |
| Building in public | 10 | Years since the year the founder says they started building in public: 3+ = 10, 1-2 = 5, under 1 = 2. 0 when they haven't said. |
| Evidence quality | 15 | Our editorial rating of how well the profile's sources held up when we checked them: high = 15, medium = 8, low = 0. |
- Longevity needs a year the founder has stated. Only 4 of 100 listed founders have one, so most profiles score 0 here; it doesn't mean they are new.
- Evidence quality is an editorial rating we give each profile after checking its sources (high: 77, medium: 23, low: 0). It is not a public figure and can't be checked from outside; low-rated profiles are also kept out of search engines.
- Consistency counts milestones dated in the 90 days before the score is calculated, plus the posts in the profile's latest weekly snapshot, which counts until the profile is researched again.
It measures how openly and consistently someone builds, not how good their product is. It is recalculated every time the site is rebuilt, so time-based parts change even when the data doesn't.
Claim, correct or remove a profile
If a profile is about you, use the claim, correct or remove form. Removal requests are handled within 48 hours: the profile disappears from the site, from search on the site and from the sitemap. Corrections are checked against the source you send and made by hand. After we confirm a claim through your X account, the profile shows a "Claimed by the founder" label (no profile has been claimed yet).
Selling and exits
"Listed for sale", "open to selling" and "exited" come from two kinds of public evidence, and each links to it:
- Listed for sale on TrustMRR: the product has a sale listing on TrustMRR's marketplace (25 founders).
- The founder's own post: they said in public that the product is for sale (1) or that they're open to selling (1).
- Exits: a public announcement that they sold a product (1).
These are the founders' own listings and statements elsewhere, not listings on Sell Micro SaaS, and we don't broker them. If you want to sell your own product, you can list it free on Sell Micro SaaS.